President George W. Bush is a proud gun owner and defender of the Second Amendment. As a fan of pretty much all of the Amendments, except the eventually repealed 18th, I don’t have a problem with the fact my president knows how to handle and, presumably, fire a gun. But one of the first safety lessons that anyone who takes guns seriously learns is that it’s essential to know and care about what’s behind your target.Given Bush’s consistent habit of shooting holes in the First Amendment as though it were a rural stop sign, I have to question his overall judgment, ability to stay focused, and aptitude for understanding complex issues. Either the guy isn’t paying attention or he’s got a serious problem with the Bill or Rights.

It’s no secret that the ex-coke addict with the low sex drive who currently inhabits the Oval Office has a major jonz against pornography. Even if he’s doesn’t and is secretly a porn hound putting on a big show for the electorate, a sizable percentage of his still-faithful constituency does. The fact that the entire world is effectively at war in the Middle East due to some exceptionally wobbly reasons seems quite secondary to most of the domestic terrorists who see “obscenity” everywhere they turn their baleful eyes. While the greatest obscenity of all is played out on international television 24-hours a day complete with commercial breaks and celebrity commentaries, Bush and his band of virtual-raincoat clad minions barely seem to notice, their minds too occupied by thoughts of hot underage girls being forced by the bus load to appear in adult videos and websites.

While Oprah Winfrey was fretting about gospel singers who like to get jiggy after watching too many volumes of Black Bad Girls or Bang My Tight White Ass or whatever titles or subject matter Kirk Franklin has apparently had to fight an “addiction” to, maybe she should have been fretting about why a bunch of rich fundie Christian white men in positions of political power can’t stop thinking about sex, especially while there’s a catastrophic domestic natural disaster and a major international war going on. You’d think these guys would have better things to do with their time and our tax-supported dollars than dream of ways that the porn industry might be degrading women and raping children.

Not since Edwin Meese directed his sexual self-loathing toward the First Amendment has this country endured the full-frontal assault that it’s fighting off under the current crusade… er… administration.

Bush’s chaps are probably chafing over the recent concessions made by Judge Walker D. Miller to the Free Speech Coalition concerning “Secondary Producers” and their culpability in the ongoing 2257 regulation skirmish. Although repeatedly defended as a well-intended effort to curb child pornography, nobody from the Bush Administration has bothered to explain precisely which child porn producers have been caught in their crafty age verification paperwork scheme. Frankly, the fact this “what about the children” rhetoric still gets taken seriously when dished out the same people who brought us white phosphorous covered Iraqi toddlers is amazing, but when it’s decorated in a garish display of bullshit like 2257, it makes me wonder what’s in the water. While some congressional Republicans may honestly think the law will do more to protect minors from sexual exploitation than the Associated Sites Advocating Child Protection (www.asacp.org), chances seem better than good that the majority of supports just want to “take a stand for morality” or some such other jingoistic nonsense.

Regardless of their justification, the various members of the Senate will soon have their chance to stand at the front of the secular synagogue and beat their humble breasts soon, given that Utah Senator Orrin Hatch is prepared to pretend to save the children once again with a bill custom designed to drive the thriving adult video and internet economy closer to underground. I’m sure it’s only a coincidence that there are elections on the horizon for many Senators who are desperately hoping to see the struggling remnants of the Democratic party working as fluffers for the next Seymore Butts’ vehicle. The House has already rubber stamped the “Children’s Safety Act of 2005,” having given it about as much attention as it did the USA PATRIOT Act and it’s expected to slide through the Senate like a shiny new bullet through a freshly polished cylinder.

Fortunately, while the GOP has distracted an appalling percentage of the public from the peril of their threatened free speech rights by giving them car bombs and media circuses, keen eyes in Hollywoodland have been casting their sights toward Washington DC and noticing that in order to “protect” the children, a whole lot of stuff mainstream people take for granted could get scooped up along with the tiny bit of bad stuff likely to get caught in the dragnet.

Hatch’s bill doesn’t believe that having names and proof of age records for actors who appear in sexually explicit content goes far enough to protect children. The House-Hatch proposal goes the next step and includes “simulated” sexual conduct, as well. No more dry humping during teensploitation or even arty coming-of-age flicks Hollywood, you filthy, child-perverting, home wrecking, suddenly pornographic film making industry!

Erik V. Huey, a lawyer for the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, recently told the Los Angeles Times, “We are extremely concerned that this measure is overly broad and violates the constitutional protections of speech.” Apparently the Motion Picture Association of America is also of the opinion that this bill is a Bad Idea. Unfortunately, although the boys in Hollywood are more than happy to take tech jobs in porn when their union leaders tell them to take some time off, but they’re not quite so keen to jump to our defense much further than it will get their buns out of the oven. Huey explained his client’s concerns as being that “Mainstream film and television productions are being lumped in the same category as hard-core pornography.” Heaven forefend! On the other hand, hard-core pornographers who make videos featuring mutually consenting adults are apparently supposed to be delighted about being lumped in with people who enjoy making sex videos featuring children who should be learning how to read so they can understand what federally mandated civil rights they lost while they were being raped on camera and some do-gooder who didn’t care about the difference between consent and coercion worked to make sure Chris Wilson stayed in jail. Bang, bang, shoot, shoot, indeed.

But wait! There’s more.

Republican Senator Red Stevens thinks Alaska is warm enough as it is and wants to see a House-passed “indecency” bill extended to include not just radio and television broadcasts but also cable television and the Internet. The beauty of this attack on protected, if controversial, speech is the FCC has defined “indecency” quite generously, meaning that more than a programs popular with adults could take one in the frontal lobe. No more Howard Stern anywhere, no more realistic web-based safer sex or sexual health education, no more Chris Wilson, no more naughty email holiday cards, no more scandalous blogs, no more politically embarrassing Abu Ghraib inmate stacking photos.

Waiting in the wings to enforce any of the scattershot blasts that become laws are Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ ass crack watching FBI professionals, poised to protect all that once was sacred by suppressing the extremes that keep us all free. Putting a cap in porn is “one of the top priorities” promoted by Gonzales and the FBI, according to a memo from FBI headquarters to its 58 field offices.

Although precious few, if any, children will be protected by any of these attacks on adult sexuality, plenty of Dallas Texas judges are likely to be kept busy by the venue shopping Feds and their freshly recruited band of invariably odd anti-obscenity agents. Although gay and BDSM communities regularly express concern that they will be especially targeted by the promised and ever-increasing obscenity prosecutions, so far the highest profile cases have concerned often surprisingly tame subject matter, including that of Eddie Wedelstedt, a Colorado porn store owner who, with 60 in 20 states, holds the record for most adult video shops. When the boys in the white hats accused him of peddling obscenity, they either couldn’t find or weren’t interested in anything sexually explicit that featured rape, the exploitation of minors, or sexual torture – so what exactly is that Northern District of Texas court going to hear prosecutors claim is obscene?

Often the purpose of local prosecution is to bankrupt a business so that it just gives up, which helps create a climate of fear. If I’m not mistaken, which I’m not, creating a climate of fear is something that terrorists are said to delight in. Last time I heard, the United States had decided to fight terrorism wherever it might be found.

In addition to not paying attention to what might lay behind his immediate target, president Bush and his friends appear to have ignored another basic gun safety tip that even trigger-nervous mothers can recite by heart. Be careful where you point that thing. You just might put your eye out.