zlacker

>>amarch+(OP)
Is there a public conversation in European countries about the value of liberty? I don't mean arguments about how liberty can lead to more economic prosperity, I mean how liberty is valuable on its own terms.

Without this value, the state can continue to erect legislation in the name of "safety", or any other perceived inequity in society, until you can no longer move.

How perverse that English law used to be a bastion of civil liberty protections. Here's a great scene from A Man For All Seasons that shows what I mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDBiLT3LASk

>>liampu+ml3
In the EU we have different liberties to the US. That doesn't necessarily make Europeans less free. For example, wlthe EU has free movement of goods, capital, services, and people across borders. None of which are present in the USA. Does that make Americans less free than Europeans? Some would argue so, but I don't see it.

The UK however, maybe. Brexit was a real dumb idea.

>>Stevvo+om3
Huh? The US has all of that. You can move freely between states.

>>CalRob+8p3
Internal movement doesn't count. Only a real hell-hole like North Korea will prevent you moving around in your own country.

>>Stevvo+hs3
The US economy is about 1.5 times larger than the entire EU.

The US is over 2 times larger by land.

Population is about a quarter smaller. Still, Massachusetts has more people than Denmark, New York has the same as Romania, California has more people than Poland.

Our original founding documents cite "these united states", interestingly and very tellingly "these", not "the." States are their own entities, and you'd find many to have very different cultures and laws — probably the same level of variance you'd find in the EU.