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Best of the Web: Modern ecclesiastical schism: Russian Orthodox Church breaks ties with Constantinople over acceptance of 'Ukrainian Orthodox Church'


RT
Mon, 15 Oct 2018 21:46 UTC
Holy Synod Russian orthodox church
© Sputnik / Russian Orthodox ChurchAn extraordinary meeting of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church is held in Moscow, on September 14, 2018.
The Holy Synod, the governing body of the Russian Orthodox Church, has ruled that any further clerical relations with Constantinople are impossible, Metropolitan Hilarion, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church's External Relations Department, told journalists, de facto announcing the breach of relations between the two churches.

"A decision about the full break of relations with the Constantinople Patriarchate has been taken at a Synod meeting" that is currently been held in the Belarusian capital of Minsk, Hilarion said, as cited by TASS.

The move comes days after the Synod of the Constantinople Patriarchate decided to eventually grant the so-called autocephaly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, thus making the clerical organization, which earlier enjoyed a broad autonomy within the Moscow Patriarchate, fully independent.

Comment:

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Red Flag

Best of the Web: Internet Censorship Just Took An Unprecedented Leap Forward, And Hardly Anyone Noticed

Caitlin Johnstone
caitlinjohnstone.com
Sat, 13 Oct 2018 00:01 UTC
Zuckerberg Dorsey
While most indie media was focused on debating the way people talk about Kanye West and the disappearance of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, an unprecedented escalation in internet censorship took place which threatens everything we all care about. It received frighteningly little attention.

After a massive purge of hundreds of politically oriented pages and personal accounts for "inauthentic behavior", Facebook rightly received a fair amount of criticism for the nebulous and hotly disputed basis for that action. What received relatively little attention was the far more ominous step which was taken next: within hours of being purged from Facebook, multiple anti-establishment alternative media sites had their accounts completely removed from Twitter as well.

As of this writing I am aware of three large alternative media outlets which were expelled from both platforms at almost the same time: Anti-Media, the Free Thought Project, and Police the Police, all of whom had millions of followers on Facebook. Both the Editor-in-Chief of Anti-Media and its Chief Creative Officer were also banned by Twitter, and are being kept from having any new accounts on that site as well.

Comment: It's clear that the reality creators have had enough with the dissenting voices getting the same exposure as their carefully crafted propaganda, and they're starting to make big moves in blatant censorship. Johnstone is right - people should be making a lot of noise about this. Our access to perspectives that lie outside of 'consensus reality' is under serious threat.

See also:

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X

Best of the Web: Facebook, Twitter Purge More Dissident Media Pages In Latest Escalation - UPDATE

Caitlin Johnstone
caitlinjohnstone.com
Fri, 12 Oct 2018 00:01 UTC
Free Thought Project banned
Facebook has purged more dissident political media pages today, this time under the pretense of protecting its users from "inauthentic activity". In a statement co-authored by Facebook Head of Cybersecurity Nathaniel Gleicher (who also happens to be the former White House National Security Council Director of Cybersecurity Policy), the massive social media platform explained that it has removed "559 Pages and 251 accounts that have consistently broken our rules against spam and coordinated inauthentic behavior."

This "inauthentic behavior", according to Facebook, consists of using "sensational political content - regardless of its political slant - to build an audience and drive traffic to their websites," which is the same as saying they write about controversial things, and posting those political articles "in dozens of Facebook Groups, often hundreds of times in a short period, to drum up traffic for their websites."

In other words, the pages were removed for publishing controversial political content and trying to get people to read it. Not for writing "fake news", but for doing what they could to get legitimate indie media news stories viewed by people who might want to view it. The practice of sharing your material around in Facebook groups is common practice for most independent media content creators; I did it myself a lot in late 2016 and early 2017, and pretty much all my indie media peers at the time did too.

Comment: It appears another wave in the ongoing social media purge has just hit the shore. The fact that this is another multi-platform event, like the Alex Jones fiasco back in August, should scream loud and clear that this is coming from higher up than the individual social media companies themselves. This is the controllers silencing dissident voices, plain and simple.

See also: Update: De-platformed sites hit back. RT reports:
Alternative voices online are incensed after Facebook and Twitter closed down hundreds of political media pages ahead of November's crucial midterm elections. Facebook says they broke its spam rules, they say it's censorship.

