“Brother, Wherefore Art Thou?” The Amazing Adventures of the Flexible Mr Lebedeff

JP (on the left): “Is this gonna work?” Lebedeff (on the right): “We lied our way into this mess… we’ll lie our way out. We’ll blame it all on Mark Stokoe and all those other loudmouthed ‘keyboard commentators’ on the internet. I shut up that pipsqueak Nathaniel, didn’t I?” Their placards read, “It’s all Mark’s fault”… just as it’s NOT “Obama’s fault”, it’s NOT “Mark’s fault”, either. The powers-that-be are chasing the wrong windmill…

NB: Nathaniel was a singular sort who had a website… rumour has it that he ran afoul of Lebedeff. I don’t agree with Nathaniel’s POV at all, but he was a nuisance to the powers-that-be, and the informed word has it that Lebedeff was involved in taking him down.

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Of course, many of us recall Alexander Lebedeff’s shameful attack on Kristi Koumentakos a while back. In that case, Lebedeff kicked Kristi in the face (metaphorically), slamming her for accepting a monetary judgement for Ray Velencia’s unwarranted publication of personal e-mails. Lebedeff piously informed us that this was an improper use of the faithful’s money… that people didn’t give money to the Church so that it would go to satisfy a court verdict (his silence on the other payouts by the OCA is, therefore, an implicit approval of them). Now, we see that Lebedeff is busy defending El Gordo… trying to tell the world that Fathausen’s lie about working for the MP is true.

However, this is “in character” for Mr Lebedeff… he’s the sort who’s a reliable weathervane… his opinions change with the vagaries of the party-line. At one time, he praised Holy Transfiguration in Boston… when HTM fell into ROCOR’s bad graces, he was the first to kick them when they were down (I’m not defending HTM; I’m describing Mr Lebedeff’s actions). At one time, he was a fanatical supporter of Vitaly Ustinov’s harebrained scheme of parishes in Russia; when an archpriestly coup ousted Vitaly, why, Mr Lebedeff informed us that his support of the ROCOR establishment in the former USSR was only a sham, for appearance’s sake. At one time, he viciously attacked the OCA; today, he defends it with equal vehemence, overlooking the obvious evidence concerning the “interesting behaviour” of Benjamin Peterson, Nikolai Soraich, Isidore Brittain, and Meletios Webber. He was in high dudgeon about clerical homosexuality at the time of the Brookline affair; now, he winks at the reports of homosexuality rampant in the higher reaches of the OCA (what about the Neon Chicken, Mr Lebedeff?).

Recently, the ball started rolling when Nina Dimas, a member of the SVS cabal downstate in Astoria (if she hasn’t moved) {hmm… I confused Nina Dimas with another “Nina”, who IS from Astoria, my bad…: editor}, posted an item on the Orthodox Forum questioning whether Fathausen actually worked for the MP. Those of you who’ve been with me for some time know that I’ve pointed that up for the last year or so… maybe, a bit longer. Here’s what I wrote a friend:

Nina Dimas is only repeating what I’ve written in the past. That means that SVS is getting ready to abandon El Gordo. She’s from Queens, and she’s part of that whole SVS cabal downstate. I’m not being hubristic… but it appears as though the ideas posted on VFR are “determining the dialogue”. That’s why I usually don’t go after personalities… one doesn’t know what side they’re on. After all, people had hidden their true opinions for years out of fear. I’ve stood up and taken the heat… that’s emboldening others. That’s why I persevere… the longer I stand, the more who’ll take heart. It’s quite that simple.

Don’t forget… I’ve always stated that Russki Palomnik was GP’s autogenetic rag (for some two years, at least) and that Fathausen keeps changing his story on elders. Do note that Kirill Pavlov is safely dead… and that Valaam refused to allow him to be one of the community, he was only a layman living on the grounds. If the truth will set you free, then, falsehood will fasten you in slavery… and the slaves are getting restless. “However”, as Chukcha the Wise would say… it’s the Last Act, it’s NOT the Last Scene… it’s the Führerbunker in Syosset, SVS, and DC… and they’re all afraid of what the future’s bringing. It’s never boring, is it?

An anonymous MP source said that Russki Palomnik “rented” space at the MP Publishing Department, but that when unnamed “sources in the USA” brought the MP “up to speed” on who and what they were dealing with, they got kicked out (who knows, that “source in the USA” could’ve been Lebedeff, he’s a from-the-bottom-of-the-deck triple-dealer from way back). The implication that JP worked for the MP is untruthful at best (it’s a conscious 24k solid-gold fib at worst), although the magazine did actually have office space (under false pretences) at the MP for a time. Paffhausen is acting just like a vagante; he publishes a spurious line of succession, for he’s anxious to grasp at all straws to bolster his “orthodoxy”. If JP had actually worked directly or indirectly for the MP, KMG would’ve said so plainly. That’s the way of it at the Centre.

