Facebook Disgrace / Eduardo Severin

Facebook founder, Eduardo Severein, a nationalized U.S. Citizen claims to have given up his citizenship to avoid paying taxes, which would sky rocket because of IPO. He was a child when he joined us in U. S. as a family member. This boggled my mind. Being the tribal animal I am, I immediately turned to chauvinistic revenge.  Perhaps we (our government) should reject the right of Facebook to do business in the United States. However, we did not reject BP’s right to do business here. after their arrogant response to Gulf the Mexico oil disaster so that does not seem right. I concede that the number of congressmen bought by the oil industry outnumbers those bought by the naive Severn by a huge margin, still the small number of conservative congressmen offended by his actions makes the idea foolish—the Grover Norquist disciples, who give short shrift to their country in the name of greed. The next option is to refuse to buy shares on his soon to happen, IPO. That too is not a feasible idea; greedy people who populate the halls of Wall Street care nothing about anything that might diminish their chance to make big money.  Some how, it would be more American to start a campaign to encourage followers to drop their membership to Facebook, which depends on its membership for its economic strength. This last option is the one I would endorse.

The heart of the matter is that I do not know what it takes to reject one’s citizenship. In conversations I have had with embassy officials while living as an expatriate, they pointed out to me that treason was the one example of something that would do it. When I asked what I had to do to commit treason they could not tell me.  The conservation was initiated by my fear that doing something wrong might jeopardize my U. S. citizenship something I consider sacrosanct. They point to Lee Harvey Oswald, who we recalled torn up his passport and threw it into the face of the official in the Moscow Embassy. After he did this, it wasn’t long before he walked into the United States without a problem and then did the dirt we all know about. I am not saying Severin is anywhere near to being a Lee Harvey Oswald, Oswald is mentioned only because he is a well-known example of someone who tried to drop his U.S. citizenship, which Severin wants to do. In other words, he cannot just say he is no longer a U. S. Citizen. Regardless, this thought brings up another possibility for punishing his avarice. Everyone should drop membership to Facebook as mentioned above but at the same time, the government should grant his wish, take away his citizenship, and make him a persona non grata. There is no greater punishment for the greedy than to take away his money and his citizenship, which is what allowed him to make his money.