2) With countries like Germany and Australia banning/blacklisting games left and right, publishers would rather not invest time and money into features that they'd inevitably have to remove for acceptance in these territories.

Ummm ... I don't know where you're getting your information from, but games banned in Australia when explicit sex and/or violence is used. So far very few games have been refused rating. GTA:SA was pulled because of Hot Coffee, but was put back on the shelves (same as the US). Postal was banned for gratuitious and needless violence, as as Manhunt. Phantasmagoria (all those years ago) was banned for a rape scene. The only dubious banning I can think of was the recent Leisure Suit Larry ... probably a good thing anyway, but you can't really ban things for just being bad taste. The point is that games aren't banned in Australia "left and right"; very few games are actually refused rating in Australia.

I'm not saying I agree with the act of refuals of rating. I'm a huge proponent of an R-18 rating so that games so rated are only sold to adults. As it happens, games rated MA-15 may not be sold to minors over here, at the risk of huge fines. Personally, I see nothing wrong with that at all. I'd prefer that a 10 year old not be able to wander into a store and just buy GTA over the counter; they should have a "responsible adult" purchase it for them ... in which case the responsibility rests with that person.

If JT just stuck to that kind of line, I don't see the issue anyway. As it happens, he's just a complete nut-job that deserves anything the US legal system can throw at him.