LAUGH LINES : Punchlines

In the news: Comic Jenny Church, on Gov. Pete officially announcing his candidacy: “His speech was so full of rhetoric, he needed a bullhorn.”

* Adds comedy writer Bob Mills: “The latest polls show that his support is so weak, if the election were held today, he’d be soundly defeated by Powell. Not Colin--Jane.”

Church, on the First Lady going to China as honorary chair of the Conference on Women: “Some conservatives don’t like Clinton’s wife being a chair. They believe the wife should be a doormat.”

Comic Argus Hamilton, on Bill and Hill camping at the Grand Tetons: “It got very cold around the campfire. So to stay warm, they had to burn all their old tax records from ’84 and ’85.”

Comedy writer Paul Ryan, on former Defense Secretary Richard Cheney saying the Clinton Administration lacks intellectual rigor: “And this from a member of a Cabinet that included Dan Quayle.”

Hamilton, on Sen. Bob Packwood wanting public hearings on sexual harassment charges against him: “He wants all the sleazy details out in the open. Now we can add exhibitionism to the list of charges.”

Comedy writer Tony Peyser, on Microsoft’s new computer program: “It’s called Windows 95 because consumers will spend the rest of 1995 looking out the window while waiting for someone to answer on Microsoft’s help line.”

Comedy writer Alan Ray, on Disney trying to buy Radio City Music Hall: “Look for an immediate impact. The chorus line will be four times as long.”

Comic Dennis Miller, on reports that the Jackson-Presley marriage is on the rocks: “This would make Michael the first celebrity to be divorced for spending too much time with the kids.”

Miller, on Mike Tyson’s victory over Peter McNeeley: “McNeeley made every mistake possible. I’m surprised he didn’t enter the ring dressed in a prison-guard uniform.”

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Also in the news: Ray, on the Oakland attorney arrested as a peeping tom: “Friends don’t understand how he could do something so despicable. Why he became a lawyer, they don’t know.”

Comedy writer Paul Steinberg, on the guy in a dog costume who robbed an arcade in Redmond, Wash.: “Fortunately, police caught him outside the arcade when he stopped during his getaway to sniff a tree.”

Church, on the Yuba City cross-dresser running for the local water board: “His campaign platform is that the board should invest in new pumps. And matching handbags.”

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Redlands reader Laura Laue’s son, Eric, 6, learned in class about different countries around the world and their foods. When the school principal made sukiyaki in honor of Japan, Eric returned home to tell his mom the required ingredients. As he struggled to recall “those long, flat, white things,” he finally realized what they were:

“Oh yeah,” he said, “baboon shoots!”