"Everyone wants to tell you what to do and what's good for you. They don't want you to find your own answers, they want you to believe theirs." -Socrates

The United States of America. Land of the free, home of the brave.

Before I dive into the controversial issue I am going to talk about, I would like to say a few things.

A) I love the United States and want to see it prosper.

B) I am not a 'Socialist Liberal' who needs to learn what the Real World is really like.

If you were to ask someone now-a-days what they thought when they heard the acronym, USA, and they were from the United States, they would most likely say, 'The strongest nation in the World! The land of the free!'

Okay, let's diagnose what was just said here. The strongest nation in the world? Okay, this is a very fair statement. We have the largest standing army, the largest amount of nuclear devices. But we also spend over $600 Billion on paid for defense, and security related international activities. So yeah, we had better be the strongest nation in the world military wise, because that is an ABSURD amount of money to spend on defense. That is also considering our National Debt is almost 20 Trillion American Dollars. But yeah nobody will ever make us pay that because we're so STRONG, remember? And before anyone tries to ask where I got this, I will add the citation. (http://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-budget)

Next. The Land of the free. Oh isn't that a quaint little phrase to bring on the tears. I dare you to walk down the street naked with a sign on that reads, 'I'm free so I can do what I want.'

I mean honestly though, have you really ever thought about that? How free are you really? Here's a little secret for you. And I'm going to lay this out there reaaaaaal simple for you. You are as free as the government sees safe. If that was too confusing, let me reword it, you are only as free as the government ALLOWS you to be.

'That's a line of crap. You're a USA hating piece of garbage.'

One phrase, buddy, Patriot Act.

Or another, NSA Surveillance Act.

If you don't believe me, go ahead and start a thread of emails that involves the United States and something somewhat malicious about them. See how long it takes you to be contacted. You could sneeze and get put on a terrorist watch list.

We chose, or I should say, our government chose that we were going to sacrifice our 'Freedoms' given to us in a beautiful little document called, 'The Bill of Rights'. Which if you say this to any politician now-a-days you'd probably get a little chuckle. Our government, and the Supreme Court, have been altering and changing our Founding Father's work, the documents that our troops die defending every single day, all for the sake of adding more power for the things they see fit.

When is the last time that you have felt that your vote actually counted for something? We live in a society where our governing force is considered a Republic. A representative government where the officials who run the government are elected by the people, and supposedly, for the people. Well, it's really starting to look like our Republic is turning into an Oligarchy. Which, for those of you who do not know, is 'a small group of people having control of a country, organization, or institution.' They are also usually very wealthy.

Does that sound familiar at all?

The Bush family. You know the two were President, the other one ran for President and is the governor of Florida (1999-2007).

Our two front running candidates are Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton.

One is an incredibly wealthy business man, and the other is the wife of a former US President who is subsequently also incredibly wealthy.

I don't really know what else to say. Maybe what I should say that we are socially conditioned to believe that our country isn't crumbling around our feet. Because if we really knew the extent of the corruption and the terrible things that are happening, we might be apt to do something about it. But the longer you are in the dark about these things, the longer they can keep you believing that they are doing things in YOURinterest.

I'm probably just an idiot who doesn't know what he's talking about. But I would encourage you, do some research. Study our government and learn what our TRUE foundations are and where they came from. And when you realize where we came from, what we were originally based on, you will realize just how far off course we really are.