Some 800 pages spanning the political spectrum, from left-leaning organizations like The Anti Media, to flag-waving opinion sites like Right Wing News and Nation in Distress, were shut down. Other pages banned include those belonging to police brutality watchdog groups Filming Cops and Policing the Police. Even RT America's Rachel Blevins found her own page banned for posts that were allegedly "misleading users."


Journalist Glenn Greenwald hit out at those on the left who cheered Facebook and Twitter's coordinated 'deplatforming' of right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones in August. "Those who demanded Facebook & other Silicon Valley giants censor political content...are finding that content that they themselves support & like end up being repressed," he wrote. "That's what has happened to every censorship advocate in history."

Facebook claims that the accounts were shut down for "coordinated inauthentic behavior," and, disturbingly, the company said in a blog post that it is working hard to root out pages, groups and accounts "created to stir up political debate."

In America, Conservatives were the first to complain about unfair treatment by left-leaning Silicon Valley tech giants. However, leftist sites have increasingly become targets in what Blumenthal calls "a wider war on dissident narratives in online media." In identifying enemies in this "war," Facebook has partnered up with the Digital Forensics Lab, an offshoot of NATO-sponsored think tank the Atlantic Council. The DFL has promised to be Facebook's "eyes and ears" in the fight against disinformation (read: alternative viewpoints).


With the Atlantic Council funded by a plethora of private donors, state institutions, and arms manufacturers, it is little wonder that some commenters on Twitter saw the group's fingerprints all over the latest round of bans.


For now, Facebook and Twitter have been free to censor with impunity. This places alternative journalists and news outlets at the companies' mercy: no viable competitors to Facebook and Twitter exist, save for twitter-clone Gab.ai, which has been slammed by mainstream media as a breeding ground for far-right extremism.

Citizen journalist Lee Stranahan called for a stockholder lawsuit against Facebook, arguing that repeated terms-of-service changes are killing the company's business. However, until that happens, users will have to accept censorship as just another one of these terms.


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Attention

Best of the Web: Hurricane Michael makes landfall in Florida panhandle - Strongest storm to hit state since 1851 - at least six dead amid devastating damage - UPDATES


RT
Wed, 10 Oct 2018 16:06 UTC
Hurricane Michael Florida coast
© AFP / NOAA
Florida residents are scrambling to flee their homes as Hurricane Michael bears down on the state. If it doesn't weaken before making landfall, Michael will be the strongest hurricane to batter Florida since 1851.

"No long-time residents of this area will have seen a hurricane this strong before," said the Weather Channel. No category-4 hurricane has ever made landfall along Florida's panhandle, and Michael is set to bring winds of up to 145mph and waves of up to 13 feet, enough to rip roofs off houses, and bury them beneath the storm surge.

As well as being the strongest storm to hit Florida in over a century, Michael is poised to be the strongest to hit the US mainland since the extremely active hurricane season of 2004.


Comment: We don't want to alarm anyone but this went from Category 1 to 4 in under 12 hours.

Michael has emerged from nowhere to become the third-strongest storm (pressure-wise) to ever make landfall in the US...

Update 14:30 EST

Footage of landfall is starting to come in. This looks like it's gonna be a doozy.


UPDATE 18:40:EST

More footage coming in:






UPDATE RT reports on 11th October 2018 (02.23):
A man and a child were killed when trees fell on their homes on Wednesday, as Hurricane Michael plowed into Alabama and Georgia, leaving behind a path of destruction in the Panhandle.

Hurricane Michael, which made landfall near Mexico Beach, Florida as a category-4 storm on Wednesday afternoon, has ravaged the Florida Panhandle with gusting winds of up to 155mph (250kph).

A man was killed when a tree fell on his home in Gadsden County, Florida, and a child died in a similar accident in Seminole County, Georgia, local officials confirmed.

Photos and videos show homes in the town of some 2,000 residents shredded to pieces.


Panama City, some 20 miles (32km) from Mexico Beach, has borne the brunt of the storm, as it downed trees, knocked power lines, tore off roofs, and splintered homes, some of which have collapsed.

The storm, the most severe to hit the Florida Panhandle in a century, brought flash floods, inundating roads and homes.

More than 300,000 homes and businesses have been affected by power outages in Florida.

At least one person was killed in the storm. The man was trapped by a fallen tree at his home in Greensboro, Gladsden County, police reported. Rescue crews that were responding to the emergency failed to arrive in time to pull him out alive due to roads being blocked by fallen power lines.

