We can’t afford these tax exiles

Monday March 30 2009

It is called ‘an Irish solution to an Irish problem’, ‘the ultimate escape plan’, and reinforces the notion that ‘only little people pay tax’. That is, moving offshore to escape the clutches of the Irish tax authorities. This needs to be stopped now.

Ireland needs to adopt the American tax system whereby an Irish citizen would have to renounce his citizenship before he could move abroad to with his cash.

We need a law that will tax the assets of those who leave for good on their way ‘out the door’, as if they were selling their assets, and a provision needs to be put in place that would tax Irish heirs on amounts given or left to them by ex-Irish citizens. Taxing the recipient instead of the donor would make it harder to get around any new tax laws.

Ireland Inc could never afford these tax exile prima donnas. In the current economic climate they need to be told that if they are not prepared to be part of the solution, they will no longer be allowed to be part of the problem.

To remove their citizenship and require them to apply for a ‘tourist visa’ to visit Ireland might concentrate their minds.

We can no longer afford freeloaders in our society.

Mick Murphy

Model Farm Road, Cork

Of course, one of the immediate and appropriate responses to a screed like this is, “‘We’, who?”

Would that be the “we” which excludes all Irish tax slaves who recognize, rightly, that taxation is theft?

Would that be the “we” which excludes all the remaining Irish tax slaves who make every effort to “cheat” the taxman by underreporting, claiming legally impermissible deductions, etc.?

Would that be the “we” which excludes all the remaining Irish tax slaves who structure their investments, businesses and other economic activities such as to legally reduce the amount of tax they pay?

Would that be the “we” which excludes all the remaining Irish tax slaves who, knowing that they could do more for the State, consistently fail to send in extra “donations” to the government alongside their tax extortion payments?

Would that be the “we” which excludes all the remaining Irish tax slaves who — Catholic, Protestant or neither — consistently engage in the democracy’s sacrament, voting, with an eye toward electing candidates who promise to reduce their taxes?

That’s right, Mick Murphy, you go. You watch a few of your fellow slaves attempt to shed the yoke, and instead of rallying for freedom, call out to your masters to make the yokes heavier. You’re a goddamned hero.

Issuance went without problems; see image at right. I’m now once again fully in compliance with all laws of the Slovak Republic regarding legal stays of foreigners. Hooray!

Especially fun is the comparison of this Most Holy Document to the one it was issued to replace. Where my old visa (the image I posted of which, unfortunately, has the relevant bit blacked out) had “USA”, my new one displays “BEZ”, with bez being the Slovak word for “without”, presumably with reference to an implied field label of “citizenship”.

My substitute Slovak temporary residence permit sticker, as affixed to my Stateless Person's Travel Document. I can has traveling paprz, plz?

An interesting bit. My visa is a “temporary residence”. I asked the cops there when I could apply for permanent residence. “After 5 years of legal residency,” they told me. Huh, I thought it had been 3 years… now I have to do some reading of obsolete versions of the Act on Foreigners’ Stays in the Slovak Republic, or whatever it’s called, along with inquiring as to which version of the law will apply to me. Whatever. The only real difference between temporary and permanent residence here is that the permanent resident only has to turn up at the Aliens’ police once every 5 or 10 years, as opposed to every 12-18 months, for a new grant of permission to draw breath, metabolize, excrete and procreate on the territory of the Slovak Republic. I asked, then, when can I apply for Slovak citizenship — not, necessarily, that I plan to, but that I should at least have information of that sort at my fingertips. After a bit of back-room talking with higher-ups, the young officer who I’ve been interacting with there since I first presented myself for issuance of a stateless person’s travel document returned to tell me that I really ought to inquire at a different office, the obvodný úrad (the “District Office”, or something to that effect), since it’s the good folks there, rather than the Aliens’ Police, who deal with citizenship issues.

While he was away from the front desk, I chatted with the other cop-lady there who had attended me originally, stickered my traveling papers, canceled my stamps, solicited my signatures, and so on. I mentioned to her the fact that, which the Slovak legislation on foreigners’ stays refers two two different types of ordinary stay with varied timing characteristics — prechodný pobyt, temporary residence, and trvalý pobyt, permanent residence — the legislation on citizenship, as it pertains to stateless persons living legally in the territory, provides that a stateless person legally resident in the Slovak Republic can apply for citizenship after 3 years of nepretržitý pobyt (continuous residence).

