I'm committing treason

On Monday, an Indiana Daily Student front-page story included a quote from a young man who believes that anyone who wants to leave the United States during the second Bush administration should be "tried for treason and shot."\nDoes anyone else see a huge problem with that statement? Other than the fact that his first thought as a solution to the problem is not dialogue, but murder, one would think the young man sounds a lot like the dictators his beloved administration deposes and destroys with military force.\nThis is a damning portrait of human nature at its worst, a fine example of the American dream, distorted.\nFirst of all, to be technically correct, treason is defined as aiding or providing comfort to an enemy of the United States. As far as I know, the places to which some people want to move, countries like Canada, Australia, England and Spain, aren't enemies of the United States.\nBack to the topic at hand -- I can't decide which is worse: calling for the disenfranchised to die or that the disenfranchised have given up and are running away instead of fighting to keep the country balanced. It is a complete failure of American principles on both sides of the ideological line. Saying that someone who is unhappy with the status quo doesn't deserve to be an American is elitist and stinks of hypocrisy and fascism.\nTo get away from these sorts of exclusionary attitudes is why the United States was created in the first place. The Iraqi dictatorship kills dissidents. The Chinese communist party jails journalists and pokes their political agitators with electric cattle prods while they languish in remote detention centers. Speaking out against the royal family of Saudi Arabia is punishable by a number of methods, including being beheaded in a public courtyard in full view of a shopping mall. Is this what 52 percent of Americans want to become?\nOn the other side, people who want to run away do the country a great disservice. By leaving they let the powers that be run amok without question or opposition. This would ensure that the government the deserters are running away from would remain unchallenged for years to come. Every time minority voices are silenced, either by force or by choice, the nation slips further down the slope toward being a homogenized factory of mindless nationalists.\nFor either party, it's a zero-win situation.\nThe people who want to leave America have to realize that Bush will only be in office for four years. After that, there will be an opportunity for change, but if no one is here to advocate change, the power balance won't tilt and the situation will only get worse. \nSelfishness is a horrible epidemic here in the United States. Those who want to abandon their nation are selfish, and those who would stifle opposition in this country are worse than selfish.\nA quote from a Frenchman, of all people, comes to mind in describing this phenomenon. Biologist Jean Rostrand hit the nail on the head when he said the following more than 40 years ago:\n"I don't judge a regime by the damning criticism of the opposition, but by the ingenuous praise of the partisan."\nNotice how he used "regime" rather than nation. That should tell you something.