alt Hacker NewsIt boggles my mind that you think this stuff is being pushed by the right. Expansion of government and surveillance is a hallmark of the left, and indeed this latest wave of surveillance is being pushed by progressive governments in Western Europe and Australia.
Governments of both flavours are ignoring the voting public, for various reasons, e.g. they are signatory to agreements that no longer work for the public but are difficult to break, the public is increasingly economically irrelevant compared to businesses, and, of course, the greedy self-interest of the politicians themselves.
I agree with you on the third paragraph, but it's also the reason that I believe the US will be okay compared to other Western democracies (an opinion I'm not sure you would share, judging by your post). The Constitution is already a thing, and is on its own a declaration that certain rights derive from a higher authority than government. The second amendment in particular is under siege (again, by the left), but does equalize things in a way that many of its opponents are reluctant to admit.
The constitution is being summarily ignored by the current administration. There is a right to trial in there that we've just totally blown past, and the deep integration between party insiders and media consolidation is a sideways assault on the first amendment.
The idea that "they're coming for your guns" is something we can begin to discuss when the first step to curb our mass shooting problem is actually taken. For now, it's a little ridiculous to infer that there's any kind of 'siege' on the second amendment given that we have them all the damn time and they're not slowing down.
I would ask folks in the EU whether they think they're leaning left at the moment. Reading their news it doesn't seem to be the case [0 1 2 3].
Just out of curiosity - in what concrete way do you think the second amendment serves as an equalizer? Do you imagine that the government sees an armed populace as any kind of a threat?
Leaving the left-right debate behind for just a second - I smell that there is something perhaps we may agree on. Representation is fundamentally broken. Even given our ideological differences, how do you feel about direct democracy? I think we'd benefit.
0 - https://www.ibanet.org/The-year-of-elections-The-rise-of-Eur...
1 - https://ecfr.eu/publication/rise-to-the-challengers-europes-...
2 - https://fortune.com/europe/2025/02/25/europe-far-right-movem...
3 - https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2024/12/24/european-polit...