“Huh, that’s interesting,” she said. “Well, go on and ask them folks at the obvodný úrad, and they’ll get you sorted out.”

I also submitted an application there for issuance of a replacement sticker for my residence permit, which I’ll have to pick up there in a couple of weeks.

Slovakia stateless person's 1954 Convention Travel Document, cover

So, I’m now an officially-documented stateless person. I’m also once again officially a human being, at least as far as concerns those annoying institutions like banks, government offices and so on, which treat people like they don’t exist if they don’t have currently-valid state identity papers.

Surprising to me, my new Proof of Humanity actually does have information and the Slovak national regalia on the front cover.

Some interesting text, verbatim from the English version, from page 33:

The holder of travel document under the Convention of 28 September 1954 is an alien with legal status of a person without state citizenship, who was granted a permission for permanent residence in the territory of the Slovak Republic. He/she is under protection of the Slovak Republic. All whom it may concern are hereby requested to afford the holder of this travel document all necessary aid and protection according to international law.

And the data page

Oooooh, protection!

Some typical translation errors there with regard to the use of articles. Neat conflict, too, between what this document says and what my visa says. I’m actually here on a temporary residence permit, not permanent.

In any case, coming back from bureaucroland I couldn’t get Iron Maiden’s old track “Back in The Village” out of my head.

Welcome back to The Village, Number Six.

(Updated: linked to full-resolution images)

Iron Maiden, “Back in the Village”, Powerslave, 1984.

Turn the spotlights on the people,
Switch the dial and eat the worm.
Take your chances, kill the engine,
Drop your bombs and let it burn.

White flags shot to ribbons,
The truce is black and burned,
Shellshock in the kitchen,
Tables overturned.

CHORUS
Back in the village again,
In the village.
I’m back in the village again.

Throwing dice now, rolling loaded,
I see sixes all the way.
In a black hole, and I’m spinning
As my wings get shot away.

BRIDGE
Questions are a burden,
And answers are a prison for oneself,
Shellshock in the kitchen,
Tables start to burn.

CHORUS

No breaks on the inside,
Paper cats and burning barns,
There’s a fox among the chickens,
And a killer in the hounds.

BRIDGE

CHORUS

But still we walk into the valley,
And others try to kill the inner flame,
We’re burning brighter than before,
I don’t have a number, I’M A NAME!

CHORUS x2

Back in the village,
And I’m back in the village,
And I’m back in the village, again

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There was much waiting around the office to do, as the staffers there were quite unfamiliar with the process and regulations for folks like me.

I was required to also submit a certified translation into Slovak of my Certificate of Loss of Nationality of the United States and €33.50 in official duty stamps.

My photograph and fingerprints were taken, and I provided a digitized signature. Looks like my document will have the hated RFID chip with biometric data embedded in it.

In return for all this I received the document below, confirming acceptance and approval of the application. I will return in 2-3 weeks to pick up my passport-that-isn’t-a-passport and to submit another application (and €4.50 in duty stamps), this time for re-issuance of my residence permit sticker. I’ll have to return once more a couple of weeks after that to pick up the sticker.

Potvrdenie o prijatí žiadosti o vydanie cestovného dokladu cudzinca (Dohovor z 28. septembra 1954)

Číslo žiadosti:                  EC-ECBA1-090216-001
Číslo záznamu (Č.p.:):    UHCP-727/RHCP-BA-OCP-Z-2009
Dátum podania:              16.2.2009
Pracovisko podania:      EC2 Bratislava
Adresa pracoviska:        HROBÁKOVÁ 1237/44 BRATISLAVA

Meno:                                             Michael Jude
Priezvisko:                                     Gogulski
Tituly:
Dátum a miesto narodenia:    8.8.1972, Phoenix
Štátna príslušnosť:                  Osoba bez štátnej príslušnosti

Žiadosť o vydanie cestovného dokladu cudzinca (Dohovor z 28. septembra 1954) bola SCHVÁLENÁ

Poučenie:
Žiadateľ bol poučený, že doklad si môže vyzdvihnúť výhradne na tom útvare, na ktorom požiadal o jeho vydanie.

