Things to make you laugh, cry, and curse...

...remorselessly pillaged from Reason's Daily Brickbats:

Keeping Their Stories Straight (7/21)
Transportation Security Administration acting chief David Stone testified before Congress that Delta, Continental, America West, Jet Blue and Frontier airlines, as well as airline reservation centers Sabre and Galileo International gave the TSA passenger data including home phone numbers, Social Security numbers, and health information. Stone said the companies didn't notify passengers the information was being given to the government or seek their permission. That contradicts previous sworn testimony from TSA officials as well as statements from airline officials.

Honk If You Love Being Tasered (7/20)
When Louise Jones pulled up to her Kansas City home, she accidentally honked her horn. That didn't sit well with a police officer who was sitting in a patrol car parked nearby. He went to a call at another house, then returned to Jones' house and gave her a ticket for honking. She says he grabbed her. The officer says she resisted him. Whatever happened, the officer then shocked the 68-yer-old woman twice in the chest. When her husband came downstairs to see why his wife was screaming, they were both arrested.

Smoking in the Boys' Room (7/16)
Massachusetts has banned smoking in all bars, restaurants, workplaces and many other buildings open to the public. Previously, many cities in the state had allowed smoking in bars and restaurants that were open only to adults or that had special ventilation equipment.

Sorry, Wrong Person (7/9)
Slobodan Milosevic has had his bank account frozen, and his funds may be seized for war reparations. That's Slobodan Milosevic the Munich bus driver, not the former Yugoslavian president on trial for war crimes. Slobodan the bus driver has tried to convince the bank he isn't a criminal. "I tried to explain that in Serbia my name is common as Hans Schmidt here, but they told me Hans Schmidt was not a war criminal," he said.

Here I Come To Save The Day (7/6)
Landowners and developers in Wyoming and other Western states say that federal rules to protect the endangered Preble's mouse have cost them more than $100 million. But genetic testing now shows the Preble's mouse doesn't exist, or rather, it's nothing more than the Bear Lodge meadow jumping mouse which is common and isn't protected under the Endangered Species Act. But environmental groups now say that rather than remove the Preble's mouse from the threatened list, the government should also list the Bear Lodge mouse.

Public Works (6/23)
The mayor of Niamey, the capital of Niger, has asked "qualified" witch doctors to chase away a spirit that as allegedly been harassing people on the street at night. Several people have reported that a woman has been appearing from nowhere, cursing young women who are scantily dressed and disappearing.

Tough Discipline (6/22)
Courtney Glowczewski has a withered arm and leg due to cerebral palsy. Unfortunately, that has made her a target for harassment by some students at Denver's Martin Luther King Middle School. She's been taunted, threatened and even had a knife pulled on her. But she says the school never responded to her complaints. Finally, after another student set her hair on fire, the school acted. It told Courtney not to come back for the rest of the year. Her alleged attacker is still at school. Administrators confirmed to a local TV station that the boy had a knife, but the school did not call police.

Basta.