For a nation recovering from one of the greatest series of cataclysms in recorded history, the victory of the Japan women’s national football team over Team USA in the FIFA World Cup was an invaluable elixir. According to this editorial from Japan’s Mainichi Shimbun, what made Japan proudest was when Japan’s national team circled the stadium with a huge banner thanking the world for its backing...

Ahh, they are good employees. And since they help set the narrative, you’re seeing the same talking points regurgitation now by some who use Fox News’ arguments in their verbal and written arguments. But this is a media story. Of course, it’s hard to really badmouth the person issuing your paycheck. And even harder to admit it. Stewart also notes how Fox reacted to NPR (not owned by Rupert...

So concludes Sean Parnell, president of the Center for Competitive Politics, as he fails to recite the full text of the First Amendment in a Stephen Colbert interview last night: Colbert has managed to keep all sides of the campaign finance debate worried by setting up his own Super PAC. What’s a Super PAC? Super PACs are a new breed created after several 2010 Supreme Court decisions that struck down...

On the nation’s movie screens, the Sarah Palin-as-saint movie is running a dismal second to Harry Potter, but in Washington, the Tea Party is offering its own fantasy to entertain Americans until the economic apocalypse premiers on Aug. 2. “The House and Senate this week,” reports The Caucus, “plan to hold politically charged but largely symbolic votes on fiscal policy in what Congressional leaders hope...

If ever was there a watermark for just how low in the cesspool we’re mired, the latest iteration of “Atlas Shrugs, Part I” is surely it. Consider the bizarrely plastic “screengrab” that Faux Nooz™ used to illustrate a ‘borrowed’ Reuters story and a ‘borrowed’ blog story: This is Faux Nation’s plastic notion of an Audio-Animatronic® ‘screengrab’...

Jobs in America will take another severe hit if further bungling in the US and Europe causes a slowdown in growth of the major emerging economies, including China, Russia, India and Brazil. There are many threats to their growth but the worst come from failure to handle US public debt and potential government bankruptcies in Europe. European finance ministers will meet in Brussels on Thursday but the impasse...

The New Yorker sums up the murky media Mughal Murdoch scandal thus: “Rupert Murdoch and his people have claimed that the newspaper scandal in London was caused by a few rotten apples. Now that a very large apple, Rebekah Brooks, has been arrested, it is clear that it is the entire barrel that is rotten.” Brooks is a former News International chief. Meanwhile London’s police chief resigned...

For your enjoyment, especially if you’ve ridden Soaring Over California Rollercoaster Safety with Patrick Warburton – watch more funny videos

With the passing of Peter Falk I am taking the evening to watch a couple Columbo episodes via Netflix streaming. I may follow it up with a few episodes of the Brady’s or Gilligan in respect for Sherwood. I’m a junkie for shows of the 60′s and 70′s (and to a lesser degree the 80′s) and when I watch I can’t help but marvel that this was network programming. When you look at...

When they get around to making the ‘Idiocracy’ sequel, this has got to find its’ way into the script On July 4th, while many where camped out on blankets, or stuck in traffic, awaiting the evenings’ display of incendiary pap, I was doing some work, and had the radio on, only stopping, mouth agape, to shake my head in disbelief, when this report came on. It was from PRI’s ‘The...

Director Roman Polanski may have narrowly escaped yet another attempt to extradite him to the United States on charges that he raped a San Francisco 13-year-old 33 years ago. According to this article by Ewa Siedlecka of Poland’s Gazeta Wyborcza, Polanski canceled a visit to a film festival in his native country of Poland at the last minute, leading many to believe he feared the long arm of American law. For...

The Coot Avengers visit the Moderate Voice. For more Coot Avengers cartoons please visit cootavenges.com. Thanks. Click on the image to make the cartoon larger. This copyrighted cartoon is licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited. All rights reserved.  

Here at TMV we strive to give you more than just political posts. We also to expand your cultural horizons and give you some posts on the arts, film, and books. Some (older) readers asked if we could find an Elvis impersonator. Due to the economy we couldn’t afford to spend much so we found this performer doing his version of Elvis:

(Editor’s Note: This is part of an ongoing series to preserve on the Internet the “lost” poetry of Nunihal Singh Layal, the “Tradesman Poet,” who I met in New Delhi in 1974. Some poems contain his original introductions. I have a self-published book of his that is disintegrating and falling apart and over the next year or two I will run and preserve all of his poetry here. Joe Gandelman) Mahatma Gandhi by...

If you love film history, this is a FEAST. Be sure you watch it to the very end, because one piece of film is also shown beautifully remastered.

Here’s a prediction and you don’t have to be psychic to make it: now that she is basically acquitted in a controversial jury decision of killing her 2 year old daughter, Casey Anthony is going to be a very very wealthy woman — and in quick time. I’ve said as much to friends as soon as the jury verdict came out. And here is the first sign: “The Jerry Springer Show” has backtracked...

More trouble for the Australian-American media mughal Rupert Murdoch and his family. It is likely that Andy Coulson, a former News Of The World editor who most recently worked as the chief spokesman for British Prime Minister David Cameron’s government, would be arrested Friday on suspicion of illegally paying the police for information during his editorship of Murdoch-owned tabloid. [UPDATE: He has been...

What do you do with a busted Murdoch What do you do with a busted Murdoch What do you do with a busted Murdoch Earl-aye in the mor-nin? YouTube video here Astonishing as it is to believe, Rupert Murdoch’s organization finally managed to commit an act of sleaze so egregious that it even offended public morality. Ironic, that. You already know the tale: after a long, burgeoning scandal in England, the...

In 17 years since the O.J. trial, media fascination with murder has morphed from classic elements as fame, race and sexual rage to pathetic obsession with the death of a little girl and the guilt of her possibly disturbed young mother. Now the Casey Anthony verdict brings into focus the extent to which reality TV has infected the daylight hours, supplementing inexpensive adventure and talent shows with even...

There’s a toilet paper shortage at Coney Island.

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It was probably a great idea in concept and design: a new mascot for the Amarillo Sox, an independent minor league baseball team. It was supposed to look like a sock. But instead it looked like an Anthony Weiner tweet. And it’s going back to the drawing boards. From amarillo.com’s June 25 report (just sent to me this morning by a friend): Amarillo Sox general manager Mark Lee shook his head late...

Celebrity independence is making Fourth of July weekend news as famous names couple and uncouple. In California, JFK’s niece takes steps to terminate the Terminator while 6000 miles away Princess Grace’s son enters wedlock in a low-budget version of the extravaganza that starred his mother, nee Grace Kelly, 55 years ago. Saving all this from utter cheesiness is the new British royal family, geographically...

Obscene Video Violence by Peter Funt The rejection by the U.S. Supreme Court of California’s video game law was a welcome victory for free speech, but a frustrating defeat for the protection of young people. In striking down the 2005 law – that was never actually implemented due to legal challenges – the Court continued its campaign to safeguard the First Amendment. Last year, it ruled 8-to-1...

So far, Cars 2 is leading the pack as the most commercially crass movie of the decade. Although up to this point I’ve been a big fan of the Pixar/Disney John Lassester magic, I just can’t swallow the Cars sequel. Simply put, Cars 2 appears to be more about stock holders than stock cars. It’s a movie made for the purpose of increasing global Disney theme park attendance and merchandizing options. It...