> bureaucracy

I wouldn't call it bureaucracy, but I don't know of a proper, better name. Hysteria maybe. Not sure.

Bureaucracy is often the result of hysteria. The USA is hysterical over terrorism when it should be hysterical over cancer, college cost increases, and health care. It's all a product of the government realizing that it's easy to fool the bleating masses with terrorist straw men.

It's not only the government, the media is very much a contributing factor too. One small terrorist attack yields multiple days of coverage and exposure. Terrorism is given an extremely outsized portion of coverage on the news and as a result people think it's a much bigger problem than it actually is. But it's an extremely convenient cover for taking away people's rights and spending even more money on the military.

I've posted this before in another thread, but after 2001, less Americans have been killed by terrorists per year than have been killed by lightning. And yet think of all the money and attention that have been devoted to something more dangerous than slipping in the bathtub, and the rights "we" willingly gave up for that. It makes 0 sense

Based on the definition of bureaucracy [1] I disagree with you. I do think the tail is wagging the dog in American politics these days but I do not think bureaucracy is the reason. I actually think the bureaucratic parts of our government work quite well. Examples being the National Park Service or NASA.

I think the real problem is that our elected representatives (politicians) are so concerned with reelection that they manipulate their constituents rather than acting as representatives. It's more of an electoral problem.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bureaucracy

Oppression is a good start.

There are a lot of people who call this "due diligence." Receiving permission to visit a country is a privilege, not a right. This trend of wanting better data before making decisions is the natural result of there being better data available on which to make it. Banks, loan officers, job offerers, and now nation states are each equally right in taking advantage of whatever you've chosen to put out there in public. I personally have no problem with this, and to the contrary would call to account institutions that make decisions without considering the data.

> Receiving permission to visit a country is a privilege, not a right.

It shouldn't be.

All border checks should be abolished. All passports should be abolished. Free people in the world should be able to travel between countries freely, and without having to justify themselves or ask permission, just as they can travel between cities within a country freely.

And if 30,000 camouflaged, balaclava-clad Russian speakers happen to cross the border from Russia to Ukraine, they're just exercising their right as free people :)

Seriously though, it depends on what responsibilities you think the government has towards the people. If a country with high taxes and generous public services bordered a country with low taxes and minimal public services, you can see why problems could arise if people could cross between at will.

What happens if 30,000 camouflaged, balaclava-clad Russian speakers happen to travel from Moscow to St. Petersburg?

I don't see the problem.

If they start shooting at people, then that's a crime and you should arrest them for that, regardless of whether you had any border checks.

And even if you do have border checks, if 30,000 people storm your border at once, a handful of guys with truncheons and paper forms aren't going to be much of a deterrent.

I agree! Also, let's take it a step further and abolish all door locks as well! Free people of the world should not have to ask permission to enter a house!

I'm not saying it's OK to go in arbitrary people's houses without permission. I'm saying it should be OK to go in arbitrary public places without permission.

It's a shame the gdpr won't apply to nation states.

Xenophobia?

Happens already with visa fees. I believe one of the reasons Americans need to purchase Indian visas in advance is because Indians must do so to enter America.

Ya, China will start asking all of us Americans for our WeChat IDs (they would ask for Twitter and Facebook also, but those are blocked).

I agree, this is very obviously a policy area where the US should be leading (or at least not setting new negative standards).

It's curious though, as the popular thing to claim today is that China is obviously the future. They're going to supposedly dominate everything, from AI to robotics to insert-tech-thing-here.

Article after article proclaimed that China would take advantage of Trump's immigration policies to do a massive global talent grab.

So what happened to that fraudulent premise? There are almost zero human rights in China. The few they had acquired, have increasingly been stripped back away.

So this social media grab is a massive problem for the US. Having zero rights in China means they're going to acquire all the world's talent and dominate the universe. Something certainly doesn't make sense in the storyline.

And when the capitalists, (elite, the 1%) see how good the cpc has it, that they can milk everyone else, they will try the same here. I call for economic and miltary containment of China.