It’s Friday, and I still hate Kobe Bryant – what else is new?

1. On N.J. strippers demonstrate in front of the statehouse to protest new indoor smoking ban:
“Usually, sleeze and scum have ways of influencing public leaders.”

2. On a pair who met in a chat room, and have never met in person, marrying in a virtual wedding:
“Eventually, it had to happen, just for the sake of being ‘the first morons’ to try this. I’m going to make a prediction that this marriage doesn’t last (I know, I’m going out on a virtual limb with this one).”

3. On Michigan man being jailed on assault charges after his handshake sickens three people:
“This guy has politics in his blood.”

4. On a man who will attempt to set a world record by kissing a venomous snake 50 times in 10 minutes:
“This has a Darwin Award written all over it. Funny what happens when somebody decides to put out a book of world records.”

5. On a convicted sex offender being behind bars in Minnesota after trying to impersonate European Royalty - Caspian James Chrichton Stuart the Fourth, the Fifth Duke of Cleveland:
“He should’ve tried impersonating a Kennedy.”

6. On a best man at a Virginia wedding being sentenced to nine years in prison for torching the groom's house during the honeymoon:
“If that’s the best man, who else was in the wedding party, Charles Manson?”

7. On a person who calls himself The Impaler" running for governor of Minnesota as the leader of the "Vampyres, Witches and Pagans Party:"
“I’m gonna go out on another limb here and say that as funny and amusing as this sounds, I’m guessing the alternatives aren’t any better … after all, this is the same state that elected Jesse ‘The Body’ Ventura as governor.”

8. On a challenge by Roman Catholic groups to a New York law requiring employers to offer prescription contraceptives being rejected by an appeals court:
“Sure, just because some people may not be Catholic, doesn’t mean they don’t have to follow Catholic rules … man, some Catholics are really full of themselves.”