2013
Did Yolkin know that the title’s a pun in English? Well, in the original, “iZombie” was in English, as was “Apple” in the title, so, it’s a possibility…
BMD
On 10 September, Apple presented its new generation of smart phones… the iPhone 5S and 5C. Sergei Yolkin casts a gimlet eye on the “Apple Corps”.
11 September 2013
RIA-Novosti
The word used for “Russian” in the original was “россиян”, not “русский”, which means that it’s asking Russian citizens as a whole, not ethnic Russians as a particular tribe. This should help to make you understand that Russia’s a self-consciously multiethnic, multicultural, and multiconfessional state, unlike the distorted caricatures bruited about by CNN and Fox News (along with the rest of their amen corner in the Western media). By the way, ethnic Russians make up 80 percent of the RF‘s population, Tatars are 4 percent, Ukrainians are 2 percent, Bashkirs, Chuvash, and Chechens each comprise about 1 percent, and all other groups are less than that. One can see that Western estimates of the Muslim population is way out of whack, more motivated by wishful thinking than observation of reality. By the way, the Russian population hit its nadir in 2009, it’s been on the rise since then, as the birth rate’s gone up and the death rate has gone down, as a result of policies put in place by VVP. Again, the Western punditry has to eat crow supreme à la mode.
Why do you listen to them?
BMD
30 July is International Friendship Day. Our infographic will show you which countries that Russians favour the most, and those, on the contrary, which one could hardly call friends and political partners of Russia. The UN General Assembly decided to establish International Friendship Day on 27 April 2011 at its 65th session. The basis for the new holiday was the Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace which was part of the International Decade for the Promotion of a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World, which covered the decade 2001-10. The UN resolution highlighted the importance of the new observance in strengthening friendly relations between peoples. In addition, one of the main goals of the international festival was to attract young people to social activities designed to respect the perception of different cultures.
30 July 2013
RIA-Novosti
One of the Cabinet wrote me:
It sucks. As long as you’re NOT on the website, you really don’t encounter the nonsense. Once you enter the website, it sets loose all Hell. It’s like going from Windows 7 to Windows 8. It has an almost-totally-new interface, which is NOT intuitive. Worse, many “functions” just didn’t work. Therefore, you waste time trying to find a friendly old function; when you do find one, you only discover that it doesn’t work. Then, the next day, it does, but the following day, it doesn’t. However, I have to admit, over the past week or so they’ve tackled many of these functional problems, but I still don’t like the new interface.
One glaring annoyance, if you’re responding from the website, so far, you can’t reply “in line” and cut out things in the original post that you don’t want to deal with, so, your response contains the entire original post, which many people hate (drives people who get the “digest” form delivered bonkers, as all the previous posts are included with each post). As of yesterday I still couldn’t approve a post, from the web site, marked incorrectly as “Spam“, fortunately the delivered e-mail request to accept or reject still worked. Yahoo has never been user-friendly, and rolling out this dysfunctional new format doesn’t earn them any kudos.
A couple of members with older Macs seem to be suffering long loading times; they even find that they can’t load the interface. Some members had those problems last week, but they haven’t complained this week, so I’m hoping it’s gotten better. I avoid the website as much as I can.
Thank you, Yahoo, for NUTTIN’! Haven’t they ever heard, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it?”
BMD
Voices from Russia 
15 September 2013. An Update on American Orthodox Coverage of the Syrian Crisis
Tags: Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America, AOCANA, Barack Obama, Christian, Christianity, Christians in Middle East, Eastern Orthodox Church, GOAA, Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch, International Orthodox Christian Charities, IOCC, Kirill I of Moscow, Middle East, Middle Eastern, Moscow Patriarchate, Obama, OCA, Orthodox, Orthodoxy, Patriarch Kirill, Patriarch Kirill I, peace in the middle east, Philip Saliba, political commentary, politics, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, ROCOR, Russian Orthodox Church, Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, Syria, United States, USA
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One of the Cabinet was kind enough to send me this roundup:
That’s where it stands at present. Why the silence? That’s disgusting and nauseating. They’d best put away their “Pro-Life” placards and attend to this… which is far more pressing, as Syrian Christian lives are at stake. It’s too much of a muchness.
BMD
Addendum 16.47 EDT 15 September:
I’ve received word that, in the Western European parishes of the ROCOR, there’s a special petition at the liturgy for Syria and the Middle East.
BMD