[dang]

This comment is heading dangerously down a generic ideological tangent, which usually means yet another tedious flamewar. I'm tempted to detach it and mark it off-topic, but will hold off.

In general on HN, it's better to keep one's comments anchored in something specific about the original story than to go off into provocative generalization. There's nearly always an ideological agenda behind the latter, and those are of interest to no one except holders of the same agenda and its opposite.