Yes and I could tear apart the flaws in the HDI all day long, even with the 2010 improvements.

Averages of studies always seems popular, like RCP's average of polls, in spite of it being blatant nonsense at every possible level. You can't average things using different standards and methodology. Plus this is no different then the others, it has a clear bias to classic liberalism, effectively libertarianism, which while admittedly my own leaning hardly makes it unbiased. One notes that while one of the sources mentions regret over not being able to discuss freedom concerning alcohol or drugs, guns tend not to get mentioned at all.

Yeah, because the media's opinion is notoriously relevant to most American Conservatives Incidentally many of those countries have prominent public TV/radio/papers/etc which generally lowers my belief in their freedom of the press, and not very many outlets. But I wouldn't claim the US has the freest press, anything but, yet I'd also point out that we have a very free press considering the pressures we are under not to, which many of those others don't have. Iceland, for instance, does not have hundreds of thousands of soldiers and spies out there vulnerable to exposure, research facilities others nations would murder to get a look inside, and all the other luxuries afforded countries on the second or third tier of power and influence.

That actually just reflects you not doing the work, not what the index says, I stuck guns as 'crucial' and the US immediately jumped to #3 and New Zealand dumped down to #161. We also lapped them on limited government and I didn't check them all. The thing is New Zealand has a very high property rights score. This metric also assumes drug rights deserve equal weight as gun rights, which needless to say I disagree with. Most people do, whether they think one ranks the other or vice-versa. Much like the HDI, which has three categories each given equal weight, such things typically revolve around over-simplificaiton out of necessity without acknowledging that just because they must oversimplify doesn't mean the data is now accurate.

If you set every parameter to 'somewhat important' or .5, so as to be able to rate these best to taste, the US jumps to top 3 on almost any option that demotes drugs as important, and it jumps to #1 just by increasing guns and business freedom, most American conservatives consider those two very important so they are actually not just indulging in nationalism if they say the US freest.

As I said, I doubt you've been very exhaustive about it, plus I really doubt anyone would publish a study that had US as #1. Its very easy to tweak the way things add up in what is typically entirely arbitrary ratings and any study showing the US as #1 would be shrugged at in the US and mocked elsewhere, even if it were valid. MY point isn't that the US is #1, and never has been, its that it is #1 for me and that such ratings systems are almost always arbitrary and rather silly.