Beautifully written.
Puerto Rico is a beautiful place, and there are a lot of beautiful people there.
Don't let anyone define you. You were born an American, you'll die an American. You don't need anyone's permission to do either one.
PR is a land inhabited exclusively by Americans, and consequently it is a permanent part of the US. The only question is the terms of the marriage. We're already married, mind you, we're just arguing about whether or not to tear up the pre-nup.
"The rum bottle in front of him almost empty, Jacobo Morales is approaching the end of a rambling stage monologue on what it means to be Puerto Rican. Earlier he had toasted "the great American nation, of which I'm proud to be a citizen." But with this most recent toast his mood has turned militantly nationalistic: "What I am is Ameri . . . Puerto Rican!" And then another turnabout. "Puerto Rican and Ameri. . . . What I am is a realist, because one thing is what I feel, another is what's convenient. What I feel is Puerto Rican first and Puerto Rican always—but what about the welfare checks?" Finally, polishing off the last of the bottle, Morales makes up his mind, shouting: "Viva Puerto Rico libre!—Long live free Puerto Rico!"
"The last line always brings the house down," he says happily.
"That's why we close the bars on election day," a government official in the capital of San Juan noted cynically as we discussed Morales's performance. "Otherwise the whole country would vote for independence."
"Turnout on election days remains steady at around 85 percent (although much of the fervor may come from the fact that thousands of government jobs, which account for one-third of the island's total workforce, can be at stake when one party replaces another)."
One third of the island's workforce works for the local government and another third works for our federal government and a goodly portion of those LEFT (pun intended) work for companies that have federal contracts or are there avoiding 90% of their federal income taxes, or both!
Any U.S. Taxpayers that want to make a state out of this Socialistic, parasitic, pesthole are out of their minds.
Please, governor Acevedo, leave the bars open in Puerto Rico on the day of this plebiscite.
LOL!