Porn!

May 12, 2001 1:57 PM

Porn! Now the latest industry to get some representation in the Bush administration. It's like watching the Marx Brothers, only its real.
posted by owillis (34 comments total)

I'm relatively liberal. I like to see this administration squirm as much as the next guy, but this looks like a man with expertise in his field providing his services to a company that is operating legally. There are plenty of more worthy targets for my outrage at the moment. Could be that the Bush "strategy" is to create controversy on so many fronts that the opposition becomes diluted.
posted by gimli at 2:54 PM on May 12, 2001

I've got no problem with this guy either, he was performing a perfectly legal service. My two bones of contention are:

1. Conservatives have appointed themselves as moral arbiters for everyone, yet it seems time and again they're the one doing all the screwing (as it were).

2. They couldn't find this in his background? How soon till they appoint a former neo nazi or something to a government position?
posted by owillis at 3:08 PM on May 12, 2001

So we had a 'porn' influence in the last administration, and this one is no different.

:)
posted by justgary at 3:35 PM on May 12, 2001

[cheap shot alert]

I can't wait until John Ashcroft has to team up with this guy on something.

Ashcroft: Well, you are a porn loving sinner.
Pitt: At least I don't writh on the floor and speak in tongues.
posted by y6y6y6 at 3:38 PM on May 12, 2001

[closing italics]
posted by youhas at 8:17 PM on May 12, 2001

With every new post he(she?)makes, I grow more convinced that owillis is actually a Republican party operative posing as a thoughtless, knee-jerk lefty so as to make Democrats look silly. Or perhaps just an under appreciated satiric genius. And what the hell is happening to that dog off-camera to give it that expression?? (second pic from bottom.)
posted by BGM at 1:13 AM on May 13, 2001

This is a legitimate topic.

For instance, one preacher quoted in the article says: "If [the man Bush chose to run the SEC] has made money on the degradation of women and children, he is not acceptable to become the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission."

If this was about Clinton, not Bush, the freepazoids would be screaming about how inappropriate the choice is.
posted by pracowity at 1:34 AM on May 13, 2001

BGM: pretty sick to draw my little pup into this

Satiric genius? Not yet. Pointer-out of hypocrisy? You betcha.
posted by owillis at 1:37 AM on May 13, 2001

Yeah, I bet the poor mutt will be in therapy for years to get over the trauma! Seriously, it's just such a fascinating shot that I couldn't resist.

How much hypocrisy did you point out during the last administration?
posted by BGM at 3:14 AM on May 13, 2001

This would be no issue but for the fact that Republicans run on morality, attack their opponents on morality, benefit the from the support of moral voters who assume they are getting who they voted for, and so should not just be held to and equal standard, but a higher one.
posted by brucec at 6:12 AM on May 13, 2001

The self-righteous are not likely to reexamine their views when their hypocrisy is pointed out. It is one of their great strengths or biggest weaknesses, depending on one's point of view. Pointing out hypocrisy is fun, but you're preaching to the choir. Don't expect any converts.
posted by gimli at 7:12 AM on May 13, 2001

``When people get in trouble, he's the first guy to call,'' Gracin said.

I can't help thinking of Harvey Keitel in Pulp Fiction.
posted by holgate at 7:28 AM on May 13, 2001

Any hypocrisy that may exist in the Republican party when nominating a person with this type of background is drowned out by the equal hypocrisy of the left, who only make it an issue, when its the right doing it.
posted by schlyer at 7:39 AM on May 13, 2001

As someone of the left, I'm very interested in hearing about the instances of hypocrisy BGM and schlyer are referring to.
posted by y6y6y6 at 9:02 AM on May 13, 2001

Nothing like meta-hypocrisy to start the morning right.

schlyer: we're not calling for this guy to quit. We're just laughing our asses off.
posted by dhartung at 10:54 AM on May 13, 2001

We here on the center/left believe in allowing people to do what the hell they want with their lives without hurting others. The right doesn't. They want to dictate a religious, conservative life to all of us. They want to tell us how to live. This is antithetical to the entire concept of America, and I'll call the bastards on it when they're shown up to be the hypocrites they are.

President Clinton screwed his intern - bad move, but so fucking what? Did it affect the GDP or the unemployment rate? No. Was it a bad move personally? Sure! But it's none of my business. The Republicans jumped on it and harped about how outrageous it was for 2 years. At the same time, their own leaders including Newt Gingrich and Bob Livingston were doing the same thing.

Hypocrites. Fucking hypocrites.
posted by owillis at 11:59 AM on May 13, 2001

This whole story seems to be based on a single line in a single paragraph of a 10-Q report:

In a further effort to demonstrate the Company's commitment to future compliance
with applicable Nasdaq listing requirements, the Company's Board of Directors
has formed a special committee of its independent directors, called the Nasdaq
Compliance Committee. This Committee will review all future corporate
transactions to assure their compliance with Nasdaq listing requirements. For
assistance in this regard, the Committee has retained Harvey L. Pitt, former
General Counsel of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and now a partner at
the law firm of Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson in Washington, D.C. In
addition, the Company has resolved to consult with the staff of the Nasdaq Stock
Market, Inc. in the event that the Company proposes to act contrary to the
advice of the Special Committee's legal counsel on any of these matters.

