| > As long as its not me - it is ok. Do I read it correctly? To me this is a non-distinction. That reasoning applies in the US as well. As long as the cops are stopping the guys who don't look like me and beating/killing them and not me, it is OK, right? > What would you take: a higher chance to get on no fly list but still be able to drive to Mexico or Canada and fly from there or leave by boat or lower chance to not being able to leave the country at all for quite some time (potentially ever)? Given that I personally have known a number of people on the no fly list (which increases my chance of getting on it), but no one in that country who was prevented from leaving, I'll take the latter. As I said, it's about probabilities. > What would you take: a higher chance to get felony charges or a lower chance to be in a wrong place and wrong time (killed for fun) with someone who paid their way out criminal justice (that's my explanation of a part of low criminal record)? In the country I lived in, paying your way out of criminal justice was not something that happened much - I'm not sure if it happens more in the US or not. Remember: My country is not your country. And do not make the mistake of conflating authoritarian with corruption - these are separate vectors. And speaking of killing, the homicide rate is much higher in the US (more than triple that country). And if I'm getting killed, I really don't care about the murderer's back story. There's not much to choose here - the US is clearly worse. Don't conflate authoritarian with high crime. > The country were I lived a bit earlier would tell you were you can live. What would you take: a higher chance to have problems with apartments search or not being legally allowed to move cities without power tripping local bureaucrat giving you permission? My country could have had the same problem under certain circumstances. Yet I know more people in the US who have trouble finding apartments for prior crimes (or credit issues, or whatever) than I know people who had trouble moving cities. I can easily see identity theft really screwing up my credit history leading to this problem. Not a concern there. So yes, I would prefer the other country. > That is how it works, you need to have loyal people in local places. You can call it however you want: mayor of the city, ruling party local political leader, etc. Maybe in your country, but that's not how it worked in the one I lived in. As long as you yourself were not a threat to the top level staff (president, etc), the judiciary was relatively effective and didn't care about local oligarchs. And we just didn't have any overlords. |