 We're on the ferry to Parramatta, leaving Sydney Harbour behind and Sydney Opera House. Anyway, I was just listening to Robert Wright interview with Eric Altman, the left-wing 25-year Nation magazine media columnist, PhD in History, a professor of English and Journalism. He was talking about how the United States is not a democracy, it's an oligopoly. And maybe you didn't hear, but Putin's Russia is not a proper democracy. Maybe you heard that China is a dictatorship. But many nations are a combination. In fact, four nations, four nation-states are a combination in different forms of government. For the United States, it's elements of democracy. It has elements of oligopoly. It has elements of dictatorship. It probably has elements of aristocracy. It has all sorts of different elements. So it's not like it's either a democracy or an oligopoly or a dictatorship. It's all three. And when it comes to foreign policy, the United States president is essentially a dictator. He has all the rights of King George III. Joe Biden has said three times the United States would militarily intervene if China tries to take Taiwan. Now, most Americans don't support the shedding of American life to save Taiwan, but foreign policy elites have already made this decision. The people don't get a vote on this. The people of the United Kingdom were very opposed to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. But England joined the fight nonetheless, because Tony Blair and the Labor government decided it. Australian people were not supportive of Australia joining the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. But Australia's elites made that decision. And so that's how it is. The element of democracy doesn't really decide Australia's foreign policy. There's just elements of democracy in foreign policy. There are elements of oligopoly and there are elements of dictatorship. So too with Israel. Is Israel in a part-aid state? Well, there are elements of the Israeli state and its occupation of the West Bank. You could rightly call similar to a part-aid. And there are elements that are not. Does England have free speech? England has considerably less free speech in the United States, but they're more than Russia. Just like people aren't honest, good, righteous, true. They're in the honest, good, righteous, true in certain situations. And they're less honest, less righteous, less true, less fair to income, less kind in other situations. So too with nations. Certain situations don't be dictatorships, such as foreign policy crises. President Dwight Eisenhower said the United States would only survive nuclear war if it was operated as a dictatorship. In times of crisis, dictatorial elements come to fall in the nation state. Other times, democratic elements or oligopoly, oligopolistic elements come to fall. Depends on the situation. So people aren't one thing.