I think it's worse than people taking liberty for granted or being apathetic. It's being reduced to such a state of ignorance and obliviousness that most people aren't even aware that they are ignorant and apathetic! Even worse, many people are content, even proud about it.
I wish I could put into words the essence of the threat, but it's definitely internal. Instead of worrying about others trying to destroy our freedoms and lives from the outside, we ought to be urgently concerned about us forgetting what it means to be the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Per Ayn Rand in a quote from this site."Today, intelligence is neither recognized nor rewarded, but is being systematically extinguished in a growing flood of brazenly flaunted irrationality." seems to fit most of the reasons given...

The greatest threat is not what we argue about but that we cant argue at all. I just attended a philosophy conference where everyone patted themselves on the back for adopting an idea called "epistemic community". It says that oppressed groups will have their own way of knowing the truth so they will not be oppressed by logic, reason, and science. Feminists, LGBTQ, and Christians will all have their own "way" of finding the truth which everyone else will have to respect as equally valid. This is so the oppressed communities will feel good about reaching no conclusions but having lots of feelings. They intend to drop reason and use political power to gain "community" goals. The students here are paying $75,000 a year and all white rich articulate future leaders. The problem is resolved by Ayn Rand's theory of universals and concept formation. They fear that there will be true statements independent of their feelings. You cant argue with them, they cant use words they just have feelings and they don't like you.

I have decided to go Galt rather than stand and fight. There's a difference. I don't think we can stop it.

Good point. Even Atlas Shrugged does not address this issue - people like Rearden and Galt want to create, not waste their time in politics. I wonder how can we ever get better people elected?

"All evil needs to succeed is for good men to look the other way." If you are not fighting the problem you are by definition a freeloader - a spectator to the fight for your own freedom. Those who don't fight for it, don't deserve it.

Our dumbed down population, especially our youth - all unique snowflakes - who don't know, don't care, don't want to know and don't want to care.

This is an inherently depressing subject given the state of contemporary America, but the root of all of the problems we face is something Peikoff identified in "Ominous Parallels" (likely elsewhere too, but that's the most comprehensive discussion of it that I remember.) Namely: the corruption of education.

His assessment is doubly discouraging, and I think it's true: "We're arguably beyond the point of no return," I think is how he put it. That was in 1982, well before the whole toxic infusion of "PC" thought-policing and what it's done to an already-degraded condition in American education, so it's gotten much worse since.

The reason we have Obama in office, the reason we have a Congressload of unprincipled buffoons (they too went to school at some point - well, presumably,) the reason we're on the threshold of American cities getting incinerated by Iranian nukes, the reason we've got a burgeoning electronic revolution whose obliteration of the right to personal privacy is vastly outpacing its legitimate, positive aspects - is because we have multiple generations of people, arguably approaching a majority, who are educated in unmitigated intellectual poison.

It's a comparatively non-sexy issue, but a top priority of the incoming Republican President should be an aggressive, radical separation of government from education. Which means that this person will have to be someone of extraordinary courage, someone utterly unfazed by momentary tsunamis of opposition. And of course, this person would have to be capable of recognizing that this is a key danger to begin with. 'Not so sure such a person exists, but maybe we can train one.

I have to make a slight correction to my earlier post. The greatest threat is someoe who is a greedy and power hungry idealist AND is also one who seeks to solve every problem known to man. Barack Obama fits that profile perfectly. In his speech last night about the shooting in Oregon he referred to himself 28 times in that 12 minute appearance. That is 3X per minute.

https://grabien.com/story.php?id=3818...

What's the greatest threat to the U.S.?
Easy answer--US. Otherwise known as Americans.

Complacency.

Irregardless of who has been in power, our lives just keep chuffing along: We hit the switch and the lights turn on. We adjust the thermostat, and magic heat or cool come out of the wall. We drive our cars, watch our TV, play games on our computers, read.

There is nothing that touches our everyday lives that gives us something to fight about. Sometimes we even 'make up things' so that we can have a cause worth fighting for (feminism; black lives matter), but the truth of the matter is that we live in a lotus land of affluence; even the people we label as poor have a better life than Alfred the Great or Ramses.

We are happy lobsters in a pot of slowly warming water, and we do not notice the increase of heat.

Jan

contemporary arrogance -- the sense that "we know better
than those folks in the past because we are here and not there."
this is derived directly from page xvii of "Liberty's Secrets"
by Joshua Charles, which I am reading. . many members
of the U.S.A. are so self-absorbed that they think nothing
of history and its lessons, thus rendering the wisdom
of our founders "secrets." . the demise of the nation
hangs in the balance. -- j
.

I believe our greatest threat is ignorance. We get the government that we vote for, but the majority of people don’t know or it appears to want to know what the issues are. If they vote, it is a reflex condition, but one out of ignorance not knowledge. I recall seeing an article by Thomas Sowell which basically stated that we need to abolish the universal right to vote, and only allow people who are smart enough to know the issues to be able to vote. He points out that Hitler got elected by popular vote but from an uninformed electorate.

O is the greatest threat because he is supplying and encouraging everything counter-American within the US and in the world . If we had leadership the US and the world would not be in its present state.

collapse of govt-induced fraudulent finance system...not a question of "if" but "when"...and how to survive it...

For me, the greatest threat is the education system that has been inculcating collectivism into children for the last 50 years. Second, are the banksters.

A very intelligent relative of mine always changes the topic if I mention the fraud of "Global Warming" to him. He fears either that he cannot handle the math and science, or else that it would contradict what his left-wing econaut buddies tell him is Established Truth that none dare oppose. Maybe both.

He's not alone. "Threat? What threat? There's nothing to worry about as long as I get my government check."

GREATEST threat is the destruction of our currency. Its the underpinning of pretty much everything in the USA. Currency gets destroyed by deficit spending and money printing by the Federal Reserve. Solution is to get RID of the federeal reserve and make it impossible for the federal government to just print its way out of profligate spending. I would vote for this tomorrow.

Right now, Islamic terrorism through Muslim refugees and perversed need to be politically correct through apathy. If you get offended at my use of the terrorist Pres. BHO...Que sera, sera.

Those who have been elected to serve the people who elected them. They have destroyed the educational system so we are seeing people get older but not growing up. They have been destroying the capitalist economic system so those who have knowledge and desire to do things are not doing anything. I think I can go on and on as many of you can pointing out what the elected servants have done to destroy the country but it is depressing. So the number one enemy of the country is the government of the country.

Obama and his radical American hating values including Muslim supremacists agents.

I agree completely, it is apathy at best, and collusion at worst.

I agree that the greatest threat is people taking liberty for granted, as if it were the default state for humanity and having quotes about liberty on monuments and our passports were enough.

Radical Islam is not even on my radar of serious threats. I wouldn't call the Chinese gov't a direct threat, but it's a bad situation to have a trading partner with such a bad record on liberty.

As a non-American my grasp of your history may be 'sketchy'.

Was it the battle of Lexington when Americans fought the British with unconventional tactics?

The British forces were too strong to take on directly, but we're worn down over time.

Have scouts observe what the opposition, reality obfuscating lefties, have wrought and reverse engineering of their pathetic scheme.

The greatest threat to the US is idealism. A greedy and power mad idealist is the worst. Some say that 50% of Americans are now greedy power mad idealists. This idealism is based on hatred of anyone who has a better position on the economic ladder due through his or her own success. There are other types of idealists, those who want to solve every problem in the universe - immediately - and do not care what the cost is. These are also dangerous but not nearly as much a threat to us as the greedy power hungry idealist.