Whenever I hear someone say that U.S. troops fighting overseas somewhere, anywhere—it doesn't matter where—are defending our freedoms, it makes me want to vomit, and for two reasons.

The troops aren't defending anything. They are engaging in the offense: intervening, violating, invading, occupying, killing, maiming, destroying, and making widows and orphans. This I have written about scores of times.

But there is another reason hearing that the troops are defending our freedoms makes me nauseated. The troops couldn't possibly be defending our freedoms because we don't live in a free society. What are these freedoms that the troops are defending? It seems as though the more the U.S. military intervenes in other countries the more freedoms that Americans lose.

Although we don't live in a free society, most Americans think they do. They sing that they are proud to be an American "where at least I know I'm free." They sing the national anthem and roar when it comes to the line about America being "the land of the free."

Oh sure, Americans are free compared with the citizens of North Korea, Sudan, Myanmar, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela, but there are 190 other countries in the world. The terrible truth is, we live in a relatively free society when compared with people in many other countries. The American people are relatively free compared when compared with people in Thailand, Egypt, the Republic of the Congo, Turkmenistan, Cuba, Nepal, Vietnam, and Pakistan.

But this doesn't mean that the United States is the freest country in the world, although most Americans would say that it is.

Even when it comes to economic freedom—where you would expect the United States to come out on top—America is not even in the top ten. The latest edition of The Index of Economic Freedom, compiled by The Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal to measure the degree of economic freedom in the world's countries, ranks the United States number 11 in economic freedom—behind Ireland and Estonia. According to the Fraser Institute's Economic Freedom of the World, which aims to identify how closely the institutions and policies of a country correspond with a limited government ideal, the United States ranks even lower at number 16—just above Romania.

And when you look at things other than economic freedom, the United States drops even further. In the Freedom of the Press report published by Freedom House, the United States ranks below countries like Estonia, Costa Rica, Barbados, Canada, and New Zealand, as well as most of the countries in Western Europe. In the Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders, the United States is ranked number 41—behind countries like Cyprus, Iceland, Ireland, Belgium, Latvia, Uruguay, and Ghana.

So, when someone says that Americans live in a free society, you have to ask: compared to what?

Do Americans live in a free society when they need to get a permit to have a garage sale?

Do Americans live in a free society when the government listens to their phone calls?