The Wall Street Journal: "Why I Chose the Red, White and Blue"

Author and journalist Philip Delves Broughton writes in the Wall Street Journal on his decision to become a United States citizen:

I had been told that the 2013 model of U.S. citizenship was the lemon on the international lot. The Internal Revenue Service would have its claws into me for life. The jihadists would mark me as a demon of the Great Satan. Canada and Australia were more welcoming. Europe has a stronger social safety net. Asia has more economic opportunities. What was I thinking?...

I could simply have renewed my green card. But it no longer seemed enough, either in terms of rights or responsibilities. I was receiving the privilege of living here on the cheap.

And so he became a citizen at a ceremony conducted by the "89-year-old federal judge, Ellen Bree Burns, and an official from the Department of Homeland Security wearing a Stars and Stripes necktie." There was also a flag flown over the Capitol to mark the occasion.