Mostly your post is just about the side-issue of whether (in 20/20 hindsight) the censorship in the USA was justified. However this ignores the fundamental double-standard toward the USA vs the UAE. In 20/20 hindsight the UAE censorship may turn out to be justified, or not, however we don't know yet.

  > And to the extent that the censorship was justified, yes, at the very least we were legally in a properly declared war.

Didn't I (preemptively) respond to this already?

"You might say it's different since we were at war, but this ignores how the threat model and immediacy is very different in the UAE vs here in the (geographically well protected/isolated) US."

In the UAE these laws are (equally) "proper" and "legal," so I don't see how the presence or absence of a formal declaration of war makes any difference here, or meaningfully responds to my point above.