Wrong. Either you know not what you are talking about, or you are deliberately mistaken. HK is an (spelling / grammar) UN recognized customs area, and by treaty and reality, has laws, regulations, and ways and means very much distinct from Beijing. Further, we have two official languages, applicable to all official documentations and should one choose of free will, commercial slips of paper. This is why HK is recognized as #1 in economic freedom, the only freedom that matters, by Heritage Foundation, a whole lot of slots ahead of wherever you happen to be.
What is so great about two official languages? The US recognizes financial transactions in any language from english to pig latin.
Yes I suppose HK is sort of like when you cross the border into Canada or vice versa, there is a duty free store. HK has economic freedoms like that duty free store.
There are freedoms and then there are freedoms. If you worship the almighty dollar, (be it HK or US) then economic freedom might be your primary concern.
However civilized people (not those that consider their spouse a scourge) would not think that is the only freedom.
HK is a part of the PRC, just as are the states a part of the US. It may be a SAR but BFD it is still a part of the PRC. Why are you required to show ID to travel to other parts of the PRC if you have these great freedoms?
I have never when traveling within the US except by airplane, been asked for ID for any reason. I am never stopped on the street by police and asked to show ID, if I were I would refuse, there is little they can do should I refuse, were they ever to ask, short of my having violated a law (speeding, etc).
I have complete religious freedom here, whether it be as an atheist, a muslim, a jew, a catholic, a hindu, or a fundamentalist protestant.
I have not only the freedom to own a gun, (pistol, rifle, yes even machine gun), I have the RIGHT to own firearms. Do you?
I have complete freedom of speech short of yelling fire in a crowded building. I can condemn the government, I can put on white sheets and march against african americans, I can stand on a corner on my soap box and condemn GWB. I can vote for the political party, or individual as I chose, and I can run for office if I so chose also.
I know of no action that I have ever had a desire to do that because of government restriction I could not do.
One guiding principle of freedom, is that your freedom ends where my nose begins and vice versa. Seems that you think your freedoms include making serfs of your wife, and every working stiff around, these to be discarded at a whim. They are there to do your bidding, pay them nothing, give them no security, were you allowed you would practice slavery, except your slaves would starve because to feed them would be giving them to much.
You see TJ with out these freedoms economic freedom is worthless because with the whim of a government that does not give these freedoms, your economic freedom can disappear in an instant.
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