Appreciate your perspective. I disagree on a few points but I think your move to the Netherlands is right for you. I don't think it's going to be very product

Appreciate your perspective. I disagree on a few points but I think your move to the Netherlands is right for you. I don't think it's going to be very productive to continue on some of these points, although I have to be honest I think you're just kind of offloading the responsibility of protecting you onto someone else and hoping for the best when you relinquish legal means of armed defense. But it's worked for the past several decades (as long as you don't look further back), for most the people most the time in the Netherlands, and you're probably of European appearance, so there may not be much risk to you personally if you're surrounded by people who may see you as one of their own. Fortunately as someone of international mobility it's a decision for you rather than a position of no alternative. I think we've pretty much drilled down into political reasons being a very significant reason for your choices. I also lament the problem of poor political tractability in the US, although I think some of this has to do with federal consolidation of power in a nation with wide interests, culture, region, economy, and values. EU has solved this by have a loose confederation of nation which for each individual nation may be more homogenous than US, and maybe the US could offer more to different sets of values by breaking up some of the federal power that forces bad compromises for everyone.