Welcome to the Department of Motor Vehicles’ office of vanity plates, where three full-time state employees review some 90,000 applications for personalized license plates each year and, citing poor taste, turn down thousands....

The requests denied by the DMV — which the agency provided after a records request by KGTV in San Diego — don’t get much better, intellectually speaking. Some are tame but a bit crass, while others feature racism or gang boasts or macho sexual innuendos....

Take the plate “C(Hand)CRSUX.” The applicant, who sought a hand symbol as part of the vanity plate, explained that “cancer sucks.” The state reviewer responded, “Cancer sucks. I agree but ‘suck’ is unacceptable.”...

Southern California resident Shawn Calpito, 40, applied for and received the license plate “NOT SEE.” Only after the DMV received complaints about the tag, which was fastened to a license-plate holder with a swastika, did the agency cancel the plate — and send Calpito a new one, according to the DMV.