Serious question: Are passports becoming imperative?

[AverageJoe]

Neither my wife nor I hold a passport and I am becoming more concerned each day that this is a major mistake on our part.

I realize that this question would have sounded completely insane just a few years ago, and many people might still think it reeks of paranoia, but I am completely serious: Do you believe we are actually approaching a moment when it will be too late to leave the United States in the same way it was eventually too late to leave Nazi Germany? Are people without passports being foolish?

I'm not trying to be alarmist--though alarm seems to be the only sane response--as the details of the NSA domestic spying program continue to leak out, each one worse than the one before. Couple that with Bush's plan to militarize our southern border, a national media whose job it is to shore up the administration and to undermine its enemies, the free-fall of the dollar, and the avalanche of reports of criminal activities finally being too great for even the corporate media to completely ignore--things we've known about or suspected here at DU for a very long time--and you find a horrible, entrenched pattern. I'm trying to objectively assess the situation and make a reasonable decision.

I know it's just a good thing, in general, to have a passport. But seriously, are we nearing the point where it becomes a matter of our freedom, or even our survival?

Feel free to tell me I'm nuts, but I truly hope to get some opinions on this.