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Dave Bacon is a theoretical ski bum who is also a pseudo 
I am always greatly amused by the display of frustration in which one threatens to leave a country if things don't change. During the end of the first term of Bush the Second, it was common in the United States to hear liberals express their anger as: "If he wins a second term, I'm going to move to Canada." (If you go too far to the left, you end up in Canada?) The expression reached spectacular heights, in my opinion, however, when Tina Fey said of Sarah Palin that if McCain/Palin won the presidential election, Fey would "leave Earth."
But now that the evil liberals have taken over the Washington, it seems to me that the evil right needs a good guide as to where they can move to overcome their ills. So I've put together a simple list to help guide you to your own private utopia.
Taxes. First and foremost on the mind of any red blooded conservative, is often taxes (especially with tax day quickly approaching.) Now it is notoriously difficult to gauge tax loads across different countries, especially considering that it depends on your financial circumstances, so instead we can use a different proxy: tax revenue as a percentage of GDP. So you're a conservative who wants less taxes spent on your government? Why not check out
- Pakistan: 10 percent of GDP
- Mexico: 19.8 percent of GDP
- Turkey: 23.7 percent of GDP
- South Africa: 26.4 percent of GDP
- Japan, 27.9 percent of GDP
- USA, 28.3 percent of GDP
- Romania, 28.6 percent of GDP
Gold Standard: A favorite less of the center of the conservative right in the USA, and more of the libertarian wing, for a long time I had little hope that anyone who wanted to bring back the gold standard would have anywhere to go. But this may be changing. Recently Russia has proposed adding gold as a major component of a new currency being pushed by Russia and China. Who wants to pitch in for a ticket to send Ron Paul to Russia to live?
Capital Punishment: The 2008 Republican platform argued in favor of the death penalty. But if the USA isn't knocking off enough people for you, then you can always get your fill in the following countries:
- China: 470 executions in 2007
- Iran: 317 executions in 2007
- Saudi Arabia: 143 executions in 2007
- Pakistan: 135 executions
- Democratic Republic of the Congo: 100 executions
- Egypt: 48 executions in 2007
- United States: 42 executions in 2007
- Iraq: 33 executions in 2007
Guns: Well I hate to say this, but there are few options when it comes to owning guns. In this case, the USA is by and far the leader. But if you just can't take it and have to move, how about:
- United States: 90.0 guns per 100 people
- Yemen: 61.0 guns per 100 people
- Switzerland: 46.0 guns per 100 people
- Iraq: 39.0 guns per 100 people
- Serbia: 37.5 guns per 100 people
- France: 32.0 guns per 100 people
- Finland: 32.0 guns per 100 people
- Canada: 31.5 guns per 100 people
Anyone seeking further guidance on where they should move to, given their political beliefs, should feel free to comment and I and others will be happy to try to find a good match!
Politics
Comments
Dude, that's fucking hilarious! Good one!
Posted by: Comrade PhysioProf | April 12, 2009 4:13 PM
A bit distorting, having two of the entries by per-capita and one not.
Executions per capita: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_exe_percap-crime-executions-per-capita
# 1 Bahamas, The: 6.62712 executions per 1 million
# 2 Singapore: 6.32625 executions per 1 million
# 3 Sierra Leone: 4.09068 executions per 1 million
# 4 Belarus: 3.20388 executions per 1 million
# 5 Rwanda: 2.84327 executions per 1 million
# 6 Kuwait: 2.56849 executions per 1 million
# 7 Oman: 1.99867 executions per 1 million
# 8 Congo, Democratic Republic of the: 1.64571 executions per 1 million
# 9 Jordan: 1.5625 executions per 1 million
# 10 Taiwan: 1.39775 executions per 1 million
# 11 Saudi Arabia: 1.09774 executions per 1 million
# 12 Iran: 0.970331 executions per 1 million
# 13 Yemen: 0.820186 executions per 1 million
# 14 China: 0.816802 executions per 1 million
# 15 Kyrgyzstan: 0.777303 executions per 1 million
# 16 Egypt: 0.619307 executions per 1 million
# 17 Lebanon: 0.522739 executions per 1 million
# 18 Cuba: 0.440645 executions per 1 million
# 19 Afghanistan: 0.334124 executions per 1 million
# 20 United States: 0.229936 executions per 1 million
Posted by: mudlock | April 12, 2009 4:24 PM
They just took our knives. Let us keep our guns. We just love them.
