NBC's "Law & Order" programs are long established and all over the schedule. But the sex-obsessed vice cops of "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" are a breed apart. They exist to be socially provocative, which is to say, to rattle, to disturb. Viewers at home probably weren't ready for the plot that aired on NBC on March 3. These scriptwriters are so revolting that they become almost comical.

As you read what follows, you decided how closely this mirrors anything resembling the world of reality.

Someone was strangling prostitutes to death and leaving prayer cards behind. The first suspect was a perverted man whose wife proclaimed he had converted to Christianity and overcome his sinful ways. The cops quickly discovered the man dismissed his wife as a "prude," and he was cheating on her with a variety of young girls because "it's not a crime to want a little variety" in his sex life, including "toys, role play, and threesomes." Despite his ardor for sexual gunplay as well, this so-called Christian was not the strangler.

WASHINGTON -- If your impression of an Afghan woman is of a shapeless, frightened form engulfed in yards of heat-trapping fabric, you haven't met Shafiqa Quraishi.

Make that Colonel Quraishi, who earned her title as one of 900-plus female members of the Afghan National Police.

Quraishi, who today is director of Gender, Human, and Child Rights within the Afghan Ministry of the Interior, was one of nine women in town to receive the International Women of Courage Award from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

She and fellow Afghan award recipient Shukria Asil sat down Thursday for lunch and conversation with members of the U.S.-Afghan Women's Council to discuss ways to help women and children struggling for rights and security.

Every week Sunshine State News will be offering a glimpse of important business legislation and crucial state issues being addressed in the Florida Legislature in the coming days.

This week a bill that would make it harder for plaintiffs to win slip and fall lawsuits against retailers makes its way to the House floor, legislation that revamps state recycling works its way through the Senate committee process, and a push for Florida to become the 20th state to demand a balanced federal budget reaches the Senate floor.

Homebuilders and homeowners across Florida are still waiting for a solution to the Chinese drywall problem. And until the state or federal government develops a plan of action, industry experts say they're likely to continue waiting.

A Nike swoosh or the Golden Arches might one day call to consumers from the back of your car.

The legislation that could allow some companies to stamp their corporate logo on Florida license plates as a way to bring in some cash for the state and save drivers some money - is likely to get a vote in a Senate committee next week.

As he attempts to lead the state during a tumultuous legislative session and prevail in a tight battle for the U.S. Senate nomination, Gov. Charlie Crist is increasingly finding himself isolated from the Republicans who control both houses of the Legislature and whose help, or lack of, could determine his political fortunes.

EDITOR'S NOTE:
From education and Medicaid, to personnel and paper clips, ideas for shaping and reforming Florida's state budget are examined in this five-part Sunshine State News series.

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Three House Democrats wrote letters in support of former House Representative and Broward County Commissioner Josephus Eggelletion. Eggelletion was sentenced on Friday for conspiring to launder money. Rep. Perry Thurston, D-Plantation, Rep. Hazel Rogers, D-Lauderdale Lakes, and Rep. Joe Gibbons, D-Hallandale Beach, urged the judge to offer leniency to Eggelletion.

Lawmakers will have to correct Gov. Charlie Crist's fuzzy math if they have any hope of balancing the budget based on his K-12 spending plan.

Boosting the public schools' outlays to $22.7 billion, Crist keeps education as the single biggest item in the state budget. But, while touting a $175 increase in per-pupil spending, the governor has no firm plan to pay for it.

Lawmakers will likely whittle away at the popular Bright Futures Scholarship program that pays for the education of more than half of Florida's college students this year as they write the budget for the state's colleges and universities.

The Senate is examining a change to the scholarship that could reduce the number of students who are eligible for the award and also permanently take it away from students who can't keep their grades up.