It's even hotter than usual in Phoenix, 116 degrees sets a new record, the Associated Press reports:

About 2,000 inmates living in a barbed-wire-surrounded tent encampment at the Maricopa County Jail have been given permission to strip down to their government-issued pink boxer shorts.

On Wednesday, hundreds of men wearing boxers were either curled up on their bunk beds or chatted in the tents, which reached 138 degrees inside the week before. Many were also swathed in wet, pink towels as sweat collected on their chests and dripped down to their pink socks.

"It feels like we are in a furnace," said James Zanzo't, an inmate who has lived in the tents for 1 1/2 years. "It's inhumane."

Joe Arpaio, the tough-guy sheriff who created the tent city and long ago started making his prisoners wear pink, and eat bologna sandwiches, is not one bit sympathetic.

He said Wednesday that he told all of the inmates:

"It's 120 degrees in Iraq and our soldiers are living in tents too, and they didn't commit any crimes, so shut your damned mouths."

KIND OF PUTS THINGS IN PERSPECTIVE DOESN'T IT?