For the children

Again, San Francisco leads the way...

Twenty women took off their clothes on Wednesday to make the world a better place.

And one of them did an X-rated dance in stiletto heels with a giant stuffed dog, because it was the right thing to do for the children of San Francisco.

Debbie Licious may not be her real name, she said, but the $10 bills that customers kept poking into her various garment straps were very much genuine. She and her caring colleagues at the Gold Club on Howard Street were turning over the proceeds of their lap dances to benefit the San Francisco Fire Department's annual charity toy drive.

I see the common element between firefighters and strippers: must be the pole - dance around it, slide down it - it's a bond. And then I read further:

"That pole is too thin to be a fire pole," Lopez said, studying the situation very carefully. "But it's a good pole for other purposes."

I wouldn't touch that line with a. . .well, you know...

Firefighters union President John Hanley applauded the strip club and said he "hadn't heard one kid complain" about the source of the toys. And Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White said the club is a "legitimate taxpaying business" and the strippers were "doing the right thing."

One club regular, who appeared to have been slaking his thirst from something besides a fire hydrant, kept slipping folding money into various posteriors.

"I'm giving back to the community!" he hollered.

Now that's civic-mindedness!