The Plastic Arts: In July, the late great Jean Michel Basquiat will be featured in a 12-inch action figure, giving company to molded-plastic friends Andy Warhol, Michel Foucault, Oscar Wilde, and others.

Found photo: Alley traffic lights, via A Welsh View.

DeLay's "culture of death": Ethically challenged House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, referencing the judges who refused appeals on behalf of life-extending measures for Terri Schiavo, says, "The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior." Huh? I heard no such ire about the men responsible for the misguided murder of 18,000 to 100,000 killed in Iraq over WMD intelligence the Bush administration investigators now say was "dead wrong." And what exactly does DeLay mean? Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) sent a letter to DeLay chiding him for the remark:

As you are surely aware, the family of Federal Judge Joan H. Lefkow of Illinois was recently murdered in their home. And at the state level, Judge Rowland W. Barnes and others in his courtroom were gunned down in Georgia.

Our nation’s judges must be concerned for their safety and security when they are asked to make difficult decisions every day. That’s why comments like those you made are not only irresponsible, but downright dangerous. To make matters worse, is it appropriate to make threats directed at specific Federal and state judges?

You should be aware that your comments yesterday may violate a Federal criminal statute, 18 U.S.C. §115 (a)(1)(B). That law states:

“Whoever threatens to assault…. or murder, a United States judge… with intent to retaliate against such… judge…. on account of the performance of official duties, shall be punished [by up to six years in prison]”

Is Lautenberg overreacting? Not according to Think Progress:

Last Thursday, police arrested an Illinois man they said robbed a Florida gun store as part of an attempt to "rescue Terri Schiavo." The next day, FBI officials took into custody a North Carolina man for placing a $250,000 bounty "on the head of Michael Schiavo" and another $50,000 to murder Judge Greer. And police yesterday said they had "logged several bomb threats" to the hospice where Schiavo died and "the circuit and federal courts that refused to order her feeding tube restored."

Too real for "reality": When the reality-TV show "Wife Swap" featured a liberal family from Minneapolis' boho-lesbian Powderhorn Park neighborhood and a pro-Bush, ultra-Christian Kentucky family (on gender roles in the family, the wife said that thanks to Eve's apple-munching in Eden, she "condemned herself and her kind to be under the heel of man.”), some of the best parts never made it to TV. Like when the Minneapolis mom found a high-powered crossbow within easy reach in the basement. Or when she plastered her pro-Bush partner's pickup with peace magnets. Or when a fight between her and her "husband" ended up with a kicked door and a Minneapolis woman in a Kentucky hotel. Fun stuff. But what if reality TV delves into actual life and death issues?

Last week, I caught the last few minutes of "The Contender," a reality show about boxing. After boxer Najai Turpin left Contender headquarters, hangdog after having lost his bout, Sugar Ray Leonard appeared on screen to announce Turpin's unexpected death. Never did Leonard mention that Turpin's passing involved a self-inflicted bullet-wound. Apparently men beating each other til bloody is "reality," but a suicide, in the realm of dishonest TV programming, isn't.

Peace for Terri: After 15 years of being kept alive in a persistent vegetative state, Terri Schiavo passed away today. Hopefully, the media will let her family grieve privately, and radical Christians in the Republican party will redirect their sanctity-of-life battle toward, say, the death penalty or the toll of the Iraq war on children (more children are starving or malnourished in Iraq today than were under Saddam Hussein). Probably not, considering that the lawyer for Michael Schiavo received death threats for his work on the case. "The most challenging aspect of this case, from a spiritual point of view, has been dealing with these forces of such hatred and negativity," George Felos said in an interview last year. "I cannot imagine what would motivate somebody to call up and say, 'We have put your name on a death warrant and if Terri Schiavo dies, you are next."'

Montage-a-Google: This is a fun little visual search engine. Just type in a search word--ear, in this case--and get a tiled graphical presentation of results, all clickable to the origin webpages. Try it out.

Byrnecasting: Talking Heads frontman David Byrne has launched an internet radio station that broadcasts his favorite music. Recently on his playlist: Cat Power, Biz Markie, Gilberto Gil, Juana Molina, Pietra Montecorvino, and Outkast. More from Xeni Jardin.