Žiadosť prijal (meno a priezvisko):        Pečiatka a podpis prijímajúceho orgánu:
XXX XXX                                                           [illegible signature, stamp]

Confirmation of acceptance of application for issuance of foreigner’s travel document (Convention of 28 September 1954)

Application number:        EC-ECBA1-090216-001
Record number:                UHCP-727/RHCP-BA-OCP-Z-2009
Submission date:              16.2.2009
Submission workplace:    EC2 Bratislava
Workplace address:           HROBÁKOVÁ 1237/44 BRATISLAVA

Name:                                     Michael Jude
Surname:                               Gogulski
Titles:
Date and place of birth:    8.8.1972, Phoenix
Citizenship:                       Stateless person

The application for issuance of a foreigner’s travel document (Convention of 28 September 1954) was APPROVED

Guidance:
The applicant was advised that the document can be picked up exclusively at that office to which he applied for its issuance.

Application accepted by (name & surname):    Accepting authority’s stamp & signature:
XXX XXX                                                                  [illegible signature, stamp]

I have two tasks:

• Exchange a quantity of Slovak koruna banknotes for euro notes
• Purchase a number of commemorative coins for a friend who is a collector

I hand over the banknotes, my card with my account number and my canceled US passport, asking to exchange the money for euros. The teller lady flips through the passport a few times, checking the data page and my visa page. She types in the passport number and confirms it against my account records on her computer screen, satisfied that they match. She then returns to look, curiously, at the four holes punched through the passport booklet, then picks up a telephone, signaling me to wait a bit.

Nope, that's not the guy.

A supervisor lady comes over. I tell her that the passport is canceled. She steps away to speak to someone out of sight for a few seconds, and comes back to tell me that they can’t accept the passport since it’s no longer valid. “I’m sorry,” I say, “but I probably don’t have any document, then, that will be sufficient.” I present my still-valid Florida driver’s license and the notarized copy of passport and visa I had made before the passport was canceled. No love. The supervisor steps away again, this time for about ten minutes. She’s on the telephone with someone.

While she’s away, I briefly address the teller, saying, “This is a matter of identity; I lost my citizenship, not my identity.” She just smiles emptily, and asks my patience for waiting.

The supervisor comes back and apologizes, saying that she’s spoken to the bank’s legal department. The passport can’t be accepted since it’s no longer a valid document.

All I wanted to do was exchange one pile of fiat currency for a different pile, and maybe buy some shiny metal tokens with the remainder. I didn’t even need any access to my accounts.

I wonder if, when the US State Department person was operating the hole punch on my passport, little wisps of smoke might have been observed coming out — magic smoke which wafted away, carrying my identity as well as my citizenship along with it.

There was a time when presenting ID at a bank was done for only one purpose: to verify that the person attempting to withdraw money from a given account is actually an owner of that account. Just ten years ago in the US I could walk into a bank and deposit cash or endorsed checks into any account, even one I didn’t own, without needing to present any ID at all. I haven’t tracked exactly what’s gone on in the US banking system lately, but with the introduction of POS fingerprinting and all manner of other “Know Your Customer” measures and such mandated under the guise of combating money laundering — which isn’t even a real crime — I imagine the situation there has only gotten worse.

You are not the bank’s customer any more. The bank’s primary customer is the state. You are just an epiphenomenon, fluttering about that core, corrupt relationship.

If the bank people wanted to serve me, they would have responded to my letter asking about alternative forms of identification differently than they did. Instead of saying, “you must bring us one of these official documents,” they could have said, “come to our office, satisfy us of your identity; we will then take your photo and put it in the computer, and establish a password by which you can access your account at the branch.”

Remarkably, I can log on to the bank’s internet banking website using nothing more than a password and GRID Card code. I can move money between accounts, issue payment orders, even invest in securities. Nobody even needs to see my face. Yet that same method of authentication is unavailable or unacceptable if I appear in person at the branch.

So, whatever. My collector friend won’t get his coins unless he can find someone else in Slovakia to deal with it for him. And I’ll phone up the guy I know who operates as a black-market money changer and see what kind of rate he’s giving on Slovak koruna notes. I’ll bet it’s still better than the official exchange rate.

Roderick, do I get Agorist Demerit Points for this, or issue them?

