The LAT's porno peace plan

By Richard Baehr

The Los Angeles Times devotes an editorial to supporting a new Israeli initiative with the Palestinians -- reaching out to them through a pornographic web site. The editorial of course finds a way to get in a gratuitous slap at President Bush for his bullying rhetoric in the region, and calls on him to pressure Israelis and Palestinians more to achieve peace, since a little American pressure is presumably all that is needed to get the job done (of course this recommended pressure should be read as pressuring Israelis more to make concessions to the Palestinians).

The editorial also compares the pornographic approach favorably with our unsuccessful radio stations in Iraq and the Arab world. Perhaps porn is the answer to how to win hearts and mind in Iraq. This is LA, and maybe the editorial will stimulate some Hollywood producer to develop a movie script for how this new approach finally brought Israelis and Palestinians together, or the US and Iraqis together.

The editorial does not touch on Islamic sensitivities to all this of course. But will the LA Times editors now be burned in effigy by rage boy in Kashmir for its endorsement of exposing the body parts of infidels?

The LA Times also avoids broaching some other delicate subjects: such as honor killing of women, and abuse of women, children and homosexuals, all of which is prevalent in the Muslim world, especially in the more Spartan Islamist dominated societies (Saudi Arabia, Iran, Gaza).

Is this the best the LA Times can do in the dog days of summer?