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ExtremeDullard

@ ExtremeDullard @lemmy.sdf.org

Posts
103
Comments
700
Joined
3 yr. ago

  • Fearful of Trump, some Americans look to make a life in Europe

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  • Renounciation costs (or at least used to cost) a few thousand dollars. That's money you quickly recoup by not paying any US taxes.

    Besides, I don't see why I should pay Uncle Sam anything of what I earn abroard, living abroad and working in a foreign company, not using any American services or infrastructure. The only rational Uncle Sam has to offer for extracting taxes from US citizens residing abroad is essentially "Pay up or else..." That's a racket, pure and simple: even if it wasn't financially sound, I don't pay racketeers.

    What other pros/cons are there?

    Not being an American is a big pro. Your conscience is less dirty.

    And as of Apr 14, 2025, the safety of not living in a dictatorship where the rule of law doesn't apply anymore is also a big plus.

    And while not directly linked to citizenship proper, living abroad offers many advantages: working healthcare, a decent education for your children, publc services that work... Yes, you pay a lot of taxes in Europe, but you know what you get out of it. The quality of life in Europe is much higher than in the US. And - I know it sounds weird but it's true - you don't need the constant background paranoia you need to live in the US. You don't realize the paranoia is there until you leave and then it lifts from you. It's a real thing.

    But of course you can experience all that while still being an American. Not being American is mostly a matter of refusing to be associated with - and finance - an amoral society.

  • Zuckerberg Sailed 5,300 Miles with Two Superyachts to Helicopter Up a Mountain

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  • Silver lining: he didn't have a skiing accident, so he didn't end up costing the Norwegian taxpayer money to rescue him.

  • Why Flatpak Apps Use So Much Disk Space on Linux

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  • From the article:

    This means the same file that belongs to multiple applications or runtimes is only stored once on disk

    So... just like how it was before Flatpaks.

    For some historical perspective, shared libraries - the things Flatpaks "solve" - were originally a solution to the size of self-contained a.out programs getting out of hand.

    Everything old is new again 🙂

  • Fearful of Trump, some Americans look to make a life in Europe

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  • You can but your life becomes one giant hell.

    If you don't have dual citizenship like I had, your best bet is to move somewhere you like, stay there for a while as a resident, then apply for citizenship there. Then depending on your destination country, that either makes you dual-citizen and you have to renounced your US citizenship explicitely, or you have dual-citizenship for that country but not for the US or vice-versa, or your US citizenship instantly becomes invalid. In all cases, if you want to stop being American, Uncle Sam will make you cough up a bunch of money. Because the US is a country of racketeers.

  • Fearful of Trump, some Americans look to make a life in Europe

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  • It was easy for me: I had dual citizenship. I simply renounced the wrong one - which cost me a pretty penny: it's a real racket run by the US, this. But it paid for itself many times over in that I never had to pay US taxes for income I generated outside the US, which is also another US racket.

  • Fearful of Trump, some Americans look to make a life in Europe

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  • When I left, I went to Canada. Then the UK - which was in Europe back then. Then I lived in a bunch of countries in Europe. Then Australia. Then back to Europe. That's where I am now.

  • Fearful of Trump, some Americans look to make a life in Europe

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  • I left the US and renounced my citizenship 24 years ago, after Dubya shat out the USA Patriot Act and I knew the US would turn into a full-blown Nazi state some day.

    Best thing I ever did.

  • Your Favorite Open-Source Project Might Be in Trouble

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  • It's high time open source projects and anything to do with software freedom and privacy relocated outside of the US. It wasn't great before that a lot of them are hosted in the US, but now it's urgent. It's not even a matter of principle anymore.

  • ‘Uh, Yeah’: Trump Says It’s ‘Ok’ if He Causes a Recession

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  • Yeah, like playing a country record in reverse: your wife comes back, you house unburns and your dog undies.

  • ‘Uh, Yeah’: Trump Says It’s ‘Ok’ if He Causes a Recession

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  • He did say he would lower prices on day one, and prices on day one of his presidency were definitely lower. So he delivered, you just have to think backward in time.

  • Trump Posts AI-Generated Image of Himself as Pope

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  • This guy is so crass and so gormless he doesn't hesitate for one second to spit in the face of 1.5bn Catholics in the world.

    Having said that, I wouldn't mind a picture of Trump as a dead Pope...

  • What’s a thing you miss that you’re 90% sure was objectively awful?

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  • No, it's the smell at the pump. Nothing to do with how the engine feeds itself. Yeah, leaded gasoline smelled different. "Sweeter" or something. Maybe it wasn't the lead, and maybe whatever replaced the lead inside modern gasoline is what smells different, but it definitely isn't the same.

    It's not like gasoline smelled better, it's just that I remember smelling that smell when the entire family went on summer holidays and we kids were allowed to stretch our legs while our dad gassed up the car. Good times and good memories!

  • Medical journals hit with threatening letters from Justice Department

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  • It's strange how all dictatorships have the same control freak obsessions with the same things around the world, across eras:

    • Obsession with squelching science and education
    • Obsession with denying basic reality and facts
    • Obsession with religions and cults of various kinds
    • Obsession with the population's natality
    • Obsession with people's sex habits and the contents of their pants

    Trump's regime, being a run-of-the-mill fascist dictatorship, is no different and ticks all the boxes.

  • What’s a thing you miss that you’re 90% sure was objectively awful?

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  • I'm way past that point.

    Missing your youth first hits you when you start having small health issues you didn't have before. And then it gradually gets worse. There's no crisis about it.

  • What’s a thing you miss that you’re 90% sure was objectively awful?

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  • Nah. I just miss my youth.

  • What’s a thing you miss that you’re 90% sure was objectively awful?

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  • Come to think of it, I miss school and I miss the military. They were both godawful, but I was young.

  • What’s a thing you miss that you’re 90% sure was objectively awful?

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  • Don't.

    Because what he left out is that for those 5 minutes of peaceful enjoyable smoking, you have to endure the rest of the day craving, smelling like dog shit, getting an earful from your supervisor at work because you're constantly out for a smoke, spending your life's savings at the tobacconist, and driving 20 miles in the middle of the night to find a pack of smokes in a convenience store in the middle of the night when all the other stores are closed. Not to mention long term health issues of course.

    That's an expensive 5 minutes of enjoyment, trust me on that one.

  • What’s a thing you miss that you’re 90% sure was objectively awful?

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  • The smell of leaded gasoline.The smell of a fine cigar: I quit smoking 14 years ago but I miss that.

    And I'm 200% sure they were awful.

  • Open-source AI platform for ear-based sensing applications

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  • ear-based sensing applications

    also known as "listening".

  • Removed Deleted Locked

    Permanently Deleted

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  • Would you have vacationed in Germany in 1934? Of course you wouldn't've, given the choice.

    Same thing.