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Tom Worster's avatar

I think of .au as more like a vassal to .us empire than member.

When I try to look on the bright side, I see this rush to abandon constitutional protections on free speech, and to deploy private sector monopoly power to push a Nato orthodoxy, as solid evidence of the decline and perhaps imminent collapse of the empire. I don't know how it will work out but the new Iron Curtain that's being hung up may end up around the Nato countries, as the rest of the world learns to do business in and keep savings/reserves in currencies beyond arbitrary US/Nato sanction/confiscation. The reserve currency status of the dollar comes simply from net exporters to the USA estimating that it a safe choice as a store of wealth and buying T-bills, and US militarily spending depends on those t-bill sales (i.e. the $s Americans spend on imported goods and services end up deposited at the Treasury to fund the MIC). And we can now see day-by-day in the international business news how this empire might end.

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Tom Worster's avatar

2nd comment, sorry. I think your feeling nervous, Caitlin, makes sense. But if and how much you are punished depends on how much of a danger you are. They continue to use Snowden and Assange like heads on spikes outside the fortress, holding them up as examples of what happens if you embarrass the US government. So how come you and Aaron Maté are allowed to do what you do? I believe it's because you don't have enough audience to be a problem. So your liberty may depend on the success of authoritarian management of the generic reality and your inability to substantially threaten it. It's so depressing.

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