If you are planning on leaving the country, please do us all a favor

[bluestateguy]

STAY REGISTERED TO VOTE IN THE US!

During the campaign I was sharply critical of people who said they would leave the country if Bush was elected. During my three and a half week vacation from DU I had some more time to think about this issue. I understand the futility and frustration that many people here are feeling. If I was of draft age, if I had draft age kids, if I was gay or lesbian or had especially expensive health care costs I could certainly understand why one would want to leave the United States. Still, I am none of those things, and I am ready now to fight once again for my country, at least for one more presidential election. I am just too young to give up right now. Another Bush-loyalist Republican victory, though, and I may have to reconsider staying.

Anyway, while I respect those of you who are making plans to leave, or consider leaving, I ask that you help out those of us who are choosing to stay--or cannot realistically leave--by performing the simple act of remaining a registered US voter in your respective states. The Republicans are very good at brainwashing people and they like to have lots of babies, so we need every vote we can get.

[Scrooge]

1. Good point

I wouldnt mind leaving myself, but cant. I do hope those that leave wont forget us that they left behind.

[Township75]

2. No one is leaving...

it is so popular to say "I'm leaving" after the election, but how many of those people are gone, or are packing-up to leave right now? I imagine very few, and of those that are, they were planning on leaving the US long before the election.

When these fools realize how much work and risk are involved in leaving a country they are established in for a country they need to start over in, they will realize the extent to which they pursue leaving the US is limited to internet searches on living in other countries.

And of those that leave, we only need to be concerned with the ones that renounce their citizenship, and thus can't vote in the US anymore. Those that choose to retain their citizenship in the US and just live outside the US aren't really leaving as they vote in US elections, and pay US taxes to support our wars.

[kiki]

3. Hi-de-hi-de-ho...

...what a funny clown.
The fat man he fell off the wall
And he can't get up again.

It's time to say goodbye,
It's time to say goodnight.
Whoever is the last one out
Well, please turn off the light...

[bluestateguy]

4. That makes no sense

I was never very good at deciphering the esotericism of poetry.

[kiki]

5. Heh heh...

Don't know song if lyrics count as poetry. It's David Byrne, and he was always a bit of an obscure fucker.

C'mon, this one's pretty easy. Who's the "fat man" (think financially fat, fat on the labours of others, "bloated") who's falling off the wall and taking everyone with him?

And suddenly, it's time to say goodnight and everyone wants to leave the party, as this thread suggests.

The line about turning off the light is a gag, and it rhymes.

These lyrics are about 10 years old, but I think they're pretty prescient.

[Dogmudgeon]

6. I'm staying

The only situations where I would leave the USA are as follows:

1. Love.

2. A very good job.

3. Immanent arrest and/or execution by tyrant(s).

I don't consider George Bush to be that kind of tyrant. He's bad enough as it is, but like most modern tyrants, he likes to keep his hands clean.

I'm staying, and I'm working (and fighting, if necessary) for Democracy.

--p!