The Watcher of Weasels council has selected its winning posts. The winning Council post is Wallo World's A Childlike Fantasy. The winning non-Council post is Cavalier's Zarqawi's War On Democracy. The full list of posts for this week can be found here. The Moderate Voice sits on the Council but a sofa is more comfortable. … [Read more...] about Weasel Watchers Pick Favorite Posts

Recently, the Christian Coalition supported  the Recording Industry Association of America and the Motion Picture Association of America in a court case. This tale of strange bedfellows has more to it than initially meets the eye. … [Read more...] about More than meets the eye (Jack Grant)

Jeff Jarvis has your one-stop shop for Iraqi election coverage: Iraqi bloggers, Iraqi youth, and non-Iraqis.  He gives brief descriptions of each and a snippet of a post for a few.  (Lest Eric Alterman get his panties in a bunch, several of the listed Iraqi bloggers are against the occupation.)  Technology entrepreneur (and Dallas Mavs courtside yeller) Mark … [Read more...] about As someone once said, “The revolution will be blogged” (Greg Piper)

A popular cable channel might be for sale, but it's not the one you think ... read this post to find out more. Well, that does it for me.  Thanks to Joe for giving me the privilege of contributing to this blog in his absence and having the chance to increase my own audience (hopefully not at his expense).  You can follow my writing - the serious, the fluff, and that … [Read more...] about Ha! It was never fair and balanced anyway (Greg Piper)

The Moderate Voice wants to give a heartfelt "Thank You" to our two highly talented Guest Bloggers Greg Piper and Jack Grant. TMV means it when he says that he visits their sites often because he enjoys the way they write and has the utmost respect for the fact that they're independent thinkers. In this case, they were gracious enough to take time from their … [Read more...] about A Big THANK YOU To Our Guest Bloggers

The Bull Moose (a weblog I know is on Joe's regular reading list, as it is mine) makes a plea to everyone regarding the Iraqi elections tomorrow. … [Read more...] about Some things are more important than political gain (Jack Grant)

...post-election Iraq will be an awful quagmire of Indochina proportions.  The New York Times, apparently not aware that it is a parody of itself by now, does a story about everyone's favorite failure and how "comparisons [of Iraq to Vietnam] are no longer dismissed in mainstream political discourse as facile and flawed, but are instead bubbling to the top" (my … [Read more...] about Just in case you forgot… (Greg Piper)

...but I must discuss this. I have seen little mention in blogworld of the capture (I won't call it "liberation") of Aushwitz by Soviet troops 60 years ago. I cannot let this pass without comment. Truly, we can never forget, for if we do, we will continue to allow it to happen, as we have for the last 60 years. … [Read more...] about Forgive me… (Jack Grant)

Best of the Web Today notes some interesting paragraphs from an AlterNet interview with Canadian writer and leftist Naomi Klein, best known for her anti-corporate book No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies.  Klein, an outspoken opponent of the war in Iraq, has some uncomfortable words for her fellow antiwar acolytes, although the interview introduction makes no mention … [Read more...] about Solidarity is always 20/20 (Greg Piper)

Internet streaming rose rapidly last year, with video streams slightly outpacing Internet radio.  It shouldn't be a surprise to fans of either, since more homes are connected to broadband (although the US is still a "broadband backwater" compared to many developed countries).  In addition to the streaming-only radio stations, some traditional stations have … [Read more...] about Subverting the “public” airwaves (Greg Piper)

Reason's Charles Paul Freund has a thoughtful consideration of why the CIA would ever set up pro-American Iraqi blogs, as Eric Alterman among others has speculated with regard to Iraq the Model (Jeff Jarvis has savaged Alterman for possibly threatening the Iraqi bloggers).  He argues, persuasively to me, that even the CIA can't be that dumb:The limitations of a pro-U.S., … [Read more...] about Cultivate your plants (Greg Piper)

A new website has been set up to carefully watch what is expected to be a battle royal over California Governor Arnold Schwarzenneger's plans to reform government. It's appropriately called Bloginators and it bills itself as a group of bloggers who aren't connected to any party who want to follow and debate the controversial proposals that are sure to be making big news (one … [Read more...] about Special Website To Watch California Government Reform Battle

It appears that the immigration reform laws of the 1980s that required employers to obtain and verify Social Security numbers of newly hired employees has had the unintended consequence of creating an industry of Social Security number identity theft.  The linked article makes for disturbing and somewhat frightening reading. The patchwork system of taxation, credit … [Read more...] about Unintended consequences (Jack Grant)

From the pages of The Economist magazine (recommended reading, giving a point of view from outside the United States), an article on the outcomes of "public goods games", research that has the potential to provide a lot of insight on how politics in democracies works (or, on occasion, doesn't...).  The concluding paragraphs: ...  The researchers were able … [Read more...] about BREAKING NEWS: Nice guys don’t always finish last (Jack Grant)

Some controversies exceed the attention span of the media and the public long before they are resolved, regardless of the importance of the issues raised or the tragedy that originated all the sound and fury. … [Read more...] about Something that has fallen off the media radar (Jack Grant)

My name is Jack Grant, and I am the author of the weblog Random Fate, which Joe has been kind enough to link relatively frequently. I am a bit older than the other guest-poster, Greg Piper, who is also helping to fill in during Joe's absence.  I received my graduate degree in Physics a full decade before Greg graduated college, so I'm sure that even though we are both … [Read more...] about So who is this guest-poster anyway? (Jack Grant)

Hillary Clinton's speech on abortion earlier this week is making waves among serious thinkers on abortion policy, both the life and choice variety.  Glenn Reynolds has speculated that the junior senator from New York might fulfill this alternate-history novel's description of her as "the most uncompromising wartime president in the history of the United States," … [Read more...] about It’s your body; use it wisely (Greg Piper)

A note to our wonderful readers. For the past year The Moderate Voice has posted for every single day with the exception of Guest Blogger stints on Dean's World. That's due to TMV having a laptop. The laptop is totally dead. Say prayer for it. Last night TMV left for a trip that will take him from Southern California to Northern California back -- all within a three and a … [Read more...] about A NOTE TO OUR READERS: Welcome Our Guest Bloggers

Jeremiah Lewis, who you'll notice on Joe's "Right" blogroll under "Fringe," has a hilarious satire and helpful advice on vanity license plates.  I first met Jeremiah through blogging - he was searching for tobacco, of all things, and came across my deceptively-titled site.  He is an aspiring filmmaker in Blacksburg, Virginia, and devotes most of … [Read more...] about My husband is a retard at Vanity U (Greg Piper)

You'd think with America's cultural obsession with sex, youth, and big, juicy brains, we'd have more research on sexual neuroscience.  That is the subject of this Mind Hacks post, which notes that only recently have published reports shown definitive links between brain activity and sexual desire - and a bizarre connection to seizures in one Taiwanese study:One of their 41 … [Read more...] about Bill O’Reilly offered to investigate and/or participate (Greg Piper)