Who lives in the Second World?

Matthew:

I think we live in the First World, and I'm pretty sure places like Haiti are in the Third World. That must mean there's a second world, so what's the deal with that?

-- First Worlder, the net

It was the Commies. The sneaky pinko weasels like Russia and China and Cuba and Albania. All those countries out to conquer the world and turn it into a socialist workers utopia. The First, Second, and Third World division was a clever shorthand for the global situation during the Cold War: the First World of industrialized, capitalist countries like us and England (the good guys); the Second World of the Red Menace (the bad guys); and everybody else, all those little countries that don't count, the Third World. The world was simpler back then.