>>>>>Can you update me... since when is the US a free country ??
>>>>
>>>>The country per se is free, and so is the air in it. Everything else, you pay.
>>>
>>>My point is, as outlined before, is that the term "Free" is very subjective. What does freedom mean? The trend i've seen the last couple of years is that freedom is increasingly under pressure, esspecially under the "Patriot Act".
>>>
>>
>>You may be confusing freedom and privacy. Privacy is under attack, I agree with you there. But we (Americans) are still free to do or say about anything we want to.
>
>Ok, go to a public library and start picking books written by Marx et al, if you can find any.
>
>Start a public debate about "why don't we have any atheists elected to high positions".
>
>Try to have zero contact with the banks.
>
>Try to do any transaction over $1000 without a middleman.


The works of Karl Marx and others who did not espouse "the American way" are readily available. We are free to read, write, and say whatever we choose, even if they are not popular views.

I don't know what you mean about having to do transactions over $1000 with a middleman. Maybe you're right. The only transactions of that magnitude I have had have been mortgage payments and car payments, plus one charitable contribution. In those cases I have dealt with financial entities, which I suppose are middlemen.

You reminded me of a funny conversation with the comment about banks. One evening at swim practice the mom of a boy who was on the swim team with my younger daughter told a story about a neighbor of hers who didn't trust banks. She said the woman kept all her savings, cold hard cash, in her house. Her house was robbed and the robber walked out with her life savings. Pat asked her she could have been so dumb and her neighbor said she liked to know where her money was. "You don't know where it is now, do you?" Pat said. LOL