Okay, first of all the story says you can watch while driving. That’s crazy, hence the safety issue should trump the rest of this conversation. Two, as a supporter of locally crafted censorship, I don’t see why we can’t leave this up to local communities and the states. Some places allow drinking open containers while driving, some don’t. Three, the comparison to Playboy is not good. Playboy is very different from, say, “The Adventures of Little Anal Annie.” If I see a guy reading serious hardcore porn openly on a park bench near, say, my daughter’s playground he’s going to have some serious problems. I would certainly expect any decent cop to tell the guy to put it away (the magazine, I mean). Four, if all Andrew is in favor of is leaving sad dudes who need to go park somewhere out of the way to watch porn alone, I agree, leave them alone (which, recall, was my original position). However, having a law on the books would let cops exercise their judgement when necessary. If some dude’s parked in the lot outside Kay Bee Toys watching “Naughty Cheerleaders Nine,” I am perfectly comfortable with Johnnny Law telling the guy to move along.

As for all the emails from folks asking what I think about putting the TV up to the window of your house and other bizarre hypotheticals, I think common sense, decency and existing laws should apply. I don’t think this is a subject worthy of crafting huge over-arching principles of liberty and privacy over.