When tyranny threatens a nation, the smart people leave. From Jeff Thomas at internationalman.com:
In 1933, Albert Einstein renounced his German citizenship soon after Adolf Hitler became Chancellor. Although that left him without a legal home, he was welcomed in England and later, the US, and eventually became a US citizen in 1935.
This was quite a risky move at the time, as he had no certainty of a better life outside of Germany, or even a prospective job. But he saw the writing on the wall. As a man of reason, he focused not on the present condition in Germany, but where events would ultimately lead. His focus was on the Germany of the future and he made a difficult call that those with less vision might not have made.
In 1940, Ludwig von Mises was perhaps the most gifted economist in Austria, as well as being a visionary of libertarian thinking. But he left Austria in that year. The Nazi expansion was already under way and he understood that, if anything, he was leaving late in the game, but before it became impossible to leave. On that day, Austria lost one of its best minds.
When Fidel Castro came suddenly to power on 1st January 1959, many business leaders understood immediately what effect that would have on them in the future and made a hasty exit from Cuba. Then, in the following years, as the socialist confiscations of businesses and property began to take place, larger numbers of businessmen made their exit. In the end, hundreds of thousands left.
Many similar examples can be studied, evidencing that, when a systemic collapse is imminent and, even more so, after it has begun, it’s invariably the best and brightest that choose to head for the exit doors first.
Good article, Robert. But where would I go? There is really nowhere to run for the average educated, straight, white male, especially if he has a family to support. If you are filthy rich and corrupt, you can do what the Bush Crime Family has done and buy land in Paraguay. If you are the Cheney Crime Family, you can surround your enclave in Jackson Hole with cohorts of willing “operators” who made bank during the 2003 “Iraq War”. If you are the Clinton Crime Family, their compound in New Yawk is secured by the SS (pun intended).
After 30 years as a Peace Officer in SoCal, my tribe and I got out of Riverside before we had to shoot our way out. After a detour in Oregon to take care of elderly family, we emigrated to North ID, where my wife was originally from. We are old, tired, arthritic, and angry. We are through running. This is the hill we will die on, one way or another. Bleib ubrig. – DTW
I face the same question. I’ll stay in the U.S., but I’m eventually going to get out of blue state New Mexico.