I believe that TalkBoard should set the rules for how moderation is handled and what is/is not allowable under the TOS. In short, it should act as FlyerTalk's legislative branch.
Moderators are the police of FlyerTalk. As such, they fall under the authority of Randy, who is the executive department. He should be the one to make certain that they are enforcing the rules which TalkBoard established and doing so in a just and equal manner.
I do believe it would be wise to have a judiciary. In theory, Randy handles that today -- a moderator's decision can be appealed to him. I say "in theory" because Randy has an extremely heavy workload and often can not get to matters in a timely fashion. I know of at least two instances where he eventually overturned a moderator's decision but did so only after a very long period during which the member was suspended.
To that end, and to make certain that moderation is applied evenly throughout FlyerTalk, I would like to have one person (preferably somebody from the House of Miles) serve as the judiciary.
Randy has repeatedly said that most suspensions are handed out for spamming. This is invariably from newbies, generally with only one or two posts.
This means that the remaining suspensions would not take up very much time for the one man judiciary.
Therefore, let's work it this way:
1. If a poster has been on FlyerTalk for less than 6 months and has less than 100 posts, any moderator can suspend him.
2. In all other cases, the moderator would remove the offending post but not suspend the member. Instead, he would send a complaint to the "judiciary". The judiciary would look at it, and if he saw any merit in it at all, contact the offending member and ask for his defense. The offending member would have 3 days to present his side of the argument. The judiciary, having seen both the complaint and the defense, would then make a decision.
There is nothing very radical in what I am suggesting. It is basically a streamlined equivalent of what happens when any person in Western nation is charged with a violation ranging from illegal parking to murder. The police make the charge, he is given the chance to defend himself, and the judiciary comes to a decision.
This would guarantee two things:
1. That moderation is applied equally throughout FlyerTalk.
2. That a suspension would not need Randy's approval to be lifted but rather the judiciary's approval to be put into effect.