As the hurricane, downgraded to a category-3 storm, moved into Alabama and Georgia on Wednesday evening, Florida Governor Rick Scott urged locals to stay inside and off the roads, as rescuers were on their way to the most heavy-hit areas. The state authorities are still assessing the damage.


Residents of Georgia and Alabama have been hit with power blackouts after the hurricane crossed into the southeastern part of the states. Some 125,000 homes were left without power in Georgia and over 52,000 homes in Alabama as of Wednesday evening.

The storm continued on its destructive path, bringing heavy rains and tearing down trees. As it moved further inland, its crushing force subsided.

By 8pm, Michael was weakened to category-1 storm, with wind gusts reaching 90mph (144kph), the National Hurricane Center reported.

Earlier in the day, US President Donald Trump stirred some controversy by refusing to cancel his MAGA rally in Erie, Pennsylvania due to the storm.

"I cannot disappoint the thousands of people that are there - and the thousands that are going," he tweeted.
According to the Guardian, Michael's 155mph winds at landfall were only 5mph short of category 5 status, making it the strongest storm to strike the United States since Hurricane Andrew ravaged southern Florida in 1992.


UPDATE: The Independent on 12th October 2018 reports:
At least six people have been killed by Hurricane Michael and more can be expected after Hurricane Michael ripped through the US southeast, devastating communities in the Florida panhandle in a tempest that authorities say is the worst the region has seen since records began in 1851.

An 11-year-old girl from Georgia is among those who died in the storm, which levelled neighbourhoods in Mexico Beach and Panama Beach in Florida.

Michael has caused widespread damage, leaving more than 700,000 homes and businesses without power across three states and even blowing a train off its tracks in Florida with winds up to 155mph, according to reports. It has been estimated that more than 300,000 homes and businesses have been destroyed or badly damaged in Florida alone.

A search-and-rescue worker walked down Main Street in Mexico Beach, Florida.
© Eric Thayer for The New York TimesA search-and-rescue worker walked down Main Street in Mexico Beach, Florida.
"So many lives have been changed forever. So many families have lost everything. Homes are gone. Businesses are gone," Florida Governor Rick Scott said shortly before a planned tour of the devastation on Thursday. "Roads and infrastructure along the storm's path have been destroyed. This hurricane was an absolute monster, and the damage left in its wake has yet to be fully understood".

Michael, which made landfall as a Category 4 storm, was downgraded into a tropical storm on Thursday, according to the National Hurricane Centre (NHC). The storm still carries with it the potential for major damage and loss of life, with the NHC saying that ongoing flash floods and dangerous winds should be watched for in the Carolinas and southern Virginia.

After daylight on Thursday residents of north Florida would just be beginning to take stock of the enormity of the disaster.

Damage in Panama City near where Michael came ashore on Wednesday afternoon was so extensive that broken and uprooted trees and downed power lines lay nearly everywhere.

The storm was due to began to pass over the Carolinas on Thursday, just weeks after the states were battered by Hurricane Florence's torrential rain. The storm is projected to begin moving eastward on Friday and then make its way out to sea in the Atlantic.

During a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, Donald Trump promised to visit Florida soon. He said that "we will always pull through" and offered his "thoughts and prayers" to those affected by thew storm. On Thursday, he described the hurricane as one of the worst the US had encountered.

"This one went very quickly, but its tremendous destruction in the areas and the path that it chose is incredible for destruction," Mr Trump said on Thursday at the White House. "We have not seen destruction like that in a long time".
More footage of the devastation has emerged:



Update: RT reports severe damage to Florida Air Force base:
tyndall AFB hurricane michael
© Reuters / Jonathan BachmanAn aircraft hangar damaged by Hurricane Michael is seen at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida, U.S. October 11, 2018.
Hurricane Michael has wreaked havoc at Tyndall Air Force Base near Panama City, Florida, uprooting trees, tearing off roofs, and wiping out the flight line and marina. It's still unknown how long repairs will take.

The base, located just 19km (12 miles) east of Panama City, suffered a "direct hit" from the hurricane, which made its landfall on Florida's Panhandle on Wednesday, shredding nearby Mexico Beach and bringing devastation to Panama City.

Tyndall has not been spared the full force of the hurricane either. Aerial footage of the base shows snapped trees, dozens of trailers scattered across parking lots and severe damage to homes, with gaping holes where roof shingles used to be.

