Can we learn from others (esp. for communities)?

[JohnnyL]

Can we learn from others?

Taiwan definitely has its problems, but... it is currently much freer than America, in most every aspect.

Most Taiwanese are not even Christian.

Their biggest problems: organized crime (which is getting more legal), politicians (imagine that!) and their schemes, and blinding accepting everything American with open arms.

If you pretty much don't cause problems, you can do pretty much what you want.
--Licensing is very lenient (most places you eat at don't have one, don't need one). If you want to do something, you can do it with a business license. Though most small businesses operate without even that!
--Taxes are much lower. You pay one tax (no sales, no state, no local).
--Cheaper "universal" healthcare.
--They have arrested and imprisoned a former president (can you picture America doing that to any political leader?)
--Foreigners treated ok.
--Very few traffic tickets. Other than three laws, as long as you don't threaten someone's well-being/ no one gets hurt, police won't bother you.
--Police in general actually don't want problems, so try to get people to settle and walk away before there's a problem. (Though they've been known to purposefully be late showing up at problems.) Police are extremely docile at demonstrations, with emotional people, etc.
--Courts are getting fairer (probably still one of the unfairest parts).
--Politicians--even high level politicians--don't dare do some wrong things because they know the public will give them problems. If it gets out, they usually have big problems.
--Whistleblowers are welcomed by media.
--Monopolies that make too much pay some back to public.
Etc.

--Interestingly, no guns! (Except for criminals and police.)

Why? And even though those would never happen on a large scale, why couldn't a community follow many of them?

What are some communities doing--anywhere in the world, and especially America--to further freedoms, that we could lead in our local communities?

[light-one]

Anytime the police have more weapons that the average citizenry, it is already a dictatorship.
We chose not to participate in such when we chose Jesus' plan over Lucifer's.
Police State never was happiness.

[Thomas]

Anytime the police have more weapons that the average citizenry, it is already a dictatorship.
We chose not to participate in such when we chose Jesus' plan over Lucifer's.
Police State never was happiness.

You mean like in the good USA, were many police agencies have surplus armored vehicles. Some even have tanks.

[JohnnyL]

In addition, while there are many laws, most everyone knows which ones not to break. For example, don't speed--but you know a policeman won't pull you over on a local road for that. Make a right turn on red, ride a motorcycle without a helmet, make a left turn on a no-left turn green--these three will get you tickets, esp. if the police are esp. looking out for it. Parking in no parking areas might get you towed, but it depends on where you park and what everyone else is doing, etc.

The laws are there for when something happens. You hit someone when you were speeding, and the law is no speeding, so you were in the wrong for that (too).

Most breaking of laws result in fines, not jail. Jail is reserved for what might be called actual felony crimes for actual bad guys.