Am I just going to let the place fall to ruin because I didn't get my way this time?
No. Let it fall to ruin because that's where it's headed regardless.
they will need my help next time.
You can't help them.
I have to hope that more people will want to make things better.
Narrator: they actually want to make it worse, as you can see by the result of this election.
hope for a better tomorrow.
How many more years or elections will you fall back on "hope"? Remember how just yesterday nobody thought the fascist could possibly win?
It'd be selfish for me to leave.
Staying is the easy way out. It allows you to fall back on the tried and failed "things will surely get better" delusion.
When you have young children, you have a choice: you can subject them to a life carrying on your battle fighting against creeping fascism and oligarchy, or you can give them a life elsewhere they can breathe and live and enjoy life.
I left the US because I wished to live deliberately, to experience the essential joy of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.
I suspect you're joking. But most developed countries wont accept anyone with a criminal record.