Wind gusts have ripped siding from aircraft hangars. "Widespread catastrophic damage" was caused to almost every structure, the base commandment said on Facebook.

"The flight line is devastated. Every building has severe damage. Many buildings are a complete loss. The hurricane completely destroyed the Tyndall marina. The structures and docks are gone."

The base "took a beating" from the hurricane and will need extensive clean-up and repairs, Colonel Brian S. Laidlaw said. The storm left the base without basic utilities, and fallen trees and power lines blocked the roads.
© Reuters / Jonathan Bachman



No casualties or injuries have been reported at the base, which was empty at the time the storm smashed into Florida. The majority of the aircraft waited out the storm in Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio and Carswell Field in Texas.

It is unclear when servicemen and families that were driven from the base can return, the commandment admitted.

"I know that you are eager to return. I ask you to be patient and try to focus on taking care of your families and each other. We can rebuild our base, but we can't rebuild any of you," Laidlaw said.

Update: NOAA's latest projection of tropical storm Michael's path:
Tropical Storm Michael is located 30 miles west of Augusta, Georgia and is moving to the northeast at 21 mph (33 km/h).

NHC forecasters say that this motion is expected to continue with an increase in forward speed through tonight.

A turn toward the east-northeast and an even faster forward speed are expected on Friday.

On the NHC forecast track, the center of Michael will move through eastern Georgia into central South Carolina this morning, then moves across portions of central and eastern North Carolina and southeastern Virginia into the Atlantic Ocean by late tonight or early Friday.
storm michael projected path
© NOAA
michael windspeeds
© NOAATropical storm Michael projected windspeed


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Hammer

Best of the Web: Kanye West's insightful statements are ignored in favor of mockery, derision

Alexander Rubinstein
Sputnik
Thu, 11 Oct 2018 23:52 UTC
Kanye West Trump
© AP Photo/ Evan Vucci
Kanye West is currently the laughingstock of the Beltway press corps, but despite his pro-Trump positions and somewhat nativist lines of critique, the rapper showed an understanding of a host of issues in America that East Coast elite thought leaders rarely mention.

US President Donald Trump met with two prominent musicians on Thursday - Kanye West and Kid Rock - when signing the Music Modernization Act. West, it seems, broke the internet with his remarks, which were derided by journalists as "incoherent." While West's remarks were at times bizarre, slightly misogynist and, let's say, braggadocious, he used the opportunity to address real issues, displaying a dedication to talking about important topics like prison reform, a responsibility which mainstream journalists have largely reneged on.

While some of the hip-hop star's remarks were indeed difficult to understand and perhaps nonsensical, it is important to remember that he is a performer. Other issues the musician spoke about - often using metaphor - showed that West is a lot more politically astute than standard characterizations of him acknowledge.

Comment: See also: Why is Taylor Swift a 'brave role model' and Kanye West a 'token Negro, Uncle Tom'?

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Satellite

Best of the Web: More ISS trouble: Russian and American astronauts dodge death in rare Soyuz rocket launch accident, successfully land in Kazakhstan


RT
Thu, 11 Oct 2018 13:32 UTC
Failed Russian space launch Soyuz
© AP Video
A botched launch of the Russian spaceship Soyuz narrowly avoided becoming the latest fatal space incident on Thursday. Rescue systems managed to save the lives of two crew members and conduct an emergency landing.

The Soyuz-MS-10 spacecraft was meant to deliver Roscosmos' Aleksey Ovchinin and NASA astronaut Nick Hague, members of Expedition 57/58, to the International Space Station (ISS). But 119 seconds after take-off from the Baikonur launch site in Kazakhstan the Soyuz-FG launch vehicle experienced a malfunction and crew rescue protocols were engaged.

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Gift 2

Best of the Web: China is offering 'no-strings-attached aid' to Africa. Here's what that means

Xiaojun Li
Washington Post
Thu, 27 Sep 2018 12:09 UTC
chinese flag africa
This month, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced a new package of aid and loans to more than 50 African leaders visiting Beijing for the Seventh Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). Much of the domestic and international reaction has fixated on the $60 billion price tag.

Yes, $60 billion seems like a lot of money - but it's about 0.49 percent of China's gross domestic product, which is below the 0.7 percent target that OECD countries have set for development aid. Furthermore, closer examination of the figures reveals that only a portion of the $60 billion may qualify as official "development assistance," as defined by the OECD.

