But this is about Carlin and here's a random and non-verbatim recollection:

-Rape is funny. Picture Porky the Pig raping Elmer Fudd.

-Ever thought about these anti-abortion women, who'd wanna fuck them anyway?

-But the biggest perpetrators of bullshit are these religious pricks. There's this man who has issued orders for you to follow, and if you don't he will throw you into a pit of burning fire and misery forever. But, he loves you. And he needs your money.

-Only in this country could we even invent anorexia: rich cunts who won't eat.

-Not every ejaculation deserves a name.

-Save the planet? We can't even save ourselves.

-You ever think the wrong two Beatles died first?

Of course this could go on and on, and context is everything. You had to see it. You had to watch Carlin shimmy and tremble when he talks about the planet, himself becoming the planet, shaking humans off like a bad case of the fleas. I saw most of his work on HBO and people often miss the physicality of it; they laugh or winch or flinch over his words. But whether they even know it or not, they react as much to this skinny, tiny, hippy-ish man bending his body or torquing his face into the shape and sound of what he's saying as they do to his language. His body is the truth, too. Remember Carlin, who becomes that burnt-frozen citizen of Pompeii who represents our ability to save the planet?

Pryor, too: he becomes the cheetah who's so fast he can wait and wait on his prey until…until Pryor assumes the sprinter's position and you know the quarry is done for.

But, back to George, the least sentimental comic I ever heard:

-Are you fucking kidding me? Save the planet. The planet doesn't give a shit about us.

And when he spoke, he spoke New York, exhaled it like a runner. And that gave him grit, an edge; he was from the jungle. Here's two words that go together - Carlin and language: he loved words, dirty or not, knew them, used them like a mason in constructing his comedy.

Remember this from one of his books? "The difference between L.A. and New York is that L.A. is a beautiful woman whispering in your ear, 'Fuck Me.' New York is a big brutish hairy man shouting out, 'Fuck You.'"

(Not that it matters, but pull up Carlin on YouTube, close your eyes and ask yourself: what famous actor does he sound like? Come on. He's Al Pacino, right? Or Al Pacino's George Carlin.)

-When I see a car with a sign saying "baby on board" I want to speed up and smash the fucking car. Like we're supposed to give a shit that you're driving your baby around and we gotta be careful.

-And what's this shit with kids these days? We gotta schedule play time. Can you imagine that—scheduling play time for your kids. Do the kid a favor and schedule some "leave me the fuck alone time."