Earlier today, the Handleszeiting posted a wonderful article critical of America’s treasured national origin discrimination titled:
Amerikanische Bürger: Herkunft als Hürde
American Citizens: National Origin is a Hurdle
Shortly afterwards, this was picked up by Die Welt with a much more fitting title:
Fiskus vertreibt US-Bürger aus der Schweiz
The Treasury is ethnically cleansing US citizens from Switzerland
Then, America woke up and immediately the title changed, shifting the blame:
US-Bürger in der Schweiz geben ihre Pässe ab
US Citizens are turning in their passports
The article mentions that the US embassy in Bern refuses to be honest and transparent about the number of Americans who are turning in their passports.
Laut Schätzungen der amerikanischen Gemeinschaft haben letztes Jahr 700 bis 900 US-Bürger in der Schweiz ihren Pass abgegeben. Die Botschaft in Bern will diese Zahl nicht kommentieren.
According to estimates made by the Amerian community, around 700-900 American citizens in Switzerland gave up their passports last year. The Embassy in Bern does not want to comment on this number.
Thanks for drawing attention to the articles my language limitations would not allow me to see, but thanks to google translate, at least now I can get the flavor of what is being said.
You have probably heard the old joke…
What do you call someone who speaks 3 languages?
Answer Tri-lingual.
What do you call someone who speaks 2 languages?
Answer Bi-lingual.
What do you call someone who speaks ONE language?
Answer: American
I really regret being raised and educated in the mid-west with the ear and the tongue for just one! 🙂
@swisspinoy, What do you mean by America woke up and the title changed?
Do you think the newspaper received some threats and changed it?
Where is the liberty of press?
Google Translate on the last link: http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.welt.de%2Fwirtschaft%2Farticle117599648%2FUS-Buerger-in-der-Schweiz-geben-ihre-Paesse-ab.html&act=url
You’ve got to love the free press.
@Chris, the first title was published before noon in Germany, in the wee hours of the morning in the US when most Americans were sleeping. The title then changed around the time that Americans in the east coast went to work or shortly afterwards. So, it is possible that the paper got pressured by the US to change the title.
…entirely likely.
The ethnic cleansing of American expats. This is exactly what is happening.
@Joe Blow
Yep. Either by them going home, or by relinquishing, an ethnic cleansing is indeed happening.
Not quite on topic but here’s the latest statement from Snowden, which contains a phrase (or at least a concept) we’ve mentioned quite often here: “citizenship as a weapon”
http://wikileaks.org/Statement-from-Edward-Snowden-in.html?snow
Snowden said; “……The Obama administration has now adopted the strategy of using citizenship as a weapon.”
So very true. And so very sad.
So telling that the embassy will not comment on the number of those in Switzerland renouncing their US status.
Can we find out how many in Canada have renounced at the embassy and the consulates? I am certain that Ambassador Jacobson knows. Surely that can’t be a secret of US national security importance. Very embarassing to the US yes, but not a state secret.
Yes, as Snowdon said, the US uses citizenship and the passport as a weapon. They punished Paul Robeson by revoking his passport in 1950, until “In 1958, the Supreme Court ruled that a citizen’s right to travel could not be taken away without due process and Robeson’ passport was returned. ” http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6440
And as we have seen, the US government, the IRS, and Treasury uses our US status as a weapon of double and confiscatory extraterritorial taxation, forcing us to comply by making threats of exile, of travel restrictions and threats to our access to US resident family, disrupting our non-US families abroad, discriminating against those deemed incompetent to renounce, etc.
US citizenship has become our ball and chain – very difficult or impossible to remove, dragging us down even when we were born outside the US, or have naturalized as a citizen elsewhere, and live permanently in another country. It claims our children too – in a kind of lifelong indentured servitude.
Also in 1950, the US stripped a Marine of his US citizenship simply because he thought that he would be fined if he didn’t vote in Australia!
Stateless because he voted
This is ironic about the US State department’s shameful past treatment of Paul Robeson;
See this from 2012:
Susan Webb , February 1 2012 http://www.peoplesworld.org/u-s-information-center-named-for-paul-robeson/
“…At a ceremony last week, the United States Embassy in Jamaica named its Information Resource Center for the African American singer-actor-activist Paul Robeson.
Ironically, 52 years ago, the State Department revoked Robeson’s passport because of his outspoken opposition to U.S. Cold War policies abroad and Jim Crow racism at home, his activism on behalf of labor and civil rights, and his association with the Communist Party USA. The action was a blow aimed at Robeson’s international role as a performer and advocate for peace and the common interests of working people throughout the world. After an eight-year struggle, and the waning of the McCarthy witch-hunt era, the State Department restored his passport in 1958.The idea of naming the information center for Robeson did not originate with the State Department……..”
