IN DEFENSE OF PRISONER TUCK 'N' ROLLS. I see a convicted killer wants a sex change at taxpayer expense. Like most of you, I had at first a bad first reaction to it -- the situation carries a heavy "ick" factor, as the icky Jonah Goldberg might put it. But let's take a contrarian view (actually contrarian, not the bullshit normally peddled under that name) and see how we feel.

If we accept Ruskin's idea that the state of any society can be measured
by the condition of its prisons, we suck. But I think we are generally tilting in the right direction on that score. Even some conservatives, normally insensible to the suffering of others, have warmed to the issue of prison rape. If National Review columnists give a shit whether Guests of the State are sexually tortured, you know we've reached a watershed.

And also in general, we have for years been pushing out the boundaries as to what, medically speaking, constitutes the acceptable minimal quality of life. With close to 20 million Americans taking antidepressants, it may be that condition of mind is getting to be as significant a standard of health as condition of body was back in the days when we first started deploring rickets in children.

I know that most people hate prisoners, for reasons ranging from personal injury done by them to a free-floating and very American contempt for all unfortunates. But even the most sour apple will admit that the lowliest convict must be given food to sustain himself and perhaps a little exercise. As our MDR for a tolerable state of being is inexhorably lifted, might we one day accept that gender confusion is a cruel and unusual condition even for the least of us?

I'm inclined to think, looking more than usual at the way our society has gone during the span of my life (tomorrow is my birthday), that despite the exacerbations of our natural cruelty leaders and newsreaders try to excite at every opportunity, we will soon enough grant privileges to prisoners that are unimaginable at this moment.

Will we, nill we, we're getting kinder. You may think that's bad, criminal, idiotarian, but there it is. (Hell, with the WMD evidence looking flimsier every day, even the hardest among us point to the kindness done to Iraqis as the justification for invasion -- if that's how Republicans are turning, can you imagine what's going on with the rest of us?) You may gnash your teeth at the injustice represented by one human being getting a little break, but I am looking at the horizon, and it seems a little brighter. I've never been among that pinch-necked crew that thinks we have too many rights. Your mileage may vary, but I believe time is on my side.