Gay ex-Republican sounds alarm on his former parties call to ban porn

[spoonboy44]

 

[BootmanLA]

A few thoughts on this:

1. I think it's a mistake, in general, to say "Trump wants to...." anything, unless it's "run everything, save his squalid business empire, and get re-elected so as to avoid prison". When it comes to ordinary governmental policies, Trump has no beliefs of his own, whatsoever; his only line of inquiry is "What's in it for me?".

For instance, Trump is widely reported to be anti-immigrant. But he routinely employs immigrants, including ones on limited temporary visas, to work on his properties, because he can get them cheaper than he can hire US workers. That goes way back, even to his construction of Trump Tower in the 1980's, where he stiffed a bunch of immigrant construction workers on their wages. For Trump, immigration is simply one more issue he knows he can use to inflame his base of support and get them riled up to vote.

The same is true of any "social" issue - abortion, porn, gay rights, trans rights, whatever - he only cares if he can use it for his own purposes (again, to gain power and to avoid prison). Trump was very pro-choice until he started nosing around about seeking the Republican nomination for president in the early 2010's - after he got pissed off at President Obama for mocking him at the White House Correspondents Association Dinner over his "birther" claims. 

Now, it's increasingly true that there's no division between Trump, his campaign, and the national GOP - it's all one big cluster of ego-propping-up, and with Trump happy to endorse GOP policies as along as they don't threaten his electoral prospects. (That's why Trump keeps wavering on abortion, taking credit for killing Roe at evangelical events but stressing he doesn't want a federal ban to suburban housewives who can and probably will tank his return to the presidency. He doesn't give a fuck about abortion itself except when he's got to pay for one for one of his mistresses, but he can't just take that stance without pissing off part of his base.)

But Trump wanting to ban porn? Please. He doesn't want any such thing; he knows that even if the GOP managed to get porn removed from under First Amendment protection (a huge task), so that states could ban it, it's still going to be widely available everywhere.