Condemning Romney as a pornographer... because he sat on the board of a hotel chain.

He did nothing -- can you believe it? -- to stop the flow of adult movies into the rooms of Marriott Hotels.

"Marriott is a major pornographer. And even though he may have fought it, everyone on that board is a hypocrite for presenting themselves as family values when their hotels offer 70 different types of hardcore pornography," said Phil Burress, president of Citizens for Community Values, an anti-pornography group based on Ohio.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, a leading conservative group in Washington, said: "They have to assume some responsibility. It's their hotels, it's their television sets."

During a recent Associated Press interview, Romney said he did not recall pornography coming up for discussion while he was on the Marriott board from 1992 to 2001. Despite being chairman of the board's audit committee, he also said he was unaware of how much revenue pornography may have generated for the hotel chain.

Romney said his current concern is not about pornography per se, but children unwittingly stumbling upon it on the Internet or television.

"I am not pursuing an effort to try and stop adults from being able to acquire or see things that I find objectionable; that's their right. But I do vehemently oppose practices or business procedures that will allow kids to be exposed to obscenity," the former Massachusetts governor said.

I see some good and bad in this.

Good:

1. Romney seems to have a some regard for personal autonomy in the private sphere.

2. Romney shows some respect for free speech of the sexual variety.

3. Romney refrains from using his power to impose his religious beliefs to limit the freedom of the individual.

Bad:

1. Romney -- assuming he's telling the truth -- served on the audit committee without understanding the value of an important source of revenue, which might suggest a certain laxness in management.

2. Romney might be lying (or fudging) about that, in which case, he's not the most honest guy.

3. Assuming Romney understood Marriott's business interest in supplying pornography to its hotel rooms, we need to worry that the three positive things listed above may not hold true when the rights of ordinary citizens are at stake.