Due to a very very busy evening of performances and arriving very late, TMV didn’t finish the Around The Sphere round up (so if you are a blogger with a link, you can still send it in). We did get one new post on the site this morning, but we’ll be gone until later this morning. So keep checking back.

NOTE: This is a Terri Schiavo free zone. Our periodic linkfest looking at some posts from all over the Internet. Posts represent DIFFERING views and do not necessarily represent the opinions of The Moderate Voice or its independent-minded guest bloggers. ADVICE TO THE GOP from the ever-knowing Bull Moose (one of our favorite weblogs) on Tom DeLay is a must read. A small taste: The Moose begs the elephant to stick with their ethically-challenged Majority Leader. Although President Bush is the official...

A diner sat down to eat at a Wendy’s in San Jose and found something in the chili that’s indispensible to driving in California: a finger. But it didn’t help digesting the meal: “This individual apparently did take a spoonful, did have a finger in their mouth and then, you know, spit it out and recognized it,” said Ben Gale, director of the department of environmental health for Santa Clara County. “Then they had some kind of emotional reaction and vomited.” If...

A Florida judge has now turned down Jeb Bush and the latest attempt to short-circuit a string of legislative judgements allowing Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube to be removed. Is this case finally at the end of the line — or are there more surprises from politicians (or some kind of new legal case) to come? The latest: A Florida state judge on Thursday rejected a petition by the state welfare agency to take custody of brain-damaged Florida woman Terri Schiavo, a move that would have led...

We will not excerpt this MUST READ POST because it is needed to be read in full, every single word. It’s by Republican blogger John Cole. We will only say this: it reaffirms our contention that what we’re seeing is not something all Republicans support — but something that scares many Republicans as well as Democrats and Independents. And a “never mind” from DeLay/Bush/Bush will not be enough. (We won’t get that because it’s not over until they win. See...

…for Peggy Noonan. I just read Peggy Noonan’s new column in the Wall Street Journal and I want what she’s drinking (or smoking). Read it all but here’s our favorite part when she writes about those who oppose the DeLay/Bush spectacle (including the bulk of GOPers, according to the CBS poll) that has been thrust upon the country: Why are they so committed to this woman’s death? They seem to have fallen half in love with death. What does Terri Schiavo’s life...

The Supreme Court has refused to get involved in an appeal on the Terri Schiavo case — thus exhausting the traditional legal remedies in this case. So now the question becomes: will Florida Governor Jeb Bush be able to get a court order to allow him to hold her in protective custody via some new appeal based on new grounds in Florida? CNN reports the news that this case has now run what would normally be the typical case for any other typical citizen such as your relatives or mine: WASHINGTON...

England’s Prime Minister Tony Blair has taken a swipe at the kind of faith-based politics he sees in the United States, the must-read international press watchdog site Watching America reports. Watching America links to a Guardian article and here are the relevant quotes: Tony Blair chose a faith audience in south London yesterday to proclaim his belief that he was opposed to US-style faith politics in British public life. The prime minister, battered by Tory tabloid pressures on abortion,...

Demonstrators in yet another part of the former Soviet Union are moving swiftly to throw the rascals out: March 24 (Bloomberg) — Protesters in Kyrgyzstan today occupied the offices of President Askar Akayev in an effort to force him to resign over allegations of election fraud, according to television footage. Akayev left the capital by helicopter, Interfax reported. The government headquarters was ablaze after it was overrun by demonstrators, live pictures from APTN Direct showed. A protester...

This just in from investigative reporter Andy Borowitz: IN BEARISH SIGN, GREENSPAN RUNS OUT ON CHECK AT SIZZLER Analysts See Fed Chief’s Move Signaling Troubled Economy The stock market, which has been trading sideways for months amid soaring oil prices and bulging budget deficits, received another body-blow today when it was revealed that Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan ran out of a Sizzler restaurant in Secaucus, New Jersey Wednesday night without paying. Greenspan, who...

Unless something changes, Tom DeLay and George Bush should know that the day they leave public office they can make a lot of money in a new career: as engineers in train demolition derbies. Because yet another poll indicates their decision to shove the Terri Schiavo controversy into Congress, abruptly change hundreds of years of democratic checks and balances, and do it in a way to maximize political drama and appeal to a key segment of the GOP base is turning into a political train wreck. How big?...

Most of our posts will start after 7 a.m. today. Last night TMV drove to Orange County, did a show, and drove back…and injured his back in the process. Back problems are grave in his family so he got in a tub last night, then right into bed. Check back here since there WILL be posts today on a variety of subjects.

All we can say on this is “hmmmmmm”: Republican media adviser R. Gregory Stevens, who was found dead in the Beverly Hills, Calif., home of actress Carrie Fisher on Feb. 26, died of an overdose of cocaine and the painkiller OxyContin, according to the Los Angeles County coroner’s office. A spokeswoman at the coroner’s office read to The Washington Times portions of the report, which was completed Friday. “Cocaine and OxyContin,” the spokeswoman said when...

