In his LA Times op/ed titled There’s nothing funny about prison rape, Ezra Klein includes this quote from Bill Lockyer:

When Enron’s Ken Lay was sentenced to jail, for instance, Bill Lockyer, then the attorney general of California, spoke dreamily of his desire "to personally escort Lay to an 8-by-10 cell that he could share with a tattooed dude who says, ‘Hi, my name is Spike, honey.’ "

Sorry, but I laughed. Shame on me.

***
This old post on Instapundit interestingly proposes that the main reason we turn a blind eye to the prison rape epidemic is because men are the chief victims.

I must be in a good mood, because I’ve laughed pretty hard already this morning. I should be prepping for my speeches tomorrow in San Antonio, but instead I moved through my RSS reader and came across these gems of lines:

1. More evidence that kids today are soft:

The New York Times Magazines revisits the first episodes of Sesame Street, the packaging of which warns that the shows "may not suit the needs of today’s preschoolers." The writer discovers an abundance of "disturbing" content in early Sesame Street, such as one scene where "two brothers risk concussion while whaling on each other with allergenic feather pillows."

2. My friend Ross Carlson has a nice tech support rant on his blog. I worked with Ross (and got my ass kicked in guitar hero more than once) when I was living in Colorado with the Mobius gang. Money graf:

"Call Microsoft!" I exclaim, what the fuck for? "You built the machine, not Microsoft, they have no fucking clue what network card is in it!". She puts me on hold for 5+ minutes and comes back with the same answer, call Microsoft. Ok, clearly this isn’t going anywhere so I ask for a supervisior. Again hold. Again "sorry, they are busy, call Microsoft". I tell her no, that isn’t an acceptable answer, "I want a fucking supervisor and I want them right now".

All of us have dealt with non-English speaking reps before, and all of us have demanded supervisors. A few months ago, I told Earthlink I had filed a lawsuit against them in San Francisco small claims court, just to get somebody to do something for me. Tech support and travel horror stories are the ultimate bond among humans.

3. Texas Monthly has a piece on Jenna Bush and her new book, and it has some of the late night comedian lines on her:

Conan O’Brien: “Jenna’s written her book for children, which is a good thing. Now her dad will be able to read it too.” David Letterman: “It’s going to be an expensive wedding. I guess it’s no surprise the three-billion-dollar contract is going to Halliburton.” Jay Leno: “Jenna announced her engagement two weeks ago, although President Bush knew about it over a month ago from some wiretaps.”

OK – enough humor for today – time to pack my suitcase.

Elaine from Seinfeld on circumcision:

Elaine: Have you ever seen one?
Jerry: You mean that wasn’t –
Elaine: Yeah.
Jerry: No.. you?
Elaine: Ya.
Jerry: What’d you think?
Elaine: (SHAKES HER HEAD) No…
Jerry: Not good?
Elaine: No, had no face, no personality, very dull. It was like a Martian. But hey, that’s me.

(hat tip: Andrew Sullivan)

In the July issue of Harpers magazine, Lewis Lapham (who I normally don’t care for) writes compellingly about the Don Imus scandal. Imus, in April, called Rutgers women basketball players "nappy headed hos."

Lapham includes a quote from the "musician Snoop Dogg who parsed the difference between Imus’s emission and those of rappers like himself":

We are not talking about no collegiate basketball girls who have made it to the next level of education and sports. We’re talking about hos that’s in the hood that ain’t doing shit, is trying to get a nigga for his money…We ain’t no old-ass white men that sit up on MSNBC going hard on black girls.

So sweeping in its analysis, so eloquent in its delivery.

Preach, Snoop, preach: We’re listening.

Somewhat Related Post: Why is Rap Music God’s Soundtrack for Black People? A Riff on Russell Simmons’ Riff

File this one in the "I am embarrassed for the human race" category.

Woman in her 70s dies in-flight in coach class. British Airways staff moves the dead body into the first class cabin where there is more room. A passenger noted that the body in-transit looked like "a bag of potatoes".

A businessman (who paid $3k for his first class Delhi to Heathrow ticket) awoke from a relaxing sleep to see a corpse next to him.

When he complained to British Airways staff, they told him to "get over it".

You gotta love it.