I'm all for tarring Bush with anything that sticks, but it's a shame that the guy's likely to lose the SEC post over this.
posted by rcade at 12:46 PM on May 13, 2001

owillis, while I disagree with your positions generally, you are way off base on this one, and are borderline trolling.

owillis - President Clinton screwed his intern - bad move, but so fucking what? At the same time, their own leaders including Newt Gingrich and Bob Livingston were doing the same thing.

You know as well as I that is not accurate. Clinton lied under oath.

owillis - How soon till they appoint a former neo nazi or something to a government position?

Now your equating someone working for a porn company to those that want to exterminate Jews? Please. Its also very suprising coming from a guy who runs a porn weblog.

The hypocricy I see is this. When Gingrich and Livingstone were exposed - what happened to them? What did the right do to them? They were run out of public office.

When Clinton was exposed, what did the left do to him? They guarded him. They embraced him. They championed him.

And in this particular case, the article you linked includes a quote from a Christian conservative: "...he is not acceptable to become the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission". What more do you want? The very people you are pointing the hypocricy finger at don't think this is a good idea, yet you still call them out for it?
posted by schlyer at 1:28 PM on May 13, 2001

I don't usually agree with the folks on the starboard side of the ship, but there's no great issue here. Whoever vetted this guy as a nominee missed something that's simply embarrassing, that's all. Pitt will now have ZERO chance of getting the job. Big deal.

People make mistakes, regardless of which party they belong to. The Republicans are no more guilty of anything substantive in this case than the Democrats were for not reading Lani Guanier's writings a little more carefully.

owillis, you're making a mountain out of a molehill. Not that the media won't do the same thing, but do you really want to be lumped in with the media?

BGM, disagree with Oliver all you want about his politics, but leave his dog out of it. That's just childish.
posted by briank at 1:51 PM on May 13, 2001

schlyer: Gingrich was not run out of office for any alleged infidelity. He was run out office because the right didn't think he was being conservative enough, that he had compromised too much. Bob Livingston pulled himself out because, yes, he looked hypocritical in critizing Clinton, then having affairs of his own exposed. Would anyone have called for his head otherwise? Doubt it.

The Washington Post, in the meantime, mentions in a profile of Tom Delay that he at least gave some very questionable testimony of his own.

In any case, I find this all rather hilarious. Would I be able to find a job if I worked for a porn company? No. Would a lot of people think less of me? Yes. I believe that Bill had a *secret* affair with an intern, but that it was pulled out of private and into the open through a legal hearing that looked an awful lot like entrapment. That doesn't make it any less sleazy, or less risky in a stupid way, but he wasn't openly working for the Horny Teen Jpegs R Us Corp.
posted by raysmj at 2:00 PM on May 13, 2001

Actually schyler, I've sold that url to someone else months ago.
posted by owillis at 2:26 PM on May 13, 2001

meant to add, this isn't just a porn company the guy was working for, but one with a heavy legal-teens-who-look-like-minors orientation. That's pretty low. You can find out yourself by going to the company's corporate site, which in turn will point you to the corporate web site of igallery.com. No pics are available on either site, but you can catch the drift all the same.

If it was regular porn -- well, there are worse operations one could work for, some highly respectable among those non-porn bizzes. Igallery sounds like a different story.
posted by raysmj at 2:43 PM on May 13, 2001

With that out of the way, let me respond to your statements:

You know as well as I that is not accurate. Clinton lied under oath.

Because he was trapped into it by moral crusading Republicans. Lying under oath was their legal method to "get" him on comitting adultery when Whitewater turned up nothing.

Now your equating someone working for a porn company to those that want to exterminate Jews?

No, that's not what I said. The Bush administration has shown a lack of interest in actually looking at the backgrounds of candidates they've put in place. In their zeal to put "their guys" into office, they refuse to look at qualifications.

The hypocricy I see is this. When Gingrich and Livingstone were exposed - what happened to them? What did the right do to them?

Gingrich was only run off for "losing" impeachment, Livingstone only left when the media uncovered his philandering - the Republicans were ready to make him their leader in the House.

I don't care what this guy did before he was appointed, as long as it was within the realm of the law. But he's been appointed by an administration who's intolerance is unbelievable.

Their constant need to go back to the drawing board and not seem like bumbling morons (China policy, energy policy, environmental policy) is pathetic, especially because of the way they blatantly pander to the corporations who helped them get in power.

That's what I'm saying...
posted by owillis at 2:56 PM on May 13, 2001

If it were HorneyTeenz Inc. sticking money straight into the party coffers, or into "Pr0n 4 Bush" soft money organisations, then I'd be worried. But this is a financial consultant, and this is the SEC. And while we'd like to think that global finance were driven by ethical considerations, if it's legal, it's not an issue.

