HK is land of the free

Good opinion piece comparing Hong Kong and USA, violence and free press.

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/stdn/std/Opinion/GB24Df01.html

Two shooting incidents within a month have Asia's world city in an uproar. Gun violence rarely occurs here. New York, America's world city, had 3,286 major felonies last year just in its subway system. In the United States easy availability of guns encourages crime and makes murder an almost expected accompaniment of mugging or rape.

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Now, astonishingly, growing evidence indicates even freedom of the press is also healthier in Tung Chee-hwa's ``communist''-run Hong Kong than in Bush's United States.For the sixth time the Bush White House has been caught either buying the services of, or outright faking, journalism.

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Perhaps we should offer the Statue of Liberty a new spot at Green Island, just outside the harbor. That bearer of freedom's torch would feel both safer and freer here.