But It’s Really OK If You Leave
The United States of America is the greatest country in the history of the world.
You don’t agree? Cool. You can do that here.
Being able to publicly disagree about issues is one of the things that makes the US the greatest country on earth. Our neighbors to the north have limits on public speech that Americans would find onerous. Don't believe me, just ask Mark Steyn. He spent years in Canadian courts for saying things that wouldn't get a second glance here.
Is America still viewed as the best place to live by the rest of the world? Let's look at the best indicator, how many people want to live in the US.
The United States is the only country to net more than a million immigrants in any single year since 2001. The United States has had that happen every year since 2001. It’s the destination for people willing to float across a hundred miles of sharks and hurricanes in a homemade boat? A few years ago, I spoke with a man who walked from Somalia to Libya to stow away on a boat to Italy so he could eventually immigrate to the US.
Think about that. He walked 4000 miles so he could hide in a boat, then wait two years to come to this country. He said he didn’t regret a bit of it. That sounds pretty exceptional.
Don't like the system in the US? Change it. March in the streets. Get your friends to march with you. Make signs, Do a YouTube video or a Change.org petition. Write your congressman, heck, be a Congressman
. In the US you can do that.
Think another country has a better system? Move there if that country will let you in. One of my friends, a retired college professor with her own income, married a Canadian judge. It took her two years to jump through all the hoops the Canadian government required. Unlike quite a few places, there are no fences around the US keeping people in.
Don't like your neighbor's religion? In the US you can tell him why he's wrong. You can point at him and laugh if you want to. Or you can tell him why he’s going to whatever version of hell you believe in.
Guess what? Nothing will happen, unless your neighbor gets mad or decides to pray for you or point at you and laugh. No one from the government is going to jail you or execute you for heresy. In fact, your right to criticize your neighbor is protected by law. Of course, his right to criticize you is protected by the same laws. That system has allowed us to reach a pretty good balance over the past couple of centuries.
Don't like the system where you live? Move to another city or state. In the US you're allowed to live anywhere you can pay the rent, even if that's somewhere outside the US. Find a better place for you and live there or change the system where you are. You choose.
You have a choice. That's really the thing that makes the American system such an unusual thing. You have a choice. You can do pretty much whatever you want to do, or live pretty much any way you want to, in any place you want to live. I think that's pretty exceptional.
Or you can leave. That’s OK, too.
