"in these socialist countries can a person go to a sporting goods store (if there are any), or any store and purchase a gun for personal or hunting activities." - yes they can, assuming they have a gun licence, some even have alot of guns, eg, Finland, which I assume you would classify as a socialist country, has 3rd highest level of private firearms ownership in the world.

"yes they can, assuming they have a gun licence, some even have alot of guns, eg, Finland, which I assume you would classify as a socialist country, has 3rd highest level of private firearms ownership in the world."

i would call the USA a socialist country, so your point is moot on me.

"So, you're in favour of allowing nazism and racism, avogadro?"

im merely pointing out if you dont have the choice to be a racist or nazi in your country, thats one less freedom. if you want to discuss whether a government allowing their people to have certain destructive beleifs like racism is a good thing, then we should probably start a new thread.

"You are right to distrust your government though, with a turnip like George Bush leading the state, I'd be frightened even.. The thing is that USA doesn't have any alternatives, you either vote Democrat, or Republican. If some government screws up over here, they lose a terrible amount of votes to another party. In America, on the other hand, people, at best, vote for the only alternative; or, after a few desillusions, stop voting. The result is that the 2 parties that dominate the political area can do pretty much whatever they want.."

imho i think other countries' larger selection of political parties just provide a more intricate way of disguising this exact thing.

avogadro: "i was referring to wfs's post where he defends restriction on racism/nazism in Scandinavian countries. if yours doesnt restrict racism /nazism then i apologize for being mislead by another poster to believe it does."

yes, as i understand it, you were saying "the claim that Scandinavian countries have more rights is ludicrous." , you were making a comparison between rights in scandinavian countries and the US, so what are these restrictions on rights that are in Scandinavian countries that are not present in the US?  this is a straight question, not an argumentative one, i'm intrigued to know more specifically what additional freedoms i would have in the US compared to any Scandinavian country.

"well, i wasn't posting to anything you had written so it doesn't surprise that it could be moot point for you."

sorry about that, i didnt realise anyone was actually going to bother to respond to johnwayne

"you were making a comparison between rights in scandinavian countries and the US, so what are these restrictions on rights that are in Scandinavian countries that are not present in the US?  this is a straight question, not an argumentative one, i'm intrigued to know more specifically what additional freedoms i would have in the US compared to any Scandinavian country."

ok, the US has smaller taxes which means americans have greater freedom to spend the money they earn the way they want to.  we have better religious freedom if its true that you're not allowed to be racist or a nazi in your country. we have more freedom with guns.  are the ones that come off the top off my head, could probably find more.

> SuperNolio Brothers wrote:

> umm, because anybody who said how long is a liar. Common sense tells anybody that to pull out of Iraq immediately would only weaken the U.S economy wise. Obama wants to stop fighting but realizes the importance of keeping some troops in Iraq right now. Bush screwed us up for the next 15 years.

Think about it,

Me and Piggy are on the north side of town playing in our back yard when our neighbor decides he wants to throw rocks at us. He won't stop. We'll call him Decimus. He says the only way he'll stop is if we give him some apples off our tree. We give him apples, he wants plums. We give him plums, he wants mangoes. etc. etc.

Joe4444 on the south side of town decides to help. He beats up Decimus and decimus moves away. As a result, 2 neighbors next to piggy and I begin to throw rocks AND sticks at us. The reason they didn't before is because Deci ruled with an iron fist. So those 2 neighbors, DPS and Zarf now have a chance to fight us as well as each other for our fruit.

Now Joe decides "hey, I didn't know this was gonna happen. Good luck" and runs away. As a result, me and piggy are getting our asses kicked.

Basically, it's Joe's fault why we are in this mess. That's how me and piggy look at it. If joe doesn't stick around to fix it, he's not getting any of our apples, oranges, plums, etc.

This is how our situation is more or less. No candidate can give an accurate solution to anything right now. Health care, economy, jobs, etc. Obama offers ideas that aren't guaranteed but they aren't impossible and are at least a start. McCain is a liar. If he says he has solutions he's bs'ing you. Hillary is so inconsistent that she can't keep the same stance for more than 7 days. Obama's problem is that he doesn't have experience so everyone's against him.

In the end you just have to vote for whomever you think is going to give the nation the best shot for the next president to build on and grow. These candidates can't fix what bush f'd up.