Rebranding RFID: Don't worry, civil libertarians. The US government won't be using RFID tags (that's radio frequency identification tags or tiny computer chips that can be used to track one's whereabouts) to keep track of you. However, it's likely they'll instead use "proximity chips," "contactless chips" or "contactless integrated circuits." The re-branded chips, which may go in national ID cards or passports, have raised the hackles of privacy experts who fear the government will use them to track your next trip to Cuba or a visit to the local anarchist bookstore. Since the chips will also contain all the same info as a passport (name, date, place of birth, etc.), there's an even scarier possibility, according to RFIDkills.com:

In a dangerous world where Americans are targeted by thieves, kidnappers and terrorists, the RFID-chipped US passport will turn tourists into targets, and American business travelers will transmit their identities to kidnappers wherever they go, thanks to the US State Department.

Close up, the information broadcast from the RFID chip can be read by anyone with an inexpensive electronic reader.  Farther away, the RFID chip can be activated enough to identify the passport holder as an American.

Mark McKinnon: PR Man extraordinaire. I love it when Bush's spinmeisters remind us of additional reasons to dislike the man. In a story on why W's approval ratings dropped seven points in a single week (two possible reasons: his early silence on the school slayings in northern Minnesota and his backing away from the Schiavo case), Bush strategist Mark McKinnon says he doubts there's a connection between approval ratings and the Schiavo case, adding that slipping approval numbers were "more due to rising gas prices, rising interest rates and some recent economic uncertainty." Oh yeah. Forgot about those.

No family photos: When 1st Lt. Kenneth Michael Ballard came home from Iraq last fall, his mother wanted to photograph his arrival. The Pentagon wouldn't allow it because Karen Meredith's son, a fourth-generation soldier, was arriving home dead, a sniper's bullet in his head. The military's strict rules that prohibit the photographing of returning coffins apparently even apply to grieving families who want a personal memento of their tragedy. "It's bad enough that they won't let the country see the pictures of the caskets, but a grieving mother?" asked Meredith. "It's unforgiveable after what I lost." Bluntly insensitive DoD spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Venable said that a hearse arriving at a funeral is essentially the same as a plane touching down on American soil carrying fallen soldiers: "It's a tarmac, not a parade ground." Ballard is one of 1,528 American soldiers killed in Iraq so far.

Axis of Evil: Venezuela? Venezuela is reportedly setting up a million-person "Popular Reserve" to defend against an attack from the US. Sound far-fetched? Not if you consider the US' long track record of aiding coups of democratic leaders in the region, remarking with great alarm at the "instability" of the country and its leader, and America's history of military interventions there. And, don't forget, Venezuela is the fifth largest oil producer in the world (president Hugo Chavez has said he's expecting Bush to say WMDs have been found in Venezuela, and he promises, ""If there is any [US] aggression, there will be no oil.)"

Block the bias: Want to protect innocent ears in your home from the false news of Fox? Use a Fox Blocker, a simple metal gadget that allegedly filters Fox News Channel from your TV. It's creator, a former Republican, writes on his website:

The FOXBlocker is a wonderful way of telling the advertisers at FOX News that you are no longer interested in being exposed to right wing propaganda.

With every order placed, FOXBlocker.com will send an e-mail in your name to the TOP 10 advertisers at FOX News letting them know that yet another subscriber has opted out of FOX News.

Gay marriage ban's unexpected side effect: Ohio's new constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages is already having an effect on straight couples: it prohibits them from filing domestic violence charges. In a case where a man beat up his live-in girlfriend over a pack of cigarettes, what could've been a felony assault charge under the state's 25-year-old domestic violence law was reduced to a misdemeanor assault charge. The difference? The felony charge comes with a maximum 18 month jail sentence, compared to a six month maximum sentence for the misdemeanor.

If Easter, just a few days away, is Christ's "triumph over death" (his resurrection involved no feeding tubes, no human intervention) and if death is the "ultimate mystery," our chance to meet God face to face, why are so-called Christians working so hard to keep Terri Schiavo in suspended animation between life and death? Let her go.

Iraqi orphans fund:

"Stop that car!" someone shouted out, seemingly simultaneously with someone firing what sounded like warning shots -- a staccato, measured burst. The car continued coming. And then, perhaps less than a second later, a cacophony of fire, shots rattling off in a chaotic, overlapping din. The car entered the intersection on its momentum and still shots were penetrating it and slicing it. Finally, the shooting stopped, the car drifted listlessly, clearly no longer being steered, and came to a rest on a curb. Soldiers began to approach it warily.

