The thing is, where is there anyplace left that has any overall greater freedom?... except that which may be purchased by the ultra wealthy, and even those purchases have a very unreliable warranty .
Sure there are places that are better in some respects, and worse in others.
Me, I decided long ago to ‘Go Galt’ and sit and watch it all fall down around me. Should be entertaining, but I feel sorry for all the decent but people who place their hopes into the political parties to save them.
“The thing is, where is there anyplace left that has any overall greater freedom?... “
There are plenty of places, I don’t think that you realize just how much of a police state the US has become nor how corrupt it is at the top. The elites are not the ones bolting as they have historically low taxation rates (witness all the Billionaires claiming to have lower tax rates than their secretaries like Warren Buffet)and have the access to politicians that make them immune to almost all laws (like John Corzine of MF global that stole $1.6B and will never see the inside of a jail cell or be required to pay any of it back).
Now look at the average citizen that has to be stripped searched and groped in the privates just to board a plane (elites fly private jets, just walk on and go), the FDA using SWAT teams to go after organic farmers selling raw milk, SWAT teams killing the family dog for fun, and on and on. We are also buried in red tape from every organization you can imagine, especially in the blue states like were I live in CA. We are no longer free, granted we still have not reached the level of some place like Cuba ... yet, but we are moving in that direction.
Most people on FR define freedom as only meaning one thing, the right to own a gun and carry it around for protection. That is about the only measure of freedom where the US stands out, in most other ways your average Mexican has more freedom than you do, which is why the tide is starting to reverse for those that have something to offer. For the welfare leaches the US is still the best as we hand out borrowed money like candy to anyone that squeezes out a baby. Sweet deal for someone that would be selling gum on the street corner in her home country.
Most of those giving up their US citizenship though are not US born refugees but people that came here for the opportunity (most on a H1B visa) but realized that their opportunities are better back home. Lots of guys from India and China that got their PhD in engineering here in the US and want to make a better life are going home. The brain drain in reverse. I’ve looked into some of these places that have a citizenship for sell and the cost is either too high for the average dude (like New Zealand where you need to be a millionaire) or the citizenship is in a country that you would not really want to live in (like some small impoverished Caribbean island where $50,000 can get you a new passport).
That plus the US dollar is loosing value at such a rapid rate that most third world countries are not as “cheap” a place to live as they once were. All in all it adds up to damned if you stay and damned if you leave so since I can’t speak a foreign language it’s stay put and like you watch the decline.