I firmly believe in Nolio's answer. He's got my vote!

avogadro: "ok, the US has smaller taxes which means americans have greater freedom to spend the money they earn the way they want to."

I'm sure the US has smaller taxes than all Scandinavian countries, I suspect that US has higher taxes than the UK or Australia at the moment, I think that most people in Scandinavia are expecting alot more services to be provided by the state, that obviously means tax rates will be higher.  Anyway, as I said before, I think it's a poor comparison to make, between, eg, Sweden and the US, can you really compare a country with population of 9 million or so to a country with population of 300 million or so, in terms of what state needs to collect in taxation...

"we have better religious freedom if its true that you're not allowed to be racist or a nazi in your country."

Neither racism nor nazism are religions, so there is no issue about religious freedom in what you are saying.  Racism and nazism are not illegal, certain aspects associated with both racism and nazism are illegal, eg, you could not walk around saying "Kill [tree]s, kill jews", this would be considered the promotion of hate crimes.  You could happily say, coloured immigrants weaken our country, we would like them sent back to Nigeria, etc.

"we have more freedom with guns." - what does this actually mean?  Where I am living, firearms restrictions are pretty much in line with what public opinion is, with respect to their availability and use, is freedom about having wider selection of firearms available?  In terms of volume, there is a very high per capita level of gun ownership in, eg, Sweden, and, not Scandinavia, but close enough, Finland.

For all the points you list, I could list other ones, eg, as an employer, there would never be any chances of action being taken against me for not hiring minorities in large enough numbers, so I am more free as an employer in Scandinavia, ...I could continue, but I am going to bed.  Only thing I'm trying to say is, some things are more free in one place, and other things are more free in another place.

"first of all, the vast majority of prisoners arent murderers or rapists in the US."

Even so, the vast majority of violent crimes (forget rape - it's not really possible for women to commit it) are commited by men, so my gender point still stands

"Probably the most common would be drug use."

Substance abuse is a sin and frowned upon by the church

"if you murder and repent you're a saint."

No, you're not. Anyway, repenting is hardly what the average prisoner does. I find it hard to believe top security prisons are fully of repenting happy, loving, holy people eager to spread the love of their new-born faith.

"
You're wrong about the wages avogadro. Scandinavians are indeed heavily taxed, but it's a redistribution of the income, so a large part comes back to you (with the bonus that you have a health insurance. Of course you can argue that being free to get one or not is a freedom as well tongue). "

i dont deny that you are heavily taxed, and i dont deny that you benefit from the taxes through systems like healthcare, but the fact that your government forces you to give them more of your money then the american government does to its citizens means that americans have more freedom with how they spend their money.

"About guns, again, you can get guns, but not straight away, and no war machines. Is that a reduced freedom on guns? Perhaps, but I don't see how this is a bad thing. After all, you have the right to live too, and I don't think we all should have a war machine gun in our houses. Order is to be kept by the police, not by a bunch of cowboys..
"

this discussion was never about which system is better; whether its better to have looser gun control laws or not is not relavent to the topic, the topic is freedoms that americans enjoy compared to freedoms Scandinavian countries enjoys, and americans enjoy greater freedom with guns.

"Then I have to ask you how racism/nazism is related to religion"

religion is a system of beleifs, so is racism. one could allow racism to be their religion.

"Still, I think your reduced right on privacy is worse... tongue"

maybe it is worse, but thats not what i was arguing against, i was arguing that americans dont have less freedoms.

"That's not even an argument. How exactly does that work, if I may be so bold?"

i think the fact that you cant tell is proof enough of its effectiveness.

"i know nobody likes me or my post, i do have a sick way of looking at things, but that is me.

i have come to realize in my years that an opinion is an opinion nothing more, because people, always(or most of the time) base their opinion on their experiences. As we all come from different parts of the world, we all have different views, which are a good thing.

Our cultures that we grew up in or are growing up in, will dictate for us what are opinions are, whether you believe this or not is your choice.

This would definitively be a boring world if we all had the same opinion"

dont kid yourself; you're not unpopular because of your view of things. in these forums we have people of every extreme, nothing you say could shock us.

you're unpopular because you act like a kid. you show a lack of respect to other forum posters and 99% of your posts are spam. and what little isnt spam, this quote being the only piece i've found yet, is nothing new and indicates that you havent matured in your perception of the world yet.

in short, shut up and grow up.

check: are we still ontopic here ?
*hands out popcorn