I read half of Traci Lords' autobiography, the pornstar from like the 80s or so. Basically she had a fucked up childhood, raped at 10 years old by this 16 year old guy she was in love with, sexually molested by a pseudo stepfather but the only adult she could trust. Got pregnant in high school by a boyfriend, who of course turned his back instantly, and had to get an abortion. Thereafter, she essentially got tricked into doing nude modeling because she needed a job to pay for the abortion (she didn't think it was nude at first). Her stepfather didn't bother to tell her the truth of course, and told her basically that everything was good and normal. Vodka and coke lines later, she's a nude model at 15. And since she has no family to turn to or friends, she stays with the porn industry, and eventually gets pressured into softcore and hardcore films. Anyway... Sexual abuse is fucked up... Why do people do it? It boggles my mind...

Oh, and she has a terrible opinion of the porn industry, says everyone has something messed up to say about their private lives. Understandable. But then again I have heard of not so traumatic things from others in the porn industry. So yes... Getting tricked into it is pretty horrific.

And I started my internship with MAPLight, and am working on a few practice bills right now. Conservatives and industry are fucked up. I'm working on this one bill, S-MINER Act of 2007, basically a comprehensive safety bill for miners, focusing especially on coal mines. Industry says, yes we love safety, but the costs are overbearing for business (the penalties and fees for safety oversight by a separate gov't department), so it isn't worth it... It'll be a detriment to the American economy, and we'll have to lay off people. God can't you just make a little less money???????????!!! It's people's lives! The technology is there, so we should use it. More evidence of the fucked up nature of human mentalities.

Basically I'm given a few bills, and I look up all the supporting and opposing organizations for the bill, list them and the source, find out a general sense of what the organization is about, and then write a comment about the bill. It's really fascinating reading some of these things... I'll generalize more after I get through some more bills... I'm tempted to generalize right away about conservative mentality, but I shall hold my tongue.

I got an interview at this place called MAPLight, which attempts to make public all of the contributions towards certain candidates, campaigns, or bills. Woohoo! I hope I get it, that'd be exciting. But it doesn't matter, getting the interview means I'm at least somewhat interesting for political organizations.