But one element that has been more than lacking is the thought of porn performers IN politics. At least, not in North America.
Of course, the worldwide template in the 80's/90's for practicing porn performers actually representing in office was Illona Staller, the Hungarian porn performer known and loved in Italy as Ciccolina, who later parlayed her XXX fame into two terms as a member of the Italian Parliament under the libertarian Radical Party.
There have been a few other passing attempts at mixing pro-sex politics with politics, such as Australia's Sex Party and Anna Arrowsmith's run for British parliament...but other than that, most attempts to bring more progressive views of porn into political bodies have fallen to the dominant Puritanism of our time.
In the United States, the closest you could find to a porn performer attempting a political run was Mary Carey's PR attempt to sell her Arnold Schwarzenegger parody, thinly disguised as a run for California governor during the 1990's, resulting from the recall of incumbent Gray Davis. Unfortunately for the libertarian Carey, that didn't turn out so well even in the PR aspect; nevertheless, she has survived and thrived in her more natural environment as a porn performer.
Times have progressed, however, to the point that social media have greatly improved the popular reach of porn performers; and combined with the popularity of hardcore porn political satire (see Sarah Palin pilloried by Lisa Ann in the Who's Naylin Paylin series), has increased greatly the possibility of a breakthrough in porn performers seriously challenging to serve in office.
Given the common stereotyping of porn performers as airheads more interested in the next blowjob than creating jobs, it would take a stupendously smart and savvy, as well as sexy, woman to shatter that particular glass ceiling and assume the position of pioneer.
Someone, you could say, like Nikki Benz.
The native of Toronto, Canada, and long time performer, feature dancer, and owner of her NikkiBenz.com website (part of Vicky Vette's Vette Nation Army network), is on track to file official papers this week in order to launch her campaign to oust her home city's incumbent mayor, Rob Ford. (See Update below.)
That would be the same Rob Ford, people, that has graced Toronto's City Hall for the past 4 years under nonstop hilarious wacky controversy after controversy. You may have heard about those rumors of him smoking crack cocaine in his offices (those are true), or his mouthing off against charges of sexual harassment of his staff because "I get enough pussy at home" (also true); or even the reports that he went on drunken spurts with his buddies, even going as far as driving drunk, and even having the brass to make YouTube videos of his exploits under the influence.
Now, in most cases, getting caught smoking crack and Moellering* up behind the wheel rolling 1.7 BAC would be enough to get your ass run from office. Problem is, Canadian law somehow prevents impeachment or removal of officials from office, so the Toronto City Council was reduced to curtailing Ford's powers and shifting some of them, as well as his staff, to his Deputy Mayor, Norm Kelly. Ford, though, is still very popular with that conservative segment of the electorate that really digs populist Right strongmen not afraid to ruffle the feathers in favor of "less guviment" and lower taxes; and he decided that he wanted to serve for another 4 years by filing last January for reelection.
Before Wednesday, Ford faced 54 challengers from diverse parties for reclaiming his seat. Benz becomes candidate #55.
Now, it may be said that she's not really serious about campaigning for Toronto mayor, and that this is all nothing more than show and blow to enhance Nikki's already towering career as a porn performer. Her first campaign "commercial" was really a 30 minute spot hosted by the porn site Brazzers.com, to which Nikki has shot several scenes sans clothes. However, she certainly sounds like she's in it to win it, because she sounds like she is truly fed up with Ford's act and that at the very least, she could do far better to reinhance Toronto's tarnished reputation.
And...I'd say she'd look a hell of a lot better sitting in the Mayor's chair than Rob Ford ever did.
Here's a vid of Nikki announcing her bid for Toronto's Mayor, released via Brazzers.com:
UPDATE (6-3-14): Nikki's quest for nomination took a slight detour last week, due to some minor paperwork malfunction. Seems like she didn't have a valid local license in order to qualify for the position, so her paperwork was rejected. Nikki confirmed that she would still be able to qualify with the proper credentials by this week, so the campaign appears to be still go on unabated.
