Comments on: A War Too Many

By: jen

jen — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

I heard about this one yesterday and it's definitely a head scratcher. Seems that the FBI has too much time on it's hands if this is where they're spending their resources.

By: Kevin Holtsberry

Kevin Holtsberry — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

- So you think we shouldn't enforce the law because we are fighting terrorism? - The point isn't to "win" a "war" but to enforce the law and hoepefully tamp down the escalating nature of the problem. The war on drugs has been effective in many ways - people do less drugs - but the arguement is about the cost. I don't think the "porn war" is similar. They are not prosecuting individual porn consumers but obscenity producers and distributors. - Do you really think we are at the point where every single FBI agent must be working on terrorism? What about other non-terrorism crimes, should the FBI lay off those as well? There is no real context for the resource allocation in the story. - It has long been the beleif that Bush would enforce these type of actions that Clinton refused to. It just took longer for the issue to bubble up. Ask anyone in the porn business and I am sure they will tell you that they knew this was coming.

By: bryan

bryan — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

The problem isn't necessarily that they are trying to fight this war, but it's that the war they are fighting may be unwinnable. The Supreme Court has held the internet and cable to different standards of indecency than broadcast television and radio. One of these cases ends up at the Supreme Court and the government will lose all of them.

cf. U.S. v. Playboy, Denver area Cable v. FCC, and Reno v. ACLU.

As someone who's just spent a semester wading through these cases, I can say that the court has never really bought the government's side of the argument re: obscenity except in the case of broadcast.

In U.S. v. Playboy, the court had every opportunity to "tone down" the obscenity, but denied the government ability to restrict access. They didn't even broach the subject of prosecuting the producers.

The Internet is an even more difficult case for the government to make, because it's a medium that requires technological skill to access and can be made and distributed from anywhere in the world.

By: Little Miss Attila

Little Miss Attila — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

"Obscenity producers and distributors" are mostly just people trying to make a buck. I don't really have a problem with this unless people are trying to market it through spam. (In particular, spam with ugly subject lines that gets sent to my niece.) Those who use legitimate means of distribution should be left alone.

By: Sarcastic

Sarcastic — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

This is not so ridiculous a venture if you remember that the adult industry is really sustained by only 10 people, each spending a billion dollars a year. Obviously, those 10 people have enormous assets and are probably tax cheats, too.

By: McGehee

McGehee — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Are those the same 10 people who are funding all those anti-Bush 527s?

By: PoliBlog

PoliBlog — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

The Best Use of Resources?
Setting aside, for a moment, the issue of whether or not this is even something the government should be dealing with, I have to ask: is this the best use of limited resources? Administration wages war on pornographyLam Nguyen's job...

By: Signifying Nothing

Signifying Nothing — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

The War on Porn
Is there anyone who thinks this plan is a good use of time and resources?* I realize that the fungibility of resources (a fancy way of saying the ability to “walk and chewing gum at the same time”) is often...

By: BoiFromTroy

BoiFromTroy — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Cover up in War on Porn
Officials in Phoenix are not waffling in the new War on Porn... Brendan Loy has the latest on their cover up. Gay Phoneicians will have to look for other ways to stay healthy....

By: One Fine Jay

One Fine Jay — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Priorities and Frivolties
First of all a small apology to Robby T. for using the name of his blog for this post. I find it appropriate considering my news surfing today:

Priority: Taking out al-Sadr.

Frivolty: Unfortunately there is a warrant for his arrest sent out by...

By: Arguing with signposts...

Arguing with signposts... — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

A technology parable ...
I don't normally post much personal stuff on the blog, but I thought I'd share this funny story with you: A student is selected to present a paper at a Graduate Student oral presentation competition. He submitted two papers, and...

By: Little Miss Attila

Little Miss Attila — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

The War on Sex
James at OTB discusses the DOJ's new policies on enforcing anti-pornography laws. He wonders whether this is a good use of Federal dollars. Me too....

By: christophe thinks out loud

christophe thinks out loud — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Breaking the law or not? We'll get back to you.
Via the rather righty Little Miss Attila, found this article (from another righty blog) questioning the wisdom about the War on Pornography. I'm not going to hash over (in this post) the idea of whether or not a War on...

---