From: Dale Thorn <dthorn@gte.net>
Date: Tue, 28 Jan 1997 13:17:53 -0800 (PST)
To: "Phillip M. Hallam-Baker" <hallam@ai.mit.edu>
Subject: Re: Fighting the cybercensor
Message-ID: <199701282117.NAA02726@toad.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Phillip M. Hallam-Baker wrote:
> Dale Thorn <dthorn@gte.net> wrote in article
> > blanc wrote:
> > > From:   Dr.Dimitri Vulis

This [below] is one of the most remarkable posts I've ever seen....

> > > However U.S.G. is able to say that people of Iraq or Lybia or Cuba
> > > should not be permitted on the 'net. It also bombs Iraq and murders
> > > their civilians in retaliation for something their governments
> > > supposedly did.

> > > The U.S.G. has many more resources than most of us to do these things,
> > > including equipment, cooperative troops, money, and recognition from
> > > other governments.   If other nations disagree with the U.S.G. they
> > > have the resources to discuss, bargain, negotiate, criticize, form
> > > alliances, take their chances and retaliate, etc.

> > I wish this were true, at least of nations which would be friendly
> > to someone like me (white, Western, etc.).  A bully on a school
> > playground can always be knocked down, no matter how big or how
> > vicious he is.  Sadly, the U.S. bully cannot be knocked down.  Bad
> > enough you get nuclear, chemical, and/or biological stuff waved at
> > you - if you get into a hot war like Desert Storm, your country is
> > carpet-bombed with fleets of B-52's until it is thoroughly debilitated.

> Actually the US is being remarkably ineffective in keeping
> Cuba etc off the Net. If you don't believe me just try
> the cuban home page. We had a Web server running in Sarajevo
> during the siege back in '93. There is no way that the US govt.
> can hope to control the Internet any more than it can control the
> phone system. What is astonishing is that the Cuban authorities are
> so keen to import a technology that breaks down their propaganda.

This *is* amazing.  The cuban govt. is *eager* (keen) to subvert
their own propaganda.

> The Cold War was not won by the arms race, it was won in
> Eastern Europe which was never a major participant. The main
> instrument that won it was West German TV which broadcast
> pictures of supermarkets with full shelves into the homes
> of East Germans every night. The viewers could see that it
> was not mere propaganda and their relatives confirmed the
> fact. As a result the East German guards on the Berlin wall
> simply decided to leave their posts one night.

That's it?  The system collapsed because the guards left their posts?
And no mutiny charges?  Incredible.

> The East Germans couldn't stop the TV signals either. When
> Dresden started to become a ghost town because people wanted
> to move to a town which could recieve the broadcasts the
> East Germans ended up installing their own relay to keep
> the locals happy.

People left their own home towns just so they could watch TV?  I
know a lot of Americans who'd like to leave their towns to get away
from TV, permanently.