The Real ID Act, attached as an amendment to another bill in the Senate, has potential far-ranging consequences and will likely result in effectively creating a national ID card. Unfortunately, this issue is flying under the radar and the bill has not even been debated on the Senate floor, despite the likely consequences that will arise if this bill becomes law. You can find … [Read more...] about National ID cards by default?

Here's yet another story that underlines why we must be nice to animals -- because they are beings that think and have emotions: A newborn baby abandoned in a Kenyan forest was saved by a stray dog who apparently carried her across a busy road and through a barbed wire fence to a shed where the infant was discovered nestled with a litter of puppies, witnesses said Monday. The … [Read more...] about Dog Is Abandoned Baby’s Best Friend

...at the Huffington Post. This is Arianna Huffington's addition to the blogworld — a combination news site blog...except the bloggers are famous such as CBS news legend Walter Cronkite, comedian-writer Larry David, David Frum, Michael Isakoff. You can't dismiss this as being all "liberal" because there are some centrists in the mix. The Huffington Post unlike blogs has … [Read more...] about Take A Peek…..

Keep checking back but we may be a bit late and erratic today on our posts due to some emergencies here. Wed throught Friday TMV will be on the road but we should also have some guest posts, plus some of TMV's own posts. Stay tuned...and check back. … [Read more...] about Light(er) Blogging Today

For those who want a bit of additional information regarding the recent history of judicial nominations, along with a bit of intemperate, immoderate, and possibly injudicious commentary, then go read this: For those complaining about the Democrats blocking 10 judicial nominations... Don't say you weren't warned. … [Read more...] about “Going nuclear”

Nowhere is impact of today's quickly changing, highly interactive world of communications more evident than in the news about the New York Times' panel's proposals to increase the paper's credibility with readers — proposals that seem impacted by weblogs' growing role and the growth of overall intensified media criticism in recent years. There was a moment in U.S. … [Read more...] about New York Times’ New Goal Is Bolstering Reader Confidence

When a new medium appears it's not unusual for the smug, old medium to need a hard lesson in the new reality — hence the saying "strike a happy medium" — and BOY is this evident in a piece by Adam Cohen in the New York Times. The piece is titled The Latest Rumbling in the Blogosphere: Questions About Ethics but it could perhaps more accurately be titled The Latest … [Read more...] about The Latest Rumbling In The Mainstream Media About Blogs And Bloggers

The Moderate Voice is off to L.A. today which means getting stuck in unmoderate traffic and being tied up all day. BUT you will see a few posts done by him before his departure and (hopefully) early in the morning at his hotel. But keep checking back: this site's highly talented and independent-minded Guest Bloggers will likely be offering you a few goodies throughout the day … [Read more...] about TMV On The Move

Basie's Jonathan Singer has another enterprising original interview on his site. This time it's with former GOP Washington state Senator Slade Gorton and he did it via email. As with any of Singer's interviews, it should be read in full. Here are a few highlights (we will limit it to the questions on the nuclear option. He also talks about Social Security reform). First, the … [Read more...] about Blogger’s Original Interview With former Sen. Slade Gorton

Hey, what's going on with this name business for babies? The new list is out for the most popular names for boys and girls in 2004 and we're shawked...just shawked...by this list compiled from Social Security card applications: GIRLS (names in order of popularity): Emily, Emma, Madison, Olivia, Hannah, Abigail, Isabella, Ashley, Samantha, and Elizabeth. Whatever happened … [Read more...] about What’s Going On Dept: The 10 Most Popular Baby Names

...then I have two questions I need answered at Random Fate. … [Read more...] about If you are or have been a member of the US Armed Forces…

Pennywit follows up his original post with a response to Media Girl, who disagreed. Interestingly enough, they are both towards the left side of the political axis. More recommended reading if you are interested in the friction between blogging and the mainstream media. … [Read more...] about More on Blogging versus the Mainstream Media

Two 16-year-old Muslim girls are detained in New York and basically not allowed to talk to anyone. Only one five minute call from a mother a week. Then they're released, with no charges. Read the details here on The All Spin Zone which feels special attention is needed for this story. Read the entire post, but here's a small taste: My daughter turns 18 on Monday. As a parent, … [Read more...] about Not A Happy Situation For Any Mother…

The call to prayer in Muslim-ruled areas used to be "a joy" but has since turned into a "thunderous cacophony" as mosques adopted loudspeakers and put their muezzins (announcers) on the mic at the same time, leading to such intrusive noise it has some faithful calling it "daily torture to the ears." Some mosques even amplify the entire service, and "what should be an … [Read more...] about Moderation in the call to prayer

OxBlog's David Adesnik notes some particularly lacking reporting on an issue in my backyard (literally, at the school across the street): the new sex education curriculum in Montgomery County, Maryland. You might have heard local conservative parents were up in arms, but if you wanted to know what's actually in the curriculum, the Post's story isn't the best place. It does … [Read more...] about Sex education in Maryland gets reporters hot and steamy

The Sunday New York Times has a feature on Nick Denton and his Gawker Media blog "empire," a compliment he doesn't particularly like. For the man said to have taken blogging mainstream, Denton is pretty skeptical:"The hype comes from unemployed or partially employed marketing professionals and people who never made it as journalists wanting to believe," he said. "They want to … [Read more...] about Gawker makes a Denton society

TMV prides himself on the fact that he obsesses and reads blogs from all over — and extensively USES his own blogroll to look at the various categories. He doesn't always see every blog on a given day but he does make the rounds. Still, it's hard to see how a post we just discovered about this website somehow got past us. And so we say a VERY belated but heartfelt … [Read more...] about One View Of The Moderate Voice

Faced with signs that North Korea might be making preparations for a nuclear test, the United States has basically told North Korea to "Cool it." Of course the language is a lot more diplomatic than that. Reuters: The White House said Saturday that the United States had a "robust deterrent capability" in the face of worries that North Korea might be planning to test a nuclear … [Read more...] about US To North Korea: COOL IT

President George Bush has been saying a lot of nice things these days about the late President Franklin D. Roosevelt, but that's when he has been pitching his Social Security reform plan — suggesting FDR's showpiece program was a good one and that the late President would perhaps even support his own controversial proposed reforms. But now, speaking in Europe, Bush has … [Read more...] about Bush: FDR Blew It On Postwar Europe

The fear has been there since 911: terrorists will somehow get their hands on nuclear weapons. That could mean an actual big weapon, a suitcase nuke (rumors have swirled around in some quarters for several years that they may already have one), or some kind of "dirty bomb" that may not be as sophisticated as one of the bigger ones, but have a huge impact nonetheless. And then … [Read more...] about Fears Over Terrorists And Nuclear Weapons