Editor's Note: The author of the piece below, Greg Piccionelli, is on the leading First Amendment lawyers in America today. Based in Los Angeles, he has dedicated his career to free speech, although he has a strong interest in science, too. In this piece, exclusive to Ivote2004.com, he makes the strong argument that the REAL pornographers are those Americans who took degrading and sometimes violent photographs of Iraqis in prison.

     Indeed, a look at these words, bannered atop the Drudge Report--a tribute to the importance of free speech if there ever was one--on the evening of May 12, suggest just how depraved the situation has been--and maybe, for all we know, still is--in Iraq. And so Greg's piece is required reading, for those seeking to gain perspective on the situation of free expression in America today.

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     SENATE VIEWING OF ABUSE EVIDENCE: Among the most shocking images, a video clip of a male detainee repeatedly banging into a cell door, until he collapsed. Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., said it appeared that the man had a rope lashed around his waist, and that someone was pulling him toward the door. "It just deepens the conclusion that this was a cell block that had gone wild," Lieberman said...

     A photograph in which "a prisoner was sodomizing himself" with a banana...

     Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., said he had not seen the pictures and saw no need to. Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., said he felt the same way.

     "I've already seen enough," Lott said. "Why would I want to go see a bunch of perverted pictures?"

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     The War On Terror is the Third World War. It is civilization vs. barbarism. It is a war we must win. This is because, in a short few years biotechnology and nanotechnology will provide even small groups of Islamic militants with the power to kill tens, even hundreds of millions. In fact, within twenty years, science's knowledge of the human genome and viruses will provide our enemies with the ability to construct racially and ethnically-targeted viruses that could obliterate entire races and ethnic groups on the basis of genes they possess. Imagine that in the hands of Osama Bin Laden. In that same time frame, it is clearly likely that our terror enemies will acquire at least some nuclear weapons.

     Because it will only take a relative few to kill so many, our military alone cannot win this war. We must win over the hearts and minds of the Muslim populations from which the radical-Islamists spring. This is a war of ideas. A great world wide referendum on the issue of rule by authoritarian radical religious philosophy or secular technology-driven democracy.

     Thanks to the cruel and stupid actions of a few soldiers and their superiors, our effort in this War To Save Civilization from the religious wackos has been severely undermined. These reckless grinning morons have endangered the lives of thousands of our extraordinary men and women in arms in Iraq and Afghanistan. They have tarnished the memories and honor of those who have nobly given their lives. And they have provided Jihadists around the world with prime recruitment materials.

     For those in the Arab world on the fence about America, images of a woman humiliating naked men and forcing them into patently offensive poses to satisfy their captive's prurient sexual and sadistic interests, will be seen as proof that America must be something of a Satan. The fact that the images were traded amongst soldiers will only confirm to the Muslim world that the disease is deep. Now we are told that the pictures and associated video are only the tip of the iceberg and that such despicable practices may have occurred elsewhere in Iraq as well as in Afghanistan and Guantanamo.

     Now what? Well, in accordance with the now long standing tradition of this administration, there is, once again, a failure to threaten, let alone, make heads roll. Our president has said that he does not watch much television. Too bad he missed the "Apprentice." He would have learned that good executives know when to say "You're Fired".

     The administration seems incapable of communicating that it is capable of dropping the ax on those who have provided wrong information about weapons of mass destruction, post-liberation Iraqi sentiment towards us, Iraqi police and defense forces' motivation to fight with the coalition, troop strength requirements, the willingness of Iraqi's to be led by exiled leaders, the trustworthiness of Ahmed Chalabi, etc. Yet the administration is clear in its amplified message that it intends to fight a new "War On Porn".

     O.K, so be it. The administration has a right to set its own agenda. But we must win this war, and if the administration understands prosecuting obscenity better than tough management, let me suggest the following. If any of the prisoner images have been distributed to the United States or any of its territories by any of those who created them, or anyone who encouraged or condoned their creation or distribution, I call on Attorney General Ashcroft to prosecute such parties for distribution of obscenity. I suggest that such prosecution be conducted with at least the same vigor he has threatened to prosecute America's mainstream pornographers. If there has been an agreement to create and distribute the materials, charges under the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) are appropriate. If any of the prisoners posed in sexual positions were minors at the time, all involved should be charged with creation, possession and distribution of child pornography.

     The prisoner photos are deeply offensive to me. I suspect they deeply offend nearly every American of good conscious in every community in this great land. They clearly appeal to a pruriently sadistic interest. They have enormously damaged the credibility of the United States. Distribution of this kind of destructive and grossly aberrant material is what our obscenity laws were created to punish.


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