If anything, it raises an interesting double standard in American society. You may have a high-profile $9bn pr0n industry which, whenever it's deemed fit, is presented as a bastion of free speech and entrepreneurial capitalism, but it's nigh-on impossible for hardcore "adult entertainment" companies to float on the stock exchange.

(Of course, Britain has its share of pornographers who run publically-traded newspapers while keeping the dirty mags under private ownership.)
posted by holgate at 3:04 PM on May 13, 2001

holgate: By big corporations being purveyors of porn, do you mean: The Mary Kate and Ashley show on Fox Family? Oh, wait, you won't get that. OK, the XFL, which thankfully just went out of business? Or the hyper-violent films purveyed by TimeWarner?
posted by raysmj at 4:42 PM on May 13, 2001

You know, I wouldn't have a problem if "HorneyTeenz Inc" or "Pr0n 4 Bush" contributed to Bush's campaign as long as they are perfectly legal businesses. Their product is no more harmful than the NRA, Oil Companies, teacher's union, or trial lawyers that contribute to both campaigns.

America's attitude to sex is positively victorian, when you consider that all those unprofitable web businesses went public and no online porn businesses went public (and they are very profitable) due to our prudeness.

Publicly traded porn would probably be a good investment.
posted by owillis at 5:14 PM on May 13, 2001

owliss: the fact that HornyTeenz even exists is an example of America's whacked attitudes about sex. It's juvenile, sleazy out the wazoo, as in, "Come here, Mr. Puritanical with certain bad-boy urges, this is really, really disgusting and regressive, just as you think sex should be." It should also be in a hotel room with roaches and a bed you'd want to use a flamethrower on, possibly with a cheerleader or a woman in a nursing outfit. Accepting the above as natural does not make you a wiser person than the great unwashed, if that's what you're getting at. The sleaze is part and parcel of the same problem. Which is a whole 'nother topic for another day.
posted by raysmj at 5:25 PM on May 13, 2001

raysmj: You probably have a point there. No, you do have a point and I agree with it.

(as an aside to this, this thread made a whole lot of people see the World's Cutest Dog^© which makes me happy :)
posted by owillis at 5:37 PM on May 13, 2001

We here on the center/left believe in allowing people to do what the hell they want with their lives without hurting others. The right doesn't.

That is waay, waay, waaaay, waaaaaaaaaay oversimplifying. The titles "left" and "right" both cover huge areas. You know that. There are lots of supporters of free speech and all the other rights you're talking about. Many of them are in the libertarian party, as opposed to the Republicans, but they're still part of the "right." There are more traditional conservatives who are like that. (William F. Buckley thinks marijuana should be legalized.)

And there are left-wingers who aren't real big on those rights, either (Joe Lieberman, to name one. And responsible gun ownership is an example of doing whatever you want without hurting others, and it's the right that's protecting them).
posted by dagnyscott at 5:51 PM on May 13, 2001

dagnyscott: Um, there are quite a number of people on the "left" for drug legalization, who could easily form an odd-bedfellows coalition. ("Traffic" was not directed by anyone on the right.) I'd wager to say political support for legalization will have to come from the right first, given how a liberal would be seen as living up to bad expectations for it. This is the only reason Lieberman-type Democrats came to be -- that is, the left of center type's being attacked for being on the "wrong" side of personal morality issues.

Oh, this has nothing to do with the topic at hand, 'cept maybe that some of the feminist left would be against porn for reasons that are just as constricting and Puritanical. Actually, that has nothing to do with the topic at hand either, but . . . this is fun.
posted by raysmj at 6:13 PM on May 13, 2001

Um, there are quite a number of people on the "left" for drug legalization, who could easily form an odd-bedfellows coalition.

I know that. That's my point. There are people on the left and the right, yes? I was responding to owillis, who seems to think everyone on the "right" is a fundie who wants to take away all of your free speech and force you to pray to a Protestant God at public school and would never even think about legalizing drugs, certainly...
posted by dagnyscott at 6:21 AM on May 14, 2001

I've gathered from this thread that "lying under oath" is an unforgivable sin, especially from those of the Republican bent.
Does this mean it's time to compile a listing of all the judgemental hypocrites who have lied under oath and therefore should resign from their respective public offices?

Someone already mentioned Tom Delay and provided the link. Yes, it seems he lied under oath, bye bye Hammer! (Thanks for the link)

Looks like Ted Olsen is up next. Liar, liar, liar. Under oath no less. You are the weakest link! bye.

This list of hypocrites could go on ad infinitum which is the point being made that the so-called Christian conservatives mantle doesn't wear very well on a politician's shoulders and looks downright tacky on a hypocrite.
posted by nofundy at 8:50 AM on May 14, 2001

You can add Ronald Reagan to your list of liars too. Oh, sorry - "I don't recall"
posted by owillis at 9:39 AM on May 14, 2001