Insensitive Item

In the Nov. 14 Footnotes column, there was an item (“Laughable Shell Corporation”) dealing with a new product called “Certifiably Nuts,” which as the writer described it, was “basically a sack of Georgia peanuts, wrapped in a tiny straitjacket, that laughs hysterically. . . . Certifiably Nuts comes with papers including a patient history and a certificate committing it to an insane asylum. At the pull of a string, it emits frenzied giggles.”

It seems to me that, with the large number of mentally ill people, The Times would take a little extra care before providing free publicity to such a product. What can we expect next? Dolls with AIDS, cancer and arthritis?

JOSEPH L. MILLER

San Bernardino