Lottery!

Let's call this person 'X'. X is born in the so called forward community and so ends up working his a#@ off for 12 years for getting admitted into a decent professional college. Due to the 100 zillion hurdles he has to face in his own motherland, X then works his a@# off to go through GRE, Toefl , admission process, student loan, grumpy visa officer and what not...and finally lands in the States for prospects of a better professional life. X then goes through the rigours of adjusting to a new environment, being a poor student grad, being overworked by the professor who does not have enough money to fund him. He finally completes his thesis with flying colors. He then gets calls from atleast 10 people per day...every one of whose first question is 'what is your visa status' ? He thus misses interview opportunities from most of the great companies after this first question. By the grace of the All Pervading force of Karma, he lands a decent job. They love X and X loves the job. Then one fine day, it is annouced that his fate of working in the job will depend on his selection in a LOTTERY ! X's dreams of a free land where he can gain and contribute with his innovative mind gets a trashing. Ofcourse again, by the grace of the All Pervading force of Karma he does get through the LOTTERY..and X is happy that he has finally won a lottery in his life :)...
My take on this has varied from being philosophical, to choices we make, to etc., to etc.,...but a basic question remains.....is there space for a free thinking mind anywhere in the world anymore ? a place where great brains are allowed to achieve greatness without having to go through political crap ?