Posted by: raana | April 12, 2009 6:12 PM
Ron Paul is not as crazy as everyone thinks he is (maybe some of his followers are, but he's not). Seriously. I attended a few of the debates (we hosted a few at Saint A's) and he was the only candidate from either party who seemed to get the fact that most of the issues are interrelated.
Posted by: Ian Durham | April 12, 2009 7:35 PM
@mudlock - have you noticed how many 1st world or western nations are in that list?
Posted by: mrcreosote | April 12, 2009 10:08 PM
Given that Obama seems to be continuing to carry out some of Bush's more extreme policies, I'm starting to think I should warm up the emigration search again.
Posted by: Ronald Pottol | April 12, 2009 11:30 PM
Ah thanks mudlock, I definitely should have done per capita killingz. I didn't know the Bahamas would rank number one.
Posted by: Dave Bacon | April 12, 2009 11:59 PM
You can say one thing with dead-dog-certainty about anyone considering moving out of the U.S., regardless of the reason: they have never, ever traveled outside America in their lives.
Posted by: Nick | April 13, 2009 12:02 AM
I didn't know the Bahamas would rank number one.
There were a grand total of two (2) executions in the Bahamas that year (1998). Their population is so small that even with a single execution they would have been #4.
Personally, I think I'll just buy a yacht and spend the rest of my days cruising around South Pacific. All those immigrants that have flooded to New Zealand during the Bush years have spoilt the place.
Posted by: Lassi Hippeläinen | April 13, 2009 4:34 AM
The solution is obvious. Only one country (besides the US) appears on more than one of your lists, and as an added bonus it is a country where people pushing fundamentalist monotheist religion wield a lot of power. I refer, of course, to Pakistan. So if you're a right-winger who wants to leave the US, book a ticket on the next available flight to Karachi.
Posted by: Eric Lund | April 13, 2009 10:28 AM
Nick says: You can say one thing with dead-dog-certainty about anyone considering moving out of the U.S., regardless of the reason: they have never, ever traveled outside America in their lives.
Incorrect, Nick. Here in Seattle we have lost young MD faculty to Canada. It's because these young MDs wish to practice medicine within a health-care system that is not morally and economically fubar'd.
Posted by: John Sidles | April 13, 2009 2:02 PM
What is "dead-dog-certainty"? I moved out of the US a couple years ago, and I have been to 25 other countries in my life and lived in 5 of them.
Posted by: tribeseeker | April 14, 2009 12:37 PM
Tribeseeker asks: What is "dead-dog-certainty"?
That's easy ... "Dead-dog-certainty" is a cognitive filter that protects states of ignorance! :)
Posted by: John Sidles | April 14, 2009 2:48 PM
The best place on earth for liberals is at the feet of the King of Saudi Arabia, as Obama as showed.
Posted by: Jose | April 15, 2009 5:34 AM
Dave, we had all better move to Scandinavia right away. Because by virtue of their new, unsurpassable bacon technology, the Scandinavians definitely are going to conquer the world.
Bacon. Is there anything it can't do? :)
Posted by: John Sidles | April 15, 2009 6:40 AM
"The best place on earth for liberals is at the feet of the King of Saudi Arabia, as Obama as showed."
Good one, Jose! But I think you mistook the Bush family for Obama, which is amazingly hard to do.
Posted by: Dave Bacon | April 15, 2009 11:09 AM
Yeah ... America definitely should keep sending hundreds of billions of dollars overseas ... each and every year ... to the Far East oil producers ... so that we can go ever-more-hugely into debt each year ... so that we can burn the oil we buy ... in order to fubar the global climate.
The reason we know this makes sense is that "the market" tells us to do it (and so does Rush Limbaugh). Duh.
Posted by: John Sidles | April 15, 2009 11:20 AM
The only president of USA that I have seen, all the world have seen it, to bow the King of Saudi Arabia is Barak Obama.
