Hatchet Man

One of the oddest moments during the Mukasey hearings came from Orrin Hatch, he of exploding computer fame, who was concerned that not enough was being done in the War On Porn.

As he always does, Sen. Hatch makes it clear that-even as we battle the Global Epic War of Civilizations against Islamo-fascism-his primary concern is that the Department of Justice is not doing enough to battle the evils of what even he calls "mainstream, adult pornography."

Hatch explains that "pornography and obsenity consumption harms individuals, families, communities." Unfortunately, Hatch said, the DOJ has a "terrible record of enforcing adult obscenity law"-such enforcment stopped during the Clinton administration and there is not much more to show for it during the Bush administration.

The problem, Hatch explained, is that the DOJ is only prosecuting "extreme" obscenity-not what he calls "mainstream obscenity," not "extreme obscenity," this strategy is misguided-it prosecutes "too narrow a range of obscenity." Also, warned Hatch, there are far too few FBI resources being devoted to "mainstream obscenity prosecutions."

Mukasey promised to review the policy of only prosecuting "extreme" rather than "mainstream" pornography, and vowed: "I recognize that mainstream materials can have an effect of cheapening a society, objectifying women, and endangering children in a way that we can't tolerate."

Notice how all of these great nannystating schemes always end up with "It's for the children." It's good to know that the nanystaters on both sides are so concerned with the welfare of future generations that they're doing their darndest to making sure that they'll be protected from themselves even better than we are.