I'm becoming one of those people you are describing here, but I'd like to keep my mind open to the possibility that I'm wrong, so I keep on reading.

My impression is that you are somewhat exaggerating a valid point and that there exaggeration may not work in your favor, theoretically speaking. But that's a whole other issue.

I guess the important question here is - what freedoms do we no longer have. Because if it is - as you say - that people won't say that it's a free country because they know it's not true, rather than it becoming a cliche for example.