14 November 2012. What PM Medvedev Thinks of President Obama

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I’m getting tired of the nasty lies coming out of the rightwing about the Prez. Truly, that’s one of the reasons that your fair-haired boy lost. Most of us were repelled by such rubbishy twaddle, and we either voted for the Prez or we stayed home. Most world leaders respect President Obama, and he’s very popular abroad. Do quit your caterwauling about access to healthcare… that’s the law, now, and its going to be single-payer before the decade’s out, I’m sure. I don’t bloody care what reactionaries think any more. Scream all that you want to… your ignorance is shocking and your advocacy of an America that never was (and never can be) is worthy of nothing but opposition.

It’s another four years for President Obama… one wonders why they hate him so viciously.

BMD

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14 November 2012. Rumour Has It That Mollard’s Going to Name “Mr Disobedience” Mark Maymon His Successor in Eastern PA

If there was ever a mistake in the making, naming Mark Maymon bishop of “anywhere” is that… God do spare us all…

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Rumour has it that Mollard’s going to name Mark Maymon his successor in Eastern PA. A worse fit couldn’t be imagined. Eastern PA is one of the most ethnic dioceses in the OCA, and Mollard wants to name a dippy convert (who was shitcanned for disobedience by Saliba) as head of this diocese. That nutters… you see, Mollard only had cred in the diocese because he was Herman‘s gofer. Herman took a very special interest in his promotion… making him a seminary instructor at age 27 (only four years after he converted!) and a bishop at age 36, when other, more qualified men were available (it makes one wonder about Mollard, taking Herman’s known proclivities into account). Maymon’s your typical disobedient konvertsy cleric… and the Valley is full of old-time old-school Hunkies. That’s going to fit like fire and water. However, the unravelling of the OCA has begun. This will not help matters… it shows that Mollard’s mad as a hatter and completely oblivious to reality. In short, the konvertsy will love it and eat it all up. This is one time that I’m not happy being right. God willing, the idiocy won’t last long (relatively speaking… I think it’ll take Mollard two to three years to wreck the OCA, and many will be hurt in the interim). God do help us all.

BMD

14 November 2012. Some Feedback from the Grapevine on the OCA Situation

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I heard this interesting titbit out in the agora:

Back in the 1970s, after the MP granted autocephaly to the Metropolia, I predicted that the newly-named OCA would implode eventually. Even as a youngster, I could see that the hierarchy of the independent OCA appeared to be in some sort of competition with the GOAA to be numero uno in North America. The willy-nilly influx of converts, the calendar change, the introduction of pews into the church buildings, etc, all pointed to the gradual degradation of the OCA and its eventual metamorphosis into a Protestant-type institution far removed from the spirit of the Russian Orthodox Church. It seems to me that the OCA has fewer members now than it did back in the 1960s, prior to autocephaly, when it was still the Metropolia. Talk about going in reverse! It seems that adding all those converts drove away the core believers born into the Church!

Why is no one save for Syosset/SVS “true believers” cheering the advent of Tikhon Mollard? Whatever the reason, that’s what’s out there. Unfortunately, Mollard lacks the charisma, guts, brains, and bureaucratic surefootedness to put it all together, and everyone knows it. One of the Cabinet said:

The uncanonical Macedonians acknowledged Mollard’s election. Patriarchia.ru copied its post on the subject from the Blunder‘s site (therefore, questionable). Also note that patriarchia.ru hasn’t created a biographical page for Mollard like they did for Herman Swaiko. So much for the sentiments of World Orthodoxy concerning Lyonyo’s Coronation of the 23-year Episcopalian convert as OCA First Hierarch…

There’ll be much fireworks and razzle-dazzle, but not much in the way of substance. It isn’t pretty, is it? God do spare us…

BMD 

14 November 2012. RIA-Novosti Infographics. NO SMOKING! Aspects of the New Anti-Smoking Law

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In late October, the Russian government introduced a bill to ban smoking in public places by 2015. Measures to limit the consumption of cigarettes are going to be phased in gradually, a series of measures will take effect from the date of the bill, and others would take effect from 1 July 2014 and from 1 January 2015. The document under consideration by the RF Gosduma provides for a ban on smoking in public places, forbids the sale of cigarettes in kiosks, ends the open display of tobacco products, and outlaws depictions of smoking in new media content aimed at children. According to the bill, the new law specifies eleven categories of places where smoking is prohibited. In particular, it lists educational and cultural institutions, hospitals, multiclinics, public transport stops and train stations, trains and planes, as well as beaches, hotels, playgrounds, offices, and hallways. The bill also mandates that the minimum retail price of tobacco will increase annually at a level higher than the consumer price index for food products set by government.

14 November 2012

RIA-Novosti

http://en.rian.ru/infographics/20121114/177458186.html