Audio, direct from Radio Slovakia International, unedited, 12.3MB, 26min 52sec (my segment begins around 15:00): streaming MP3 — downloadable MP3 (no longer available)

Google Video, trimmed to just my segment (11min 2sec):

TRANSCRIPT

Commentator: On the eighth of December, 2008, there was a press release that was different from the rest. A 36-year-old American, Mike Gogulski, started a process to become a stateless person and renounced his American passport and citizenship. This is not an everyday thing, so we talked to him on his feelings about the US and soon being a person of no state. Christopher George met him in our studio.

Christopher George: Before the interview, I must state that Radio Slovakia International, as an institution, does not share the ideas and ideology of Mr. Gogulski, but feel he has the right to express his own opinion via our broadcasts.

Mike Gogulski: My name is Mike Gogulski, I’m 36, a former American living here in Bratislava.

CG: How long have you been here?

MG: I’ve been legally resident for about two and a half years, and I’ve been visiting the country since about 2004… mid-2004.

CG: When did you start the process of becoming a person of no state?

MG: Well, in very real terms, the process only began a couple of weeks ago when I first visited the American embassy here in Bratislava…

CG: A few weeks ago?

MG: Two weeks ago, to actually start filing the paperwork. The mental process is one that started quite a long time ago… I suppose — really about ten years — when I first had this idea that said, “I want to leave America, go live somewhere else.”

CG: What is your idea of the US government… or the US in general, as an American?

MG: Well, the …

CG: …as an ex-American…

MG: …as an ex-American? Well, like every government, the United States government in my view is a criminal organization, it just happens to be one of the most powerful ones in existence today. So, where I see American politicians talking loudly about ideas of freedom and democracy and free markets, the reality, I think, is rather different.

CG: Do you believe in the system? Do you believe in American politicians when they go electioneering and so on? Do you believe that … they’re a politician and they have a set of beliefs that they will follow?

MG: With respect to politicians there’s a couple of important things that I believe. The first is that the desire for power over other human beings really ought to be considered a sort of mental illness. The other is that politicians, especially at the national level… they don’t hold the real power in the system. The real power is held by what you could call plutocratic interests… the politicians are the instruments for the implementation of their policy.

CG: Do you think this is problematic in the system in that most politicians are sponsored by various companies and lobbyists and so on before they even get into office, and when they are, they…?

MG: Well, yes, sure, there are any number of cases that you could look back on and see politicians taking campaign contributions from certain industries or from certain companies then later repay the favor by sponsoring or signing on to legislation that favors those entities, even when those acts of government are contrary to the interests of the people. So, sure.

CG: Your attempt to become a person of no state in relation to Slovakia… is this a place where it is possible and easy to fulfill this goal?

MG: From my reading of the law and the treaties regarding statelessness and stateless persons, I believe that in Slovakia it is possible to become a stateless person, if one thinks that’s desirable. Is it easy? I don’t know yet. I’m just beginning a bureaucratic process with the Interior Ministry, by way of the Aliens’ Police, to become documented as a stateless person. Slovakia is signatory to one UN treaty on the status of refugees and two on the treatment of stateless persons which set up a number of conditions that give congruent rights to stateless people legally in the territory as are enjoyed by citizens and legal residents with citizenship.

CG: I have here in front of me a scan of your trvalý pobyt, which means your residence permit…

MG: My residence permit.

CG: And it says that it expires on the 21st of the fifth [sic], 2010…

MG: Correct.

CG: Do you see this as problematic? What is the process? You’ll have to go there and renew it, of course…

MG: My understanding right now is that… I’ve sent a letter to the Foreign Police saying I forfeited my American passport, which contained my povolenie na trvalý pobyt… na prechodný pobyt, actually, it’s temporary, not permanent…

CG: Oh, it’s not even trvalý…

MG: Yeah. My understanding is that my legal residence here is tied to my person, not to my citizenship. So, I’m still a legal resident by virtue of a file entry having been made at the Foreign Police office. I’m applying now for them to issue a 1954 Convention Travel Document for me as a stateless person and then re-issue the visa sticker.

CG: So, do you see any problems in the future with extending your residency permit?

