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THIS STORY IS SCORED

Royal Banana

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

The trick here is the sorting hat: there is press he cherishes and press he has classified as a national security threat, and the sorting is done by the same hand typing the post. Any official who reserves the right to define which coverage counts as legitimate has not defended the free press, he has put it on probation. Note also the escalation ladder built into a single paragraph — disease, conspiracy, security threat, and then the demand that it be stopped immediately, which in the mouth of an executive is not commentary but instruction. The thank-you at the end is the part that should chill you, because it is the sign-off of a man who believes the matter is already settled.