Originally posted by: Obi Jeewhyen
Perhaps if our government was the totalitarian regime it aspires to, I would not hold myself or my countrymen responsible for its actions.

I wish you knew what a totalitarian regime was really like. Then you would not compare America to one. All you know is that it is not a good thing, and you don't feel the American government is a good thing, so in your mind they might as well be the same. America is the complete opposite of everything any totalitarian state would stand for. Where my wife is from, when she was little she was always told that she lived in the most prosperous country in the world. They would tell everyone how poor America was and how America wanted to invade them. All the people knew how much the Americans and the Russians lusted after their country, but they didn't fear too much. After all, they were the most powerful nation in the world. They would liken America to a cartoon tiger, it didn't realize it was a cartoon, America thought it was the real thing. It went around growling and snarling, threatening everyone, while it was really completely harmless. Everybody laughed at the idea of a cartoon tiger running around making threats, when in reality it was just a colourful little kitten. In the morning you would stand in line to get your milk ration, at some point, without fail the milk would run out. When this happened nobody would say, "Hey, the milk is out, everybody just go home. Better luck tomorrow." No. You knew the milk was out, you saw people walking away empty handed. But you didn't say anything. If you did any number of things could happen to you, but none of them would be pleasant. No. You waited in line, once you got to the front of the cue they would tell you the milk was out, and wish you better luck tomorrow. Then, you would go home. To say the milk was out and to leave the cue before getting to the front would be to admit that there was a problem, a milk shortage. But in your society there are never any problems. Never. Your society is perfect!
This is what it means to live in a totalitarian state. I am not saying that America could not one day succumb to such a regime. If it did, it would be a very long ways off, and some very large changes in the way we think would have to take place first. To say America aspires to be totalitarian is the sheerest of ignorance. I take it George Orwell is no longer required reading in American High Schools? That is truly a shame.

"Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows." - Nineteen Eighty-Four.