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>> the US still manages to exert power over its populace

Self-oppression. For all the fearmongering, the US population is clearly able to install random people into high office and rewrite the rules as they see fit. Both Obama and Trump are clear evidence that you don't need to be from established political families to gain power. Literally any idiot can be elected should the people want them. Many are.

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Another indicator is the rate of citizen un prisons. The laws on gun ownership doesn't prevent the US government to have high rate of citizens incarcerated [1]. On the other hand, US is a state of law, and in theory, US incarceration does not come from oppression but from justice and written laws [2]. Now even though gun ownership might be one way to garanty that US remains a state of law, it is not obvious that it is the only way. If US was not a state of law, I would not be comfortable that GAFAM companies gets their own armies, as in the funny dystopian novel Jenifer Government [3].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera...

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat

[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Government

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