Mike
Why is it a non-sequitur? You're all worked up about perceived "freedoms" when you live in one of the most free countries on earth. Maybe you need to go somewhere to try a bit of starvation to see whether your current wounds are as deep as you say and whether you might expend your energy worrying about something a bit more soluble.
JR
"... They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."
-- Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, scene 1