MG: If the Slovak government decides that I am “undesirable”, for whatever reason, and makes a notation in my residency file with the Foreign Police, the Foreign Police have broad discretion to refuse to renew or grant a residence permit. So it is possible that they would refuse to renew it. What position would that put me in? I’m not exactly certain. I would be a stateless person now no longer legally present in the Slovak Republic. Would I be deportable to America? I’m not quite sure.

CG: And with regards to your application, do you see it being just a formality, and it’ll be accepted?

MG: I hope so. That’s certainly the impression that I got from a letter that I received from the Foreign Police in response to an inquiry about applying for a Stateless Person’s Travel Document, and in which I mentioned that I would renounce my American citizenship. Of course, you know, the bureaucracy likes to answer questions directly, so there may be other factors that come into play when I actually face the application and approval process. But I don’t expect anything dramatic.

CG: So your application went in on the 8th of December, if I remember, right?

MG: Well this was my application to renounce my US citizenship. I haven’t yet filed the application for these other documents from the Slovak government because I am waiting for a certificate from the American government certifying that I’ve actually lost my citizenship.

CG: How have the few days since then been? Has it been a normal average day, normal average week?

MG: Normal average days, normal average week… I go to the grocery store and I buy food and nobody asks me for ID. I go to the bank machine and withdraw cash and there’s no problem. I ride the bus and eat in restaurants and do my work. [ed: my final comment here, stating that my cat doesn't even realize anything has changed, was edited out of the broadcast.]

CG: Do you see this being a long, drawn-out process?

MG: I hope not. What I’ve been led to expect by the American embassy is there will be a period of up to 30 days while they process my application to renounce. By the end of that period I should either receive the Certificate of Loss of Nationality or receive a letter stating that my application has been rejected for some reason, together with my passport returned to me. After that, I will apply immediately to the Foreign Police for this Travel Document and my new visa… my replacement visa. That’s a process which can take up to three months. So, there’s a possibility that it might be March 8 or April 8 before I’m documented again.

CG: So, you obviously don’t see yourself going back to America.

MG: No plans…

CG: And, Slovakia? Are you interested in staying here?

MG: Well, I’ve been here for some time already and I feel quite at home here. My professional work as a translator is connected directly to the Slovak language. I have a small community of friends here. I don’t have any real desire to leave or to go anywhere else.

CG: And to other people, would you suggest this as something to do if they feel that they are against, or that they clash with the system?

MG: Well, it’s a terribly dangerous and risky kind of step to take, I think. I wouldn’t go out preaching that Americans ought to renounce their citizenship as a means of protest. However, if there are some who think they might want to do that, well, they’re certainly welcome to contact me through my website and ask me about my own experience. But there are limitations and restrictions that anybody doing that is going to have to accept.

CG: What about the current change that has been happening in America? Where do you see this, where do you see the new presidency going?

MG: There was a comedian back in the 1980s named Bobcat Goldthwait who once had a great line in one of his stand-up routines that said, “Blaming Ronald Reagan for how screwed up the country is is a little bit like blaming Ronald McDonald when you get a bad cheeseburger. Neither of them really run the show.” Barack Obama, a very charismatic politician who has rode himself into office kind of on a wave of messianic fervor, is already being revealed as a tool of the plutocratic elite that really controls American politics and American policy. So, as far as “change”? Maybe they’ll move some soldiers from Iraq to Afghanistan instead.

CG: So no administrative problems, really? Because it seems you have letters from most … embassy, and banks, and … I guess the list goes on. People and institutions that are happy with the situation, really.

MG: There were two main concerns for me in renouncing my citizenship. One is with respect to the identification function that a state passport provides. So, for example, if I walk into Tatra banka, where I’m a client, and ask to withdraw money in cash from my account, they want to see my passport. At the moment I don’t have a passport or a stateless person’s Travel Document, so what I have for this interim period while I’m undocumented, in order to manage the ID function, is, one, this notarized copy of my passport and visa. The second is I executed a power of attorney designating a friend of mine as being able to sign for all legal acts in my name. So, if I needed to withdraw cash from the bank, I would take her along to the bank branch and she would present her ID and sign for me, based on the power of attorney.

The other function of the passport, obviously, was to hold the residence permit sticker. Right now I don’t have that, so I could have a real problem if I were stopped by the police.

