<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>patrickk</author><text>&quot;&lt;i&gt;2. Media outlets individually (particularly in the US) decided not to cover the actions of the Icelandic government because they think most of their viewers don&apos;t care much about Iceland and/or because &quot;check out what has slowly been happening in Iceland over the past 5 years&quot; isn&apos;t much of a breaking news story.&lt;/i&gt;&quot;&lt;p&gt;It&apos;s highly relevant because of the stark contrast in the manner in which Iceland prosecuted the bankers like the criminals they are, versus the crazy manner in which bankers are treated in the US and Europe.&lt;p&gt;One law for the corrupt, rich, and connected bankers, and much harsher laws for ordinary people who are not connected, wealthy and powerful (e.g. individuals targeted for illegal downloads versus bankers blowing up the global economy causing untold economic hardship). This sends out a strong message from a government to it&apos;s electorate: &lt;i&gt;fuck you, you miserable peasant. Not only will you go along with these bailouts, you&apos;ll cheer loudly for your bought candidate when he&apos;s re-elected.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;I&apos;m from Ireland, and we should have copied Iceland to the letter. The difference is we&apos;re in the EU and our government is happy to be Angela Merkel&apos;s little bitch, and take the pain (sovereign debt burden) to maintain the illusion that everything is rosy in the garden.&lt;p&gt;Iceland even had the balls to &lt;i&gt;crowd-source&lt;/i&gt; it&apos;s new constitution, giving real, tangible power to it&apos;s people (you couldn&apos;t even imagine this in most countries). Talk about real democracy compared to crony capitalism:&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://gigaom.com/2012/10/22/icelanders-approve-their-crowdsourced-constitution/&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://gigaom.com/2012/10/22/icelanders-approve-their-crowds...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;Great article on Iceland from Michael Lewis (Wall Street on the Tundra):&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/04/iceland200904&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/04/iceland2...&lt;/a&gt;</text><parent_chain><item><author>brown9-2</author><text>Which is an easier explanation to believe?&lt;p&gt;1. The &quot;media&quot; got together and said to each other, &quot;We better not cover this story at all, because it will give too many people dangerous ideas&quot;&lt;p&gt;or&lt;p&gt;2. Media outlets individually (particularly in the US) decided not to cover the actions of the Icelandic government because they think most of their viewers don&apos;t care much about Iceland and/or because &quot;check out what has slowly been happening in Iceland over the past 5 years&quot; isn&apos;t much of a breaking news story.&lt;p&gt;This story &lt;i&gt;has&lt;/i&gt; been covered, but just because it isn&apos;t to the extent that you wish it was covered does not mean a conspiracy must exist.&lt;p&gt;NPR did a story on Iceland just two days ago: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/02/01/170867071/episode-435-a-new-mom-and-the-president-of-iceland&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/02/01/170867071/episode-...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Why Did The Media Keep The Recent Peaceful Icelandic Revolution Quiet?</title><url>http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/01/11/why-did-media-keep-the-recent-peaceful-icelandic-revolution-quiet/</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>drzaiusapelord</author><text>Yeah, I&apos;m having a hard time buying the conspiracy theory here. Iceland&apos;s entire population is the equivalent of 2 or 3 larger neighborhoods in Chicago.  Its just not pressing news. Its a small and unimportant country. I doubt most Americans could find it on an unlabeled map.&lt;p&gt;Not to mention, parliamentary style governments are always being torn down and rebuilt as different blocs of power emerge. Things can change fast, especially if that country also does direct democracy referendums. That&apos;s a feature, not a bug and very different to the more stable and conservative style of government the US was built on.&lt;p&gt;Also, a screen blocking &quot;join us on facebook&quot; dhtml pop-up? Wow. Another example of the hostile web here.</text><parent_chain><item><author>brown9-2</author><text>Which is an easier explanation to believe?&lt;p&gt;1. The &quot;media&quot; got together and said to each other, &quot;We better not cover this story at all, because it will give too many people dangerous ideas&quot;&lt;p&gt;or&lt;p&gt;2. Media outlets individually (particularly in the US) decided not to cover the actions of the Icelandic government because they think most of their viewers don&apos;t care much about Iceland and/or because &quot;check out what has slowly been happening in Iceland over the past 5 years&quot; isn&apos;t much of a breaking news story.&lt;p&gt;This story &lt;i&gt;has&lt;/i&gt; been covered, but just because it isn&apos;t to the extent that you wish it was covered does not mean a conspiracy must exist.&lt;p&gt;NPR did a story on Iceland just two days ago: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/02/01/170867071/episode-435-a-new-mom-and-the-president-of-iceland&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/02/01/170867071/episode-...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Why Did The Media Keep The Recent Peaceful Icelandic Revolution Quiet?</title><url>http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/01/11/why-did-media-keep-the-recent-peaceful-icelandic-revolution-quiet/</url></story>