Where is the "third world"?

[Cleita]

Did they discover another moon or planet orbiting the earth? Dumbya says the flu vaccine could come from a "third world". I wonder where that is?

*slapping my forehead in frustration*

It's a "third world country" that you mean George!

Can't his handlers get him to at least memorize the phrases they feed to him? Or, is he really losing what's left of his mind?

[shaolinmonkey]

1. I've always wondered about the second world.

Nobody ever talks about the second world.

[aden_nak]

2. Yeah, what is a "second world nation" anyhow?

As for the third world, it's a trans-dimensional parallel universe where George Bush was raised as the son of a poor construction worker and wound up going to Harvard on an Academic Scholarship.

Okay, so not EXACTLY parallel.

[Philostopher]

4. Yeah, I always wondered about that, too.

I kind of know what's meant by 'third world country,' but what are the first and second? Is there a fiscal line, or a technology line, or a medical services line ... some measure of cultural evolution ... you're right. I never could figure out exactly where the line was, and what came between the 'first world countries' and the 'third world countries' in that definition.

[trotsky]

5. First World = Capitalist West, Second World = Communist East

Third World = everybody else

Comes from the Cold War, obviously, but "third world" has stuck.

Nice article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World

[shaolinmonkey]

6. Thanks! And from Trotsky no less! Awesome.

[trotsky]

7. Hey, those bastards kicked me out.

So yeah I know a little bit about the 2nd world. ;-)

[Union Thug]

3. Just around the corner. /eom

[knowbody0]

8. everything south of the equator

[Cleita]

10. Not exactly true.

Although a large chunk of them are.

[tom_paine]

9. Imperial Amerika is now the Third World

We used to First World, the Free World.

Of course (sigh) that was when we had a Free Press and a Trustworthy Voting System and leaders who at least partially cared about the integrity of the Constitutional System of Checks and Balances.

It seems like a hundred years ago, doesn't it? But it was only four.