There's another important dimension of this aid package. This featured prominently in Xi's keynote speech, when he stressed that China's aid and loan to Africa will not "come with any political conditions attached." This promise of unconditional aid is in contrast to most aid from traditional donors - who usually require the recipient to undergo changes in governance structure and adhere to international "best practices."


Comment: Or 'structural conditionalities' and other newspeak for 'do as we say, not as we do'.

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Quenelle - Golden

Best of the Web: Pro-Russia 'Harmony' party wins Latvia elections - Coalition govt with New Right parties likely - EU chiefs furious, blame Putin!

Simon Osborne
Daily Express, UK
Mon, 08 Oct 2018 19:49 UTC
latvia elections
Harmony, which draws most of its support from the country's sizeable ethnic Russian minority, won 20 percent of the vote to become the largest party for the second time.

The result has set alarm bells ringing throughout the European Union and NATO which see the Baltic nation as a key ally in their increasingly tense relations with Vladimir Putin.


Comment: Funny how democracy terrifies 'democrats' when it doesn't go their way!


Suspicion of the left-leaning party's links with the Kremlin has kept it sidelined from power in the past but it is now expected to enter talks to form a coalition government with two other populist parties - the KPV LV and the New Conservatives which took 27 percent between them.

Harmony will hold its 24 seats in the 100-seat parliament, with the New Conservatives on 16 and KPV LV on 15.

Comment: In short, the Latvian people are done with being Deep State pawns in the war against Putin. And another one bites the dust; yet ANOTHER eastern EU country has 'gone rogue'.

Suck it up, Tusk.

donald tusk
EU Council President Donald Tusk


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Pistol

Best of the Web: 'I sleep with a loaded gun': Rand Paul's wife afraid of 'unhinged' people goaded by Democrats


RT
Tue, 09 Oct 2018 11:01 UTC
Kelley Paul
© Storyblocks / Scott Morgan / Reuters
Facing an increasingly polarized political climate, the wife of Senator Rand Paul says she sleeps with a loaded gun as a precaution against "unhinged" people being goaded by Democrats into harassing Republican lawmakers.

The Paul household used to keep its doors unlocked, but now feels "under assault" by self-described activists who resort to intimidation, harassment and even physical violence, Kelley Paul told Breitbart News.

"It's bizarre. I've never been like this in my whole life... We used to never even lock our doors, and now that has all changed," she said.

"We've updated all of our security systems at home. I sleep with a loaded gun by my bed."

Kelley also expressed deep concern about lawmakers who have encouraged their constituents to confront Republican politicians.


Comment: See also:

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Quenelle - Golden

Best of the Web: Over 100,000 march in Edinburgh calling for 2nd Scottish independence referendum

Tommy Sheridan
Sputnik
Mon, 08 Oct 2018 14:37 UTC
March independence Edinburgh
© Tommy SheridanMarch for Scottish independence in Edinburgh
I'm still buzzing as I write this column. I'm not long back from Edinburgh and I was so proud and inspired to march alongside well over 100,000 other supporters of independence for Scotland. We filled our capital city today with men, women and children from all walks of life and scores of dugs as well.

Sheldon is a kick in the arse off a horse and marched with purpose while Hamish was there with proud owner and SNP MP Brendan O'Hara and displayed impeccable manners and temperament.

It was a pleasure to walk alongside them from Johnstone Terrace near to Edinburgh Castle to Holyrood Park down the Royal Mile. A relatively short 15 minute walk that took in excess of 90minutes to complete such was the incredible size of the crowd. I was there with my immediate family, my two girls Gail and Gabrielle, but the truth is we were all part of the one big family, The Indy Family.

To put the turnout into perspective imagine over one million people marching in London and you get the picture. Police estimates of the crowd ranged from 100,000 to 120,000 and the banners and placards were from every part of our broad movement.

The English Scots For YES group was there, alongside the Pensioners For YES, the YES Bikers, the Catalonia flags, EU flags, Red flags and a sea of saltires that depicted national identity and pride but without chauvinism or arrogance.

There was even a new Rangers Supporters For Independence banner which was made welcome. Young and old, men and women, black and white all marched with hope in their hearts and a vision for a new, better, fairer and nuclear-free Scotland in their heads.

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