Posted by: Jose | April 15, 2009 1:17 PM
The only US president I have seen hold hands with the King of Saudia Arabia is Bush. Here I'll even give it to your from one of your own fitfh monger hate woman that you are so proud of Jose: http://michellemalkin.com/2005/04/26/who-needs-enemies-photos-of-the-day/
So what if a president bows to the King of Saudia Arabia. Do you really think Saudia Arabia is happy with us leaving Iraq? Can you even tell me which religious group dominates Saudia Arabia? (Now don't go out there and cheat use the internet!)
Posted by: Dave Bacon | April 15, 2009 1:24 PM
Yes I known it, there is a tradition between presidents of USA to be friends of criminal dictatorships. But the fact is that this time is Barak Obama who reverenciates a dictator.
Posted by: Jose | April 15, 2009 2:06 PM
Certainly he should have pulled out his AKA and shot him instead.
Posted by: Dave Bacon | April 15, 2009 2:33 PM
OK then there are only two possibilities: to make a submissive gesture or to shot a gun.
By the way a republican could say: "Certainly Bush should have pulled out his AKA and shot the King of Saudia Arabia instead of hold hands with him."
"Do you really think Saudia Arabia is happy with us leaving Iraq? Can you even tell me which religious group dominates Saudia Arabia?"
This reasoning means that Obama is a friend of Iranian regime.
Posted by: Jose | April 15, 2009 2:55 PM
I think you mean AK-47, and it's unlikely that an American president would use one--probably an M-60 or a chain gun like Governor Ventura used in Predator (Ol' Painless).
Although thinking about what pulling out an AKA during a negotiation would mean is pretty funny.
"King Saud, enough talk. We end this now.
Do you know who I am Also Known As? Huhn, do you, punk?"
Posted by: Geordie | April 15, 2009 7:40 PM
Somedays I just shouldn't respond to trolls.
Posted by: Dave Bacon | April 15, 2009 7:44 PM
Time for a TEA party ... "Theorists Enjoying Algorithms" ... *so* civilized ... shall we call Fox News? :)
Posted by: John Sidles | April 15, 2009 9:03 PM
I have been reading your blog many years. I have seen you to get a better position as professor, I have seen in this blog your new home, the day of your wedding, congrats for your second anniversary, etc.
I have given my opinion and because it is against your political ideas then you insult to me, calling me a troll. OK Dave, don't worry more about me, I'll never come back to read your blog, not more opinions than contradict your opinion.
Finally, I live in Spain, so I cannot be a troll of the republicans, but it was sad for me to see the president of the first democracy of the world in such attitude.
Bye
Posted by: Jose | April 16, 2009 4:24 AM
And here is *my* full disclosure: I am *not* a paid provocateur of the ancient and secret Stonecutter Society.
Not, definitely not.
Because it's classier to be a volunteer. :)
Posted by: John Sidles | April 16, 2009 7:00 AM
Bye Jose and thanks for the fish!
Posted by: Dave Bacon | April 16, 2009 10:56 AM
We were talking about this at work today. Brent Scowcroft wrote out his rationale for not driving SH from power in Iraq the first go-round, and it is fair in light of discussions about King Saud, et al.
It is simply an ugly truth that frequently there is no visible path to a global optimum, so you have to pick a local optimum, the highest point that you can get to. In the case of dictators, they often end up being the least of possible evils; they are at least the lightest on our consciences.
We see it to some extent in Iraq, and much more in Afghanistan. Orderly, evil regimes were toppled, and the Wild Near East broke out. From that fountain of disorder comes severe threats. They aren't planning-to-take-over-the-world threats, they are going-to-hell-in-a-flash-of-fire-withon-without-you threats. The nefarious asymmetric threats where a couple of well connected guys could conspire to kill 50 of us for every 1 of them, in a local catastrophe.
They are a threat to our security, and that fear compromises our humanity. They are criminals, for sure, but police actions are reactive, not proactive. The only assured strategy of negating asymmetric threats amounts to genocide. Kill 'em all and let god sort 'em out. I work with a lot of former military officers and we all agree that whatever is bad about a regime pales by comparison to genocide. So, we negotiate, work with, and in some cases support pretty bad guys because they keep us safe.
Posted by: David | April 16, 2009 9:36 PM