Cranky crusades by highly-placed conservatives have moved a long way since Ronald Reagan's 1980 election and the rise of the religious right. As discontent sweeps Middle America, widespread conservative alliances are rapidly changing the nature of one of the world's most liberal nations.
It is against this background that Nadine Strossen's book, Defending Pornography, has been published to a storm of protest. Her attempt to link the women's movement with right-wing ascendancy has not only got up feminists' skirts but the fact the president of the American Civil Liberties Union chooses to do it while defending the indefensible has sent shockwaves through the country.
Strossen has faced a barrage of abuse for knocking hell out of feminists who are fighting to restrain pornography. Her book has been lambasted as an appalling attack on her sisters, scape-goating two in particular, Catharine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin.
But the author, a professor at New York Law School and noted human rights activist, firmly insists the book, her first, neither advocates nor opposes pornography.
Rather, it defends the right of all consenting adults to look, or not look, at pornography as they choose. So much as wolf whistle these days and the sex police will be after you, she bristles.
The pro-censorship lobby's problem, according to Strossen, is that their fight is based on speculation that pornography may lead in the long run to discrimination or violence against women. She believes there is a lack of evidence to substantiate their fears.