CG: If anyone out there wants to visit, or to find out more information about yourself, could you please give them the link?

MG: My personal blog, my website, is www.nostate.com, just n-o-s-t-a-t-e-dot-com.

A few hours ago at the American Embassy in Bratislava, I surrendered my United States passport, completing my “expatriating act” and making my renunciation of United States citizenship official. If everything is accepted and certified by someone back in the US at the State Department, I am a stateless person as of today, 8 December 2008.

Someone else's US passport... on fire!

I also submitted the IRS Form 8854 mentioned in my previous post, and there were several revisions needed to the various documents that I signed, filed, submitted, swore or affirmed to and had certified by the Consul. Repeated checking of things turned up several minor errors that needed to be corrected. A merry time was had by all in reviewing successive quintuplicate copies of documents, repeated signature and re-signature, unstapling and restapling corrected pages, and so on. I guess I was there for about an hour.

The Consul was kind enough to provide a certified letter on official embassy stationery for me to present to the Aliens’ Police (the visa authority) to document my status pending receipt of my Certificate of Loss of Nationality of the United States, which may help me cut through a bit of confusion when I contact them later in the week to inform them that my passport (and therefore my visa) is no longer in my hands. It reads:

My next steps:

• Get a notarized copy of the letter above (tomorrow).
• Draft a letter to the Aliens’ Police Director explaining what has happened and requesting information on my legal obligations with respect to the loss of my passport and the procedure to follow to apply for the stateless person’s travel document and a replacement visa sticker. Enclose certified copy of the above letter (tomorrow).
• Write and distribute a press release (tomorrow or Wednesday).
• Sit around waiting for my Certificate to arrive at the Embassy. I’ll get a phone call or email from them when it comes in (whenever Information Retrieval gets around to it). Call came in on 29 December 2008 that the certificate is in. Now I have to get down there and pick the silly thing up.
  
• Update my “About” page (*yawn*…).
• ???
• Profit!

I don’t know how many of the security cameras disguised as birdhouses around Hviezdoslav Square catch sight of me. Doesn’t matter, really. I also don’t bother with my usual survey of the people around, looking for the undercover secret police and intelligence agents who can sometimes be spotted in the vicinity through careful observation.

Hviezdoslav the bollard, via bratislava-photo.com

I haven’t been to the Embassy since its renovations were completed over a year ago. The visible signs of that renovation included moving the security perimeter of the compound outside the building proper into a small, newly-constructed building dedicated to being an access control choke point. A metal detector was added, supplementing the X-ray machine for visitor baggage. Perimiter fencing was extended to encompass the new man-trap building, and new vehicular denial devices installed at a couple of points. Modifications to the underground parking garage connected with the adjacent Carlton Hotel were performed in order to prevent close access to the Embassy premises by unapproved vehicles. Additionally, a passive cordon consisting of a series of bollards linking areas bounded by long fountains was added to prevent vehicular access from all but approved directions. One of the ironic features of this cordon is that the monumental statue of famed Slovak poet and parliamentarian Pavol Országh Hviezdoslav, the square’s namesake, has been incorporated into the bollard lines, thus making a symbol of Slovak cultural identity part of the American Imperium’s local outpost.

A small line of people wait outside the man-trap security building to speak with the woman behind the bulletproof glass. They are all hoping to pick up visas. They present their paper receipts, the woman looks through a box of documents, and to each one says to come back on Friday. A woman next to me asks me, in Slovak, something about Friday. “Sorry?” I say. “Oh, I mean…” she fumbles, switching to English. “Aj po slovensky,” I tell her, indicating that she can continue in Slovak. She asks me what the woman behind the bulletproof glass was telling the others, and I say that I don’t know, but that it appears the folks here must come back for their business on Friday because the Embassy is closing for the day in a few minutes and tomorrow, Thursday, is Thanksgiving, an American holiday.

I’m at the front of the line in about a minute, show my passport and tell the bulletproof lady I’m here to renounce my citizenship. “Okay,” she says, “but very quickly; we are closing.” She tells me to go to Window 5, and confirms that I know where that is.

At right, US Embassy in Bratislava. At left, the man-trap.

