U.S. Justice Department Prepares Assault on Pr0n
An anonymous reader writes "The Baltimore Sun is reporting that the Justice Department is preparing to reawaken old laws to fight the war on ... no, not terrorists... porn! And not just the kinky stuff either. In the age of Internet connectivity, will this mean these jobs are headed to India too?"
...Is to pry it from my hot, sticky hands!
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. -Frederick Douglass
That is pretty much what happened when Ashcroft was prosecuting cases in Missouri. He would go after small smoking accesory dealers. He wasn't going to go after Afghani Drug Lords (who own a controlling interest in companies that distributes paraphernalia in hotel rooms.) He knew he couldn't win even against the small guys, but he would seize their assets over and over again and hold onto their inventory for a period of time (long enough for them to have to reorder it) to disrupt their business and cost them tons of legal fees till they went bankrupt. He would let them get it back, seize it again... He did eventually bring several of them to trial (and I don't remember him winning though I believe a couple of the stores closed from all of the disruption of their business). Temporary injunctions also work well for business disruption.
... at a retail outlet.
I've always thought that this trait in Ashcroft could be put to good use by telling him most spam is advertising perscription drugs and a good portion of it ends up in the in-boxes of kids and teens. Try to get him to go after spammers instead through the back door. Unfortunately that has not happened.
To me it's all kind of silly. Drugs (& paraphernalia) wouldn't be a multi-billion dollar industry with exceptional growth rates if people didn't want it. It also wouldn't be the money maker it is without the internet there to let people shop in relative privacy. It's worked out fantastic for the sellers of sex toys as well, eliminating the barrier to entry for customers that would be averse to buying the double ended
Given his prior history if I hosted a site that sold water pipes or bongs I would probably try to move it off-shore.
Now, i realize lots of people would argue for porn and against drugs, but a lot of the arguments are the same.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!