Candidates Spar Over a Soldier's Right to Porn

By Ali Trachta in News on Jul 11, 2008 6:21PM

Republican Representative Peter Roskam of Illinois's 6th District is co-sponsoring the Military Honor and Decency Act, which would ban the sale of pornographic material on Army bases all over the world.

A similar law is already in place on bases in the United States, where hard-core magazines and movies are forbidden. Per the Sun-Times, even mainstream mags such as Cosmopolitan are banned in certain countries, including Iraq, as not to offend locals. Roskam’s bill would streamline these boundaries, banning any racy material on all Army bases in all countries. More specifically, it puts the kibosh on the following:

“human genitals, pubic area, anus, anal cleft, or any part of the female breast below a horizontal line across the top of the areola with less than an opaque covering but does not include the exposure of the cleavage of the female breast exhibited by a dress, blouse, bathing suit, or other apparel.”

So basically anything more graphic than a woman in a push-up bra is unacceptable. [Ed note: Who knew "anal cleft" was the official (scientific? political?) term for coin slot?]

Roskam’s Democratic opponent Jill Morgenthaler, a retired Army Reserves colonel, actively opposes the bill. She argues, "I find it offensive, having served with the young men and women in Iraq…Every day we trust them to make decisions. This bill says we don't trust them to choose their own magazines or movies.”

Roskam has never served in the military.

While we don't want those we serve overseas thinking Americans are porn-mongers, we consider T n' A a fundamental right that should apply to American soldiers wherever they are. Come on, if we have the right to bear arms, shouldn't we also have the right to bare boobs? [S-T]