As another correspondent put it:

Why should it matter to Lebedeff whether or not Jonah worked for the MP? Is it because [Podmoshensky] had been in the ROCOR, or, is he trying to feather his nest for a union between OCA and ROCOR?

THIS is where the rubber hits the road. Alexander Lebedeff is a slippery and changeable sort… peruse his record over the years… at first, he defended, and, then, he attacked, Holy Trinity Monastery in Brookline MA, Gleb Podmoshensky (and St Herman Monastery in Platina CA), and Vitaly’s parishes in Russia. On the other hand, he first attacked, and, now, defends, the MP and the OCA. Along with Viktor Potapov (a similarly flexible chameleon), he screamed that Patriarch Aleksei Rediger and many other MP hierarchs and clergy were KGB agents. Now, he says that he didn’t think that at all. In short, this man has changed his position almost as often as he’s changed his gotchies. I’m a fair sort… Lebedeff’s an older fellow; the proper thing for a well-run Church to do is to retire him. Give him a gold watch, a retirement banquet, and his pension (they should do the same for Iggy, for instance). It isn’t worthwhile to pursue him; in any case, we’re Christians… Christian people only do the requisite amount necessary to right a situation… it’d be wrong to pursue him. If it’s wrong for Lebedeff to kick others when they were down, it’s wrong for us to kick him when he’s down… fair is fair. It’d be nice if he apologised to his victims (and he truly should), but I’ll advise ‘em all not to hold their breath… it’ll suffice to remove him from power.

In the end, Mr Lebedeff is a Barmaglot (Бармаглот)… and he makes as much sense. Oh, what’s a “Barmaglot?” Why, it’s the Russian translation of “Jabberwocky”… total nonsense in both languages, wot?

Barbara-Marie Drezhlo

Thursday 2 June 2011

Albany NY 

2 June 2011. America the Ugly: What the Republican Party is Trying to Do to America

Here’s the vision of the current GOP… and none of us fit their criteria, dontcha know…

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• We’re the new “liberals” of the Republican Party. Can you imagine that?
• When you say “radical right” today, I think of these moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican Party and make a religious organisation out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye.
• It’s time America realised that there is no gay exemption in the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the Declaration of Independence.

US Senator Barry Goldwater (R-AZ)

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Read this:

http://www.thenation.com/blog/161051/gop-debt-ceiling-gambit-part-and-parcel-paul-ryans-scheme-gut-medicare-social-security

Let’s keep this part simple. The present-day Republican Party wants to gut Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security and impoverish fixed-income seniors to line the pockets of its “productive” affluent effluent constituency (they’re the same folks who gutted American industry in the name of “outsourcing”, “efficiency”, and “globalisation”). This is NOT the Republican Party of Dwight D Eisenhower, with his warnings against the Military-Industrial Complex… this is NOT the GOP of Richard M Nixon, who founded the EPA and advocated a National Guaranteed Income… this is NOT the GOP of Nelson Rockefeller, who gave the “bird” to hecklers… this is NOT the GOP of George H W Bush, a genuine war hero… this is NOT the GOP of William F Buckley, the Happy Warrior of the National Review… most of all, it isn’t the GOP of Barry Goldwater, a true conservative who believed that “different” people have rights too. Look at the quotes from Old Barry above. Who are the RINOs (Republicans In Name Only)? Are they the people I just named, or are they the rightwing extremists John Boehner, Paul Ryan, Sarah Palin, Dropout Scott Walker, and the Fox News media kooks (who, along with Rush Limbaugh, are virtually all cowards who refused to serve their country in the forces)?

Here’s something that’s making the rounds of the Internet:

He grasped me firmly but gently just above my elbow and guided me into a room, his room. Then, he quietly shut the door and we were alone. He approached me from behind, and spoke in a low, reassuring voice close to my ear. “Just relax”. Without warning, he reached down, and I felt his strong hands start at my ankles, moving upward along my calves slowly, but steadily. My breath caught in my throat. I knew I should be afraid, but somehow I didn’t care. His touch was so experienced, so sure. When his hands moved up onto my thighs, I gave a slight shudder, and partly closed my eyes. My pulse was pounding. I felt his knowing fingers caress my abdomen, my ribcage. Then, as he cupped my breasts in his hands, I inhaled sharply. Probing, searching, knowing what he wanted, he brought his hands to my shoulders, slid them down my tingling spine. Although I knew nothing about this man, I felt oddly trusting and expectant. This is a man, I thought, used to taking charge. A man not used to taking “no” for an answer. A man who would look into my soul and say…

“Okay, Jeff, all done. You can board your flight now”.

