Friday, May 16, 2008

State of California v. The Porn Industry

According to CNN, California is again trying to penalize the use of pornography, this time by levying a 25% tax on strip clubs, videos, and websites. Yawn.

The talking head in the CNN segment rattles on and on about porn being bad, claims that "some divorce lawyers" attribute more than 50% of their divorce cases to pornography use. Pornography is also "killing our families and our society!!!" he shrieks.

The bill, AB 2914, was introduced by Assemblyman Charles Calderon. The bill also calls for an 8% tax, not a 25% tax as the CNN guy erroneously states.

Calling for the creation of the Adult Entertainment Venue Impact Fund, which the tax would pay for, the bill plans to use its monies to ameliorate the "Secondary effects" of adult venues. That means property taxes, law enforcement, and funding to address "mental health" and "disease transmission." The bill doesn't specify whether that money would go to people who work in the industry or those poor, poor divorcees who wouldn't tolerate their husband's porn habit.

Maybe they could compromise on some wife spanking.

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