Take Ted Kennedy first please...

xm15e3

I thougt you guys might like this, I did. I figure we could pay airfare by scrapping the National Endowment for the Arts, PBS, NPR ect.

Luck of the Irish
And the French and Canadians and Germans and so on

by Alan Bisbort - June 19, 2003

ALAN BISBORT COLLAGE

Wouldn't it be better to live abroad?

There will come a time, when and if George W. Bush wins the 2004 election, that many first-rate Americans will give serious thought to emigrating from the country of their birth, this place formerly known as the land of the free. If you haven't at least given some fleeting thought to this possibility already, then you aren't paying attention to what's going on here. You are, shall we say, living in a fool's idea of paradise.
This has never been more apparent to me than now, after a 10-day visit to Ireland, a grand, beautiful country with a civilized, healthy democracy and a free -- and freely skeptical -- press. Returning to these shores, I'm convinced that America is in the grip of a monstrous delusion, one that bears no resemblance to the rest of the world's reality. The passive acceptance of corruption and lies that is the foundation of this current house of cards strikes me as a collective version of the go-along-to-get-along mentality that rules families victimized by abuse and addiction. It is easier -- and less dangerous in the short run -- to look the other way, to let the likes of Ashcroft, Delay, Scalia and Rove redefine the meaning of the Constitution, to let Rice and Fleischer and Cheney corrupt even the language we use to communicate. But a house of cards is just that, something that will in the long run collapse into nothingness.

To the Irish (and the rest of the world), for example, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are far from over, despite the fact that Americans collectively watched, in shock and awe, as the idiot prince, sporting a codpiece and helmet, landed aboard an aircraft carrier to declare the "mission" in Iraq was "accomplished." To the rest of the world, Bush is, at best, a laughingstock and, at worst, untrustworthy.

I certainly understand why anyone would hesitate before leaving the nation of their birth. Who the hell, after all, wants to toss in the towel on what was one of the greatest experiments in democracy in world history? To use the metaphor begun above, many a spouse has reconsidered, at the eleventh hour, taking the kids and running from an abusive mate.

And many have asked the police to drop charges and rescind restraining orders, after being physically beaten, psychologically assaulted and/or threatened, only to turn up dead or permanently maimed a few months down the line.

However, I would suggest taking a different, more pragmatic view of any such decision. Rather than see it as a defeat, a tossing in of the towel, see it as a rational reaction to irrational behavior. See it as a way to take yourself out of a place that is dangerous, violent and delusional and put yourself in a different place where a government -- however inefficient -- is in the business of caring about its people rather than crushing them underfoot in pursuit of an extremist ideological agenda.

Indeed, this same get-out-while-the-getting-is-good mentality swept through Germany in the late 1930s. The United States was the beneficiary of a wave of immigrants who went on to become some of the nation's finest thinkers and doers, among them Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt, George Grosz, and Thomas Mann. It only makes sense that, should America turn its own back on, if not openly threaten, the best and brightest among us -- simply because they oppose, with every ounce of their being, the usurpation and abuse of power exhibited by the White House -- then these gifted people will seek other places where their talents will be better appreciated. A place, for example, where their children won't be shot at their high school desks, kicked by a demented Little League mom, brainwashed into becoming an obese adolescent by an unhealthy consumerist ethic, dulled in mind and body by television and pop cultural inanity, taunted and bullied by idiots who drape themselves in the Stars and Stripes.

Many people of my acquaintance have suggested Canada as a logical alternative. It's clean, friendly, multicultural, and relatively near to hand. Allow me to suggest Ireland. Since there are 40 million Americans of Irish descent among us, going to Ireland is not a giant leap into cultural surrealism (give or take the driving on the left side of the road and the potatoes that come even with the Chinese takeout order).

One caveat: Be prepared to be kicked in the teeth, ass or nuts by your fellow Americans. Remember "love it or leave it" from the Vietnam War era? It still lives.

Consider this exchange, between readers of one of my recent columns for In These Times: One "Cat" from Virginia said, "We are a society of bred enablers and consider ourselves to be entitled to whatever we can get by whatever means necessary (hence the new regime's popularity). If I could talk my husband into it, I'd move to Canada ..." To which one "Tom" from points unknown responded, "Cat, please move to Canada. I, for one, don't want you here and I can't imagine that anyone else does either, unless they like being preached at and being generalized as stupid, lazy, and entitled assholes."

Look at it this way: Once the smoke clears above the ruins of the Bush Era, Americans will long for a state of democratic grace. Then they will gladly take you back, like exiles from Saddam's reign of terror, and ask you to help rebuild the land of the free.

Until then, consider joining the rest of the world.