http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2006/01/super_lobbyist.html

Abramoff is alleged to have engaged in a number of complicated and shady activities involving money and politicians and gambling and whatnot. Most of the allegations aren’t that interesting. But one scheme, according to Time magazine, caught my eye. They say, “eLottery – This Internet gambling firm hired Abramoff and invested some $2 million in an intricate campaign in 2000 to kill a bill that would have outlawed most online gaming. Abramoff used Christian groups to block the bill on the grounds that it didn’t go far enough.”

Yes, the man convinced Christian groups to support gambling. Now THAT’S what I call an effective lobbyist. I suppose if he did all the things he’s accused of doing, he has to go to jail. But with any luck, he’ll get a judge that wouldn’t mind a few “fact finding junkets” himself, and Abramoff will go free. If that happens, I plan to hire him just to see what else he can convince Christian groups to do, just for fun. Here’s my short list: (see link)

Convicing anti-gambling Christians to vote against an anti-gambling measure is the work of a superlobbyist.

Convicing anti-porn Christians to vote against an anti-porn measure must be the work of an even better superlobbyist.

I'd love to learn the whole story behind this one:

Ubiquitous Porn: Alive on the Net
By John C. Dvorak

In a column I wrote in the 1990s, I proposed the creation of an .xxx top-level domain to make it easier to prevent what I then described as a porn storm. These were onerous self-spawning pornography page attacks that took place on the desktops of unsuspecting users. This phenomenon evolved into the "pop-ups" that we still see today and is essentially driven by a flaw in the design of browsers. Since most of these storms were created by porn sites, it seemed as if the easiest way to control them would be to create an .xxx domain for porn and filter the storms out unless you actually wanted to see them.

I harped on this topic on and off for a decade, and it was finally going to happen when, in a surprise move last week, Vint Cerf removed the initiative from the agenda of an ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) board meeting. It appears that a mere 6,000 canned letters sent to the Commerce Dept. did the trick. These apparently stemmed from a cell of evangelical organizations. That's all it took.

If ICANN cannot resist pressure from clichéd theopolitical zealots, then the chances of the organization maintaining control of the Internet—instead of handing control over to an international consortium of United Nations connivers—is nil. This episode marks the beginning of the end for the Internet. It does not bode well for ICANN, an organization that I supported until now.

Exactly how these folks became enamored of resisting the .xxx domain is somewhat mysterious, and I suspect the pornographers themselves are behind it. These women have been tricked. Who benefits from the death of .xxx? The pornographers, that's who.

The idea behind the .xxx domain is to make it brain-dead easy to keep porn out of the American family home. That's the reason it was proposed. So why do these people oppose it? The argument against the .xxx proposal seems to indicate either an incredible naïveté regarding the workings of networks and computers or an extreme distrust of computer users themselves. Perhaps it's a combination of both. Concerned Women for America claims that the .xxx domain will increase porn by giving the pornographers a "new platform." What? Can someone tell me exactly how this creates a new platform? Don't these people understand how a ghetto works? Do they know what a platform is? Do they understand that this is like the warning stickers they themselves insist should be put on records and games? How do they not get that?

More:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1896410,00.asp


See related thread:
GOP Donors drip with hot, sticky porn money
IanDB1
Thu Dec-23-04 12:30 AM
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=1093853