Paul Robeson said; ““You Are the Un-Americans, and You Ought to be Ashamed of Yourselves”: Paul Robeson Appears Before HUAC” http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6440
A poll shows that more Americans see Snowden as a patriot than as a traitor. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/26/us-usa-security-snowden-poll-idUSBRE95P1A420130626 Will the State Department name something after Snowden 53 years from now?
@Badger
You say:
“US citizenship has become our ball and chain – very difficult or impossible to remove, dragging us down even when we were born outside the US, or have naturalized as a citizen elsewhere, and live permanently in another country. It claims our children too – in a kind of lifelong indentured servitude.”
Question for you:
Have you considered simply declaring yourself to be a free person and leaving it at that?
“……..U.S. Justice Department spokeswoman Nanda Chitre rejected Snowden’s allegation that he was marooned, “since he is still a United States citizen and his country is willing to take him back.”
“As the State Department has already said, the U.S. government is prepared to issue individuals wanted on felony charges a one entry travel document to return home,” she said……… http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/snowden-has-asked-for-political-asylum-in-russia-report/article12903246/
Ah yes, the one way entry into Mordor.
Meanwhile, the very same US that is forcing FATCA on the rest of the world, is also bugging them http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/us-plays-down-spying-reports-amid-eu-outrage/article12902176/ “….US intelligence services are spying on the European Union mission in New York and its embassy in Washington, according to the latest top secret US National Security Agency documents leaked by the whistleblower Edward Snowden.
One document lists 38 embassies and missions, describing them as “targets”. It details an extraordinary range of spying methods used against each target, from bugs implanted in electronic communications gear to taps into cables to the collection of transmissions with specialised antennae.
Along with traditional ideological adversaries and sensitive Middle Eastern countries, the list of targets includes the EU missions and the French, Italian and Greek embassies, as well as a number of other American allies, including Japan, Mexico, South Korea, India and Turkey. The list in the September 2010 document does not mention the UK, Germany or other western European state….”
And what about Canada? Are we exempted? Would you believe the US if that is what it claims?
@USCitizenAbroad, I’m not sure what you mean? That I could just unilaterally declare myself a free person? In a practical sense, what would that mean for the future?
To comment on the articles wording…I don’t believe the change was made under any threats from the USA. The contents are the same, and only the headline changed. The translation provided by Swisspinoy for the first headline is wrong and semi inflammatory. The key word is “vertreibt” (vertreiben). By itself it means to expel, banish, exile. Used in this content it means that the US fiscal policy is driving Americans from Switzerland. It has absolutely nothing to do with ethnic cleansing. The reason the headline was changed IMO is that it clarifies that Americans are not actually leaving Switzerland but that the ones that are here are giving up their passports and renouncing their citizenship
I had a laugh about the Handleszeiting article yesterday as someone had posted it over on the English Forum website with a Microsoft translation into English that came out as saying Americans were gaining citizenship and not losing it on their visits to the embassy in Bern.
@Mark, threats are certainly questionable, but pressure is highly possible. “Vertreibung” is often used to reference ethnic cleansing, such as seen with the following
the common understanding that the Vertreibung was a crime of “ethnic cleansing,”
Ethnic Cleansing in Galizien: Flucht und Vertreibung der Polen
Expulsion – Vertreibung. We make Expulsion – Verteibung information available in the hopes that the suffering brought about by post World War 2 Ethnic Cleansing of Eastern European Germans will not be forgotten.
Thus, the suggestion that the US treasury was engaged in “Vertreibung” hints towards human rights violations and thus the title had to change since the US government would otherwise have to justify its actions, which wouldn’t look good.
Driving Americans from Switzerland is similar to driving Jews from Germany, Palestinians from Israel, Christians from Iraq, Tutsis from Rwanda, Armenians from Turkey, etc. Yet, this situation is unique since neither the US nor Switzerland wish to drive anyone anywhere. This is rather the result of bad policy which is leading towards ethnic cleansing and promoting racism, such as indicated with the following comment to the article:
@JustMe: “I really regret being raised and educated in the mid-west with the ear and the tongue for just one! :)”
You’re in good company. Even the Harvard-educated “wunderkind” who serves as US President doesn’t speak a foreign language:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-502443_162-4254480-502443.html
On the other hand, his nemesis, Vladimir Putin, speaks the language of Goethe and Schiller well enough to address the German Bundestag in it. If interested, his German speech starts at about 2:40: