[mpyne]

But on the other hand, making the U.S. congruent to every despotic state tends to cheapen the sacrifice of those who actually had to live (and die) under those despots, instead of sipping a venti espresso at Starbucks while typing away on their MacBook Pro.

[veidr]

Some people sip espressos in North Korea, too.

Meanwhile, we (Americans) have more people living in cages than North Korea, China, Iran, and Vietnam combined. Most of them citizens, incarcerated after being subjected to extremely dubious trials for crimes related to drugs -- and whoops, look at today's latest headline: Drug Agents Use Vast Phone Trove Eclipsing N.S.A.’s

Relatively free states slide morph into corrupt police states precisely when the people sipping coffee with their luxury computers refuse to notice it happening.

[mpyne]

> Relatively free states slide morph into corrupt police states precisely when the people sipping coffee with their luxury computers refuse to notice it

That's... at least mildly pretentious. What social ills are the brave bands of roving latté-sippers going to save the country from next? Anyways, history has shown that despots don't have to care about what the intelligentsia thinks.

[veidr]

Urrrgh, for fuck's sake: are you gonna make me trot out the 'First they came for the...' cliché (which like all good clichés is totally on point)?

Obviously, despots don't care what the intelligentsia or anybody else with < despot power thinks. But in a high-functioning democracy, it is only through the apathy or willful ignorance (or freaky racism / nationalism) of the citizenry that you get despots in the first place. We're not there yet, but are obviously on that path.

I assume you're caucasian and rarely have your luxury car searched at traffic stops, or your electronic devices searched at border crossings? Me too. Yay for us.

[mpyne]

> are you gonna make me trot out the 'First they came for the...' cliché (which like all good clichés is totally on point)?

And also like any good cliché, says more than it really says. For instance, that there is no permissible reason for government to go after anyone since it logically follows that if we let government go after Party A, they are that much closer to going after Party B.

For that reason, instead of living my life by clichés, I try to evaluate each situation on its own merits.

> I assume you're caucasian and rarely have your luxury car searched at traffic stops, or your electronic devices searched at border crossings?

Caucasian, yes.

'Luxury' car, no. Unless the MP3 player is a luxury nowadays. It doesn't get searched at traffic stops, but that is probably because I've not run across a traffic checkpoint in years.

Maybe I should go visit the despotic America though, so that I can find out what a traffic stop is like? Where would I find that, as I've been all over the East Coast and have had no success yet in finding it.