The sound of children crying came from the car. I walked up to the car and a teenaged girl with her head covered emerged from the back, wailing and gesturing wildly. After her came a boy, tumbling onto the ground from the seat, already leaving a pool of blood.

"Civilians!" someone shouted, and soldiers ran up. More children -- it ended up being six all told -- started emerging, crying, their faces mottled with blood in long streaks.

This experience, witnessed by Getty photographer Chris Hondros, describes an incident in January where US soldiers in Iraq left nine children orphaned, killing their unarmed, civilian parents. Now, as Boing Boing points out, a fund has been started specifically to help these children. Learn more, and how to donate, here.

A catholic (and Catholic) perspective on Schiavo: The Terri Schiavo case is about one thing only, says Rev. John Paris, a Boston College bioethicist and Catholic priest: "The power of the Christian right. This case has nothing to do with the legal issues involving a feeding tube." Versed in laws of both church and state, Paris says it has very little to do with what "radical right-to-lifers" say it does:

The sanctity of life? This has nothing to do with the sanctity of life. The Roman Catholic Church has a consistent 400-year-old tradition that I'm sure you are familiar with. It says nobody is obliged to undergo extraordinary means to preserve life.

This is Holy Week, this is when the Catholic community is saying, "We understand that life is not an absolute good and death is not an absolute defeat." The whole story of Easter is about the triumph of eternal life over death. Catholics have never believed that biological life is an end in and of itself. We've been created as a gift from God and are ultimately destined to go back to God. And we've been destined in this life to be involved in relationships. And when the capacity for that life is exhausted, there is no obligation to make officious efforts to sustain it.

Read his interview at Salon.com.

A schism? Paris' viewpoint may suggest that doctinal Catholics don't buy into the Bush extremists' point of view on the Schiavo case (although a New York Times piece claims the opposite). A CBS poll says that 68% of white American evangelicals say Bush and Congress should butt out (compared to 82% of the general public), and black evangelicals are none too thrilled either. And an increasing number of conservatives think Bush's incursion into states'-rights territory is anything but conservative. Are cracks forming in the once iron-clad conservative/Christian right alliance?

Cliff Notes of the Jeff Gannon Story:
Fake name. Fake reporter. Fake news agency. And now this ...

Fake Marine.

Not much true about this fella, is there?

Auctioning off Social Security on eBay! Thanks to Billionaires for Bush.

Products we can live without: In a banner week for new-product development—Beer without aftertaste? Bust-boosting bubblegum?—the most curious may come from Peru: former president, Alberto Fujimori (who was run out of town in 2000 under allegations of torture and corruption), wants to "quench the thirst of popular discontent." With what? His soon-to-be-released line of Fuji-Cola, of course. (Via AgendaInc.)

And: NowToronto ponders whether American Apparel's sweatshop-free values outweigh its kiddie-porn advertising aesthetic.

More on fascist crowd control: "Italian dictator Benito Mussolini was so deeply troubled by the chaos of people walking around central Rome that he enacted strict rules governing pedestrians," writes Project for Public Spaces' Jay Walljasper in a column I mentioned yesterday. "Everyone on... Via del Corso was commanded to walk in one direction on the east side of the street, and the opposite direction on the west side... Romans living under the bootheel of Mussolini's fascist regime refused to accept this infringement of their right to walk the way they want to walk... So why has no one in Winnipeg... torn out the sidewalk blockades at Portage and Main, one of the most celebrated intersections in Canadian history? Why don't folks in Seattle... revolt against the police department's longstanding policy of issuing jaywalking tickets to innocent souls simply crossing the street?"

If you visit Empire North's website, you'd get the impression crowds in public spaces are rebelling--violently--at such restrictions. "As the urban battlefield grows more complex and intense, new ways of managing and controlling crowds are needed," the page reads.

Its solution?

The ID-Sniper, a trademarked rifle described thusly:

It is used to implant a GPS-microchip in the body of a human being, using a high powered sniper rifle as the long distance injector. The microchip will enter the body and stay there, causing no internal damage, and only a very small amount of physical pain to the target. It will feel like a mosquito-bite lasting a fraction of a second. At the same time a digital camcorder with a zoom-lense fitted within the scope will take a high-resolution picture of the target. This picture will be stored on a memory card for later image-analysis.

OK, it's not real. Copenhagen-based artist Jakob Boeskov created the site and the product, which was so convincing it was featured at China's first police weapons fair.