The US is one of the most barbarous countries on Earth. Sure, there are worse – places that execute citizens in what amounts to Hammurrabi’s code – but we pretend to be an advanced democratic republic. Briefly, let’s jump down that rathole: in principle the United States is a state organized along the lines of State Legitimacy, i.e.: a social contract in which the state is allowed to enforce certain things on an otherwise independent populace, in return for the populace expecting certain things from the state. What sort of things might those be? A social safety net? Health care? Minimal pointless wars? The right of the citizen to be secure in their possessions and pursuit of happiness? Being cruelly put to death when the state follows its “due process” and eventually decides its time?