How much research and how many horror stories do people need to get the message? From Daily News Central: Unless the current suntanning trend is reversed, today’s youth could be three times more at risk of eventually acquiring malignant melanoma — the deadliest form of skin cancer — than their grandparents were. This stark assessment came as Professor Brian Diffey, sun protection specialist and adviser to Cancer Research UK, launched this year’s Cancer Research UK SunSmart...

We are living in exciting scientific times: Astronomers have announced that for the first time, they’ve detected the light of two planets hundreds of light years away. The scientists say the development paves the way for the discovery of earth-like planets outside our solar system. Since 1995, astronomers have been able to detect planets beyond our solar system through indirect means, such as the wobble that the planets’ gravity exerts on nearby stars. Scientists detected some 130...

If justices of the U.S. Supreme Court seem surly today it’s because they have just been tossed a hot POLITICAL potato — the Terri Schiavo case which has turned into a political skirmish that could end in the Republican party emerging with a lot less political support than what it had before it began. The event: an appeals court in Atlanta gave thumbs down on Terri Schiavo’s parents’ attempt to get their daughter’s feeding tube reinserted after a judge (now reviled and...

Brace yourself. Visit your church or synagogue. Go into intense prayer, and if you are an atheist just make a wish that this event does not take place. Make sure you are nowhere where it can impact you. And make sure your kids never see it: Ben Affleck is about to direct. Is there no mercy in the universe? It’s been so long since the words “Ben Affleck” and “hit” have appeared in the same sentence that the actor has decided to take matters into his own hands. Affleck,...

…at Mike’s Blog Roundup. It’s actually a part of the highly addicting video blogger blog Crooks and Liars. But it’s a stand-alone page of the blog that gives you an excellent daily roundup of some items on various blogs — and is a great way for new bloggers to get noticed (send them a post you feel good about) since it’s always looking for new material, especially from good new sites. We like it so much we’ve added it to Other Voices on our blogroll and...

If you hear a weird noise tonight, it could be the sound of conservative icons Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan turning over in their graves. Senator Rick Santorium basically now suggests the judge wasted his time ruling on the Terri Schiavo case since unless he had ruled the way Congress wanted, he was “defying” Congress. Sanatorium’s new argument is that if Congress passes a law, it is automatically correct even if it is a law involving a highly controversial issue seeped...

And all along the world thought Yassir Arafat died of natural causes. But you know those crafty, insidious Jews: COLOMBO, March 19 (Bernama) — Attallah Quiba, the Palestinian ambassador in Sri Lanka, believes that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was killed by unnamed Israelis using advanced technology, the Island newspaper said. Responding to questions at a media conference in Colombo on Friday, Quiba claimed that two Israelis who met Arafat on the day he was taken sick “used a laser...

Here is GOOD NEWS from Iraq — this time from the New York Times rather than the ever-thorough Arthur Chrenkoff: ordinary Iraqis had enough and went after the “insurgents” on their own. SOMETHING is happening in Iraq that is good news for the U.S.: Ordinary Iraqis rarely strike back at the insurgents who terrorize their country. But just before noon today, a carpenter named Dhia saw a troop of masked gunmen with grenades coming towards his shop and decided he had had enough. As...

The federal judge who received the political hot potato of deciding whether to restore Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube — tossed to him by a special law passed by Congress and President George Bush rushing back from Texas to sign it — today nixed the idea..moving the issue now to another court for an appeal. It will now be interesting to see how this is framed — whether this simply moves to appeal or we see the unveiling of a campaign to vilify this judge due to his legal decision....

Right now the most miserable job in the world belongs to federal U.S. District Judge James Whittemore who is deciding on whether to order a feeding tube put back into Terri Schiavo, who has become a symbol of an ethical dilemma for some and seemingly a political football for others. What more can you say about a case where the Congress meets to pass a law to apply specifically to just one case, GOPers are reportedly being told what a great issue it is for their party, talking points have been distributed,...

Our occasional linkfest of interesting posts from all over the you-know-what-sphere. Links are NOT restricted to one viewpoint — and views do not neccessarily reflect the viewpoints of The Moderate Voice or his independent-minded Guest Bloggers. GOOD NEWS FROM THE ISLAMIC WORLD: Arthur Chrenkoff looks at demonstrations throughout the world in detail, focusing in particular on the Islamic world. A small taste of what he says: I’m having a deja-vu to the 1980s, when as a young lad stuck...

Let’s be blunt: if this guy wasn’t a celebrity named Michael Jackson and was on trial for child molestation and demonstrated this kind of behavior — repeatedly showing up late and making a side-show of himself, distracting the vital issue at hand — he’d be in the SLAMMER by now: Michael Jackson appeared to fall apart in court on Monday arriving late to his child-molestation trial for the second time in two weeks. The singer’s entrance was less dramatic than the...