So www.freerepublic.com would be www.freerepublic.com.us to anyone outside the ".us" domain and that ".us" routes you first in to the USA country domain and dns
This is no different then the world phone system
You have an in-country dialing plan and standards and then you have international access and country code to interconnect in to other countries networks with their dialing plan and standards
Don’t worry, the UN can’t censor our comments. This is all we have to do - *************************, then, *************, and also ***************.