This sort of police state invasiveness came to us courtesy of George W Bush and Richard Cheney. Whenever the GOP wants to justify a particularly nasty case of taking away people’s rights, they trot out “terrorism” as an excuse. Why, the government “needs” to wiretap phones without warrants, so, we have the so-called Patriot Act (a darling of the GOP). George W Bush didn’t want to treat those captured in battle in Afghanistan as POWs, so, he sent them to a special gulag in Guantánamo, and refused them the normal rights of the Geneva Convention (the present Republican Party beams its approval). Now, the USA is trying “War on Terror” POWs in the courts, and they’re giving long stretches in the slam to cooks and chauffeurs (giving them longer sentences than those handed out to actual concentration camp guards). This isn’t the America of my childhood. This isn’t the Republican Party of the past. This is a bunch of unrepentant power-hungry fascists; they’re trying to line the pockets of the rich by cudgelling the weakest amongst us.

Here’s another example of the erosion of our rights, this time, from academe:

http://dailycaller.com/2011/06/02/student-prohibited-from-graduation-for-facebook-comments/

Do note:

All students enrolled at Saint Augustine’s College are responsible for protecting the reputation of the college and supporting its mission.

The college refused a student the right to attend the graduation ceremony, for posting on Facebook:

Here it go!!!!! Students come correct, be prepared, and have supporting documents to back up your arguments bcuz SAC will come hard!!!! That is all.

Certainly, it embarrassed someone… it angered them enough that they used their power to deny this student from attending their graduation ceremony… obviously, they couldn’t deny him a degree. This is common in post-9/11 America… people in power are quick to mete out “punishment” for the smallest imagined slight. Oh, yes… the college involved is a private school, affiliated with the TEC (the Episcopal Church). Nice guys, aren’t they?

We didn’t need a Department of Homeland Security in the Cold War… we don’t need one now. The “War on Terror” is a sham bogeyman… trotted out to justify all sorts of totalitarian nonsense. We don’t need to gut “entitlements”… we need to raise taxes and slash the “defence” budget by ending foreign military adventures. Return the tax levels of the rich to those of 1980, plus a 10 percent surcharge, that won’t deep-six the affluent… that’s not expropriation (they were the only group not to suffer in the Great Recession, that’s only fair). Then, we must rescind the Bush tax cuts for everybody; we’ve got to pay for Bush’s Great Giveaway to the Rich. Close all foreign bases… trust me, the US has plenty of “overseas” bases on US territory (especially in the Pacific and Caribbean). Guess what… we have a inane Republican drunken toot to pay for… but have no fear, we’ll have the use of allied bases in the Anglosphere (UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and their dependencies), which will suffice to hold a forward-deployed defensive barrier in the Westpac and the GIUK Gap that will keep any potential adversary FAR from the American heartland (these states will gladly host US forces, as it will keep local defence spending down). Most of all, there’s NO need whatsoever for ABMs deployed in Eastern Europe… their logical location is the Pacific Trust Territories, Alaska, and Greenland (protecting the Great Circle Line).

Despite the posturing of the Republican Party’s current rightwing, the USA is NOT the “sole superpower”. Reagan’s intemperate tax cuts to the rich and his wild military spending on tick weakened the US economy in the ‘80s. In 1987, the US was in the position of the UK in 1918… outwardly strong, but economically fragile. It needed at least two generations to recover from the economic after-effects of Reagan’s crack-addled arms race on credit, but it didn’t get that. It got an eight-year respite under Clinton, who left G W Bush a slight surplus. Almost immediately, G W Bush plunged the country into inane and hellishly-expensive military adventures (remember the supposed WMDs of Iraq?), whilst, at the same time, cutting taxes to the rich in a conscious attempt to redistribute income to the affluent, as they were the only “productive” people in the country. I say that we should return to the sanity of Dwight D Eisenhower, Richard M Nixon… and Barry Goldwater. We should run out the extremist religious nutters who now run the GOP… if not, they’ll attempt to turn the entire USA into Utah. Look at Mormonism… they’re typical totalitarian Sectarians… do you want that? I don’t… I somehow think that you don’t either.

That’s what the current Republican Party is trying to do to America… and that’s SCARY…

Barbara-Marie Drezhlo

Thursday 2 June 2011

Albany NY