I shuffle around and enter the adjacent door as I am buzzed in, passing inside the man-trap. Backpack off and into the X-ray machine, pocket contents into the plastic tray for X-ray as well, and I pass through the metal detector — much less sensitive than those at airports, as my belt buckle and the studs in my shoes fail to set it off. One of the four guards in the room hands me a visitor’s badge and a receipt token for my mobile phone, which must remain at the security checkpoint until I am ready to leave the premises. I reclaim my backpack and pocket contents.

Through another door and out into the small parking area in front of the embassy, surrounded by high metal hurricane fencing. I enter the first door, turn, and find myself in an unfamiliar place. I take a few steps in, up a couple of stairs, and find myself in a small room with another bulletproof box containing a young United States Marine Corps junior officer. “Your badge, sir?” I show my badge, and he tells me I’m in the wrong place. Go to the next door down. Ah, right, the proles’ entrance. This door for ruling class tools only.

Back outside, and through the door that was always the entrance before. The security checkpoint used to be here, but now I just breeze in, turn right, through the door, up a few steps into a waiting room, turn left and into the sound-muffling, heavily camera-monitored room which is the place where petitioners to the almighty American State come to present their pleas, again to women safely ensconced behind bulletproof windows.

I approach Window 5, pull out my passport and all the documents I’ve brought with me, all pre-filled-in and ready for execution. After a few minutes’ wait, a Slovak woman employed by the Embassy comes to the window and asks how she can be of assistance. “Hello, I’m here to file these documents and take the oath to renounce my citizenship.” She pauses a moment, frozen, and then a sly smile steals across her face. “Are you sure?” she asks. “Yes, quite sure.” “And may I ask why?” she inquires. “Political reasons.” “And have you spoken about this with anyone?” Yes, I tell her, I’ve spoken with a great many people about it. “Ah, but anyone here?” she insists. “No, not yet.” “Very well,” she says, and invites me to pass my passport and documents to her through the narrow slot which presents the only opportunity for contact between the two worlds separated by the bulletproof glass. “Please take a seat in the waiting room, and I will call your name.”

I go back into the waiting room, plop my backpack on a chair and head over to a wall to examine a large poster with attached paper addendum laying out the fee schedule for the various “services” performed by the Embassy. A quick scan of the lists shows that there are no fees given for renouncing one’s citizenship. I sit down and pick up a week-old copy of Nový Čas, a trashy daily tabloid paper, and settle in to read a short editorial celebrating the fact that Slovaks no longer require a pre-arranged visa to visit the US as tourists, but doubting that the young people taking the most advantage of the “privilege” of visa-free travel reciprocity today really have any appreciation of how much the world has changed since the 1988 Candle Demonstration, which took place right outside where I am sitting now on Hviezdoslav Square and which was an important event toward the fall of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia.

“Mister Gogulski,” comes the woman’s voice over the loudspeaker. I shuffle back into the petitioning chamber.

“So,” the woman behind the translucent barrier tells me, “if you really want to do this, we need you to fill out this form, and contact us to make an appointment to speak to the Consul.” Again, the wry smile: in her eyes, perhaps, I am either insane or stupid — or both.

Form? What form? Oh, damnit. It’s the Questionnaire: Information for Determining Possible Loss of U.S. Citizenship. I forgot about that one. Nuts. Oh well, another day.

“One more thing,” I ask, packing up my things, “are there any fees for this?” “No,” she tells me.

“Thanks. See you on Friday,” I tell the woman, and leave for home.

The visa (pictured) is affixed as a sticker inside the US passport that I will soon surrender.

My permission to draw breath and metabolize on the territory of the Slovak Republic

Next steps:

• Obtain notarized, certified copies of my passport and visa, for use in lieu of the real things during the period prior to obtaining a stateless person’s travel document, or having my passport sent back to be with a rejection of my renunciation (early next week)
• Execute and have notarized a blanket power of attorney authorizing a friend to perform all legal acts in my name (early next, same visit to the same notary)
• Visit the US Embassy here in Bratislava, sign and swear to the various documents renouncing my US citizenship (mid- to late next week)
• Wait for the US State Department to respond, either with a rejection notice or with a Certificate of Loss of Nationality of the United States, US State Dept. DS-4083
• Assuming I receive the certificate, apply at the same Slovak police agency that issued my new visa for the Travel Document and for a replacement visa sticker

And I’ll keep y’all posted…