Waay back when I was in the service (more than 40 years ago), I found out that some PXs and BXs carried Playboy, and some did not. I do not know for sure, but had been told it was at the discretion of the base commander. It may well have been the PX / BX manager that made the decision. Playboy was considered racy, if not quite pornography at the time. But of course, that was before Jimmy Carter's "I have lusted in my heart" interview.

I'm not about to second-guess the discretion of the base commander. That's something for the military to decide.

Not Congress. And certainly not some busybody group.

For what it's worth, the BX still carries Playboy, and Maxim, but not Penthouse or Hustler. (Are they even still in print?) Motorcycle and car magazines, of course. Muscle-building stuff. Also home stuff, cooking and decorating magazines. Plus the fun stuff like the Enquirer and Star at the checkouts - but not the Weekly World News, that's no longer in print.

What IS odd, however, is a decided lack of military themed or SF paperbacks. There's a scattering of westerns, and a lot of romances and 'inspirational' reading.

Way I look at it, if you're in the military you're old enough to decide what you want to read. Thankfully, with the internet and Amazon.com, it's REAL easy to get what you're looking for!

What strikes me as odd is that Michael Yon's book (according to his website) is not available in PXs and BXs. Where do government contractors get off deciding our warriors don't want to read about their successes?

Which points out that it is often a non-military company deciding what the military gets to buy on base or post. They can, of course, buy anything they want to from civilian sources.

Well, maybe someone would like to point out to the Congressman that if the troops overseas cannot purchase jackoff materials, they may do one of two things*;

1. Find 'bitches' amongst themselves, like in prison.

2. Um, yeah, them UN troops and teenagers. What they did.

Which is perhaps what's known as unintended consequences. The Congressman might reconsider his stance (wide) after that.

*Yeah, I know, far-fetched, but seriously, there are bad eggs everywhere, despite the generally high standards of the US armed forces, and this kind of crap nobody needs, least of all some stupid Congress-critter mucking stuff up as usual.

Playboy is porn for those that get their rocks off to bad air brush jobs. This bill and its sponsors are ridiculous, let the military have its porn.

Our military folks are already giving up a whole lot of their freedom to defend ours. It hardly seems fair to take away any more of it. Besides, "cheesecake" is a fine old military tradition! Think of the nose art on WWII aircraft.

If this silly bill goes through, I will start a morale campaign: If sleazy lefty skanks can flaunt their grubby hides for protests and such, conservative babes can surely do even better by "lowering the shields", as it were, to raise troop morale. Albums of the resultant photographs could be prepared and sent in care packages. Heck, I'll contribute some of my own, too! Although I must admit that, plump and middle-aged as I am, I would definitely benefit from the assistance of a highly skilled airbrush technician, were all of me to be displayed in the altogether. ;-)

See, this is where conservatives start thinking maybe they're more libertarian than they thought, and distancing themselves from types of conservatives.

Of course, I suppose the busybody group could be liberals - there has been a shift in that direction over the decades. Candlelight vigils are usually a liberal thing.

Nah. I'll bet it's our own side being jerks here.