52-Pickup—Las Vegas police are suddenly, aggressively, picking up prostitutes in the “resort corridor” of the city. Armed with a deck—or a list, anyway—of our “50 most prolific prostitutes,” vice cops nabbed almost half of them in the first two weeks of the initiative.

Meanwhile, Las Vegas promotes sex, women, and “anything goes” in its siren call to visitors.

Meanwhile, the talks go on about legalizing, or at least decriminalizing, prostitution in Vegas, as in 10 out of our 16 counties.

What is Vegas if not one big hypocritical contradiction? Prostitution creates a “bad image for Las Vegas,” says Metro Vice Lt. Karen Hughes. What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, beckon the ads. Barbara Brents, a sociology professor at UNLV, said it best: “It seems pretty hypocritical to me to have an economy based on sexualizing women and then to come down on the women when police want to make it seem like they’re enforcing the law.”

Aren’t there better things for Las Vegas Metropolitan Police to do? Eastern Europeans have invaded and are having a heyday with fraud and id theft. Home invasions are on the rise, too, and are non-consensual, unlike prostitution.

In the Las Vegas Review Journal’s Sunday cover story this past weekend, Hughes said “it’s time to stop the revolving door of prostitution-related arrests, especially when those arrests involve ‘trick rolls.'” Well of course, arrest thieves! Whether it’s a pickpocket, or a prostitute who empties her sleeping client’s wallet, book ’em.

Hughes goes on to say they “want to minimize opportunities for prostitutes to be aggressive with the tourists and with men who aren’t interested in that.” Aggressive sales tactics are annoying, I agree. I particularly detest the loud recorded radio-style ads blasted through hotel speakers onto the Strip. I’m not fond of the hundreds (it seems) of Mexican men and women (they are all Mexican, and they all wear earphones) who shove escort ads at passers-by, whether they’re interested or not. They create an awful lot of litter, too. And I’m especially irked by the saleskids in the malls who accost passers-by with questions meant to engage, meant to stop a person to create an opportunity for a sales pitch.

Oh, and it’s okay to aggressively solicit porn stars on huge, well-lit billboards.

I haven’t done a survey, but I bet a large proportion of our visitors enjoy temporarily flirting with the naughtiness Vegas cooked up. They can be momentary voyeurs, or daring participants, wannabes, or shrinking lurkers, aghast but rapt. We know one thing: trying to appeal to the family crowd didn’t work, and isn’t what Vegas wants.

Why not legalize prostitution? No one need buy the product unless it’s wanted. Legalize brothels, and no one need see the product unless they want it. It would end trick-rolls. It would be safe for the working girl and safe for the customer. Our mayor, who won’t publicly “advocate it,” says a Little Amsterdam red-light district in Vegas would generate hundreds of millions of dollars for the city.

Otherwise, I’ve got an idea for the pimps. Leave the girls at home. Keep them off the streets, where they’ll just be arrested. Put them in front of a web cam, and show your iPod or iPhone to potential clients. Call her on your cellphone and introduce her to the john. Let them speak. Let her stay safe (and warm, or cool), while you do the soliciting. Just until prostitution is legalized.