quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:



So there's no evidence it was intentional, and although he phrases it differently, there's no evidence it was accidental either.

Spontaneous combustion

It could be anything at this point. It certainly could be arson but I have to imagine a building this old probably has a mishmash or electrical as well and it could be as simple as sparks plus hundreds of years old timber.

I fall in the it seems fishy camp but regular old shit happens could be at play just as easily.

quote:

Originally posted by cslinger:
It could be anything at this point. It certainly could be arson but I have to imagine a building this old probably has a mishmash or electrical as well and it could be as simple as sparks plus hundreds of years old timber.

I fall in the it seems fishy camp but regular old shit happens could be at play just as easily.

And it just happened to catch fire at the beginning of holy week.

quote:

Originally posted by c1steve:

quote:

Originally posted by cslinger:
It could be anything at this point. It certainly could be arson but I have to imagine a building this old probably has a mishmash or electrical as well and it could be as simple as sparks plus hundreds of years old timber.

I fall in the it seems fishy camp but regular old shit happens could be at play just as easily.

And it just happened to catch fire at the beginning of holy week.

Gibbs Rule #29: “There is no such thing as coincidence.”

Once, is happenstance; twice, is a coincidence; thrice, is enemy action.

quote:

Once, is happenstance; twice, is a coincidence; thrice, is enemy action.

Many-- far more than three--churches across France have been desecrated in the past couple of weeks. This thread contains links to the news stories.

Then, the most famous church in France, and one of the most famous in the world, catches fire at the beginning of Holy Week.

Could it possibly have been an accident? Yes, that can't be ruled out. But there is good reason to suspect otherwise.

And, based on past actions, good reason to believe that Macron will never admit arson.

quote:

Originally posted by chellim1:
There seems to be an increasing number of French citizens growing sick and tired of being lied to by the French government.

You mean the guys in the yellow vests who, as far as they have anything like a common base at all, have demanded a national net minimum wage of 1,300 Euros (1,470 dollar) and minimum pension of 1,200 Euros from age 60, both with automatic inflation adjustment, maximum salaries of 15,000 Euros, a single-payer welfare system, rent control, the rich paying more taxes, ending austerity politics and privatization of business, rebuilding the public service and banning private train/mail operators and schools, and "fair treatment of asylum seekers"?

I. e., the guys who after the initial anger over the fuel tax hike have protested against all of Macron's policy of economic liberalization, and against about any other common grievance except Islam? Some of whom have called Macron, a former banker at Rothschild's, "a tool of ultra-liberal, globalist forces, controlled by Jews", and heckled noted philosopher Alain Finkielkraut who supported them as a "dirty Zionist shit" who should "go to Tel Aviv", have vandalized (including by anti-semitic graffiti) and burned posh restaurants, shops and banks, and defaced and smashed statues at the Arc de Triomphe, France's premier memorial to its war dead, spanning the tomb of the unkown soldier?

I'm sure it's total coincidence that the acts of vandalism against French churches rose in step with the emergence of the movement. Hasn't anybody actually read the article on the issue that has been cited twice in this thread, and what the Catholic watchdog group which pointed it out said? Elements of the Yellow Vests are just as likely to have set Notre Dame ablaze as some Muslims. Which are both rather minor possibilities considering the numerous ways a massive construction of 800-year-old wood currently being worked on for renovation could catch on fire. Since Joan of Arc has been brought up:

quote:

Originally posted by justjoe:

quote:

Once, is happenstance; twice, is a coincidence; thrice, is enemy action.

Many-- far more than three--churches across France have been desecrated in the past couple of weeks. This thread contains links to the news stories.

Then, the most famous church in France, and one of the most famous in the world, catches fire at the beginning of Holy Week.

.

And three days after a jihadist woman is jailed for a failed terror attack on Notre Dame in 2016.

When I learned fire investigation I was taught to assume nothing and question everything. Let the evidence lead the investigation not supposition or theories.

oops!

Notre Dame has no insurance policy

quote:

Originally posted by Ackks:

quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:



So there's no evidence it was intentional, and although he phrases it differently, there's no evidence it was accidental either.

Spontaneous combustion

Maybe it's divine.
"Radical rabbi says Notre Dame fire retribution for 13th-century Talmud burning"
https://www.timesofisrael.com/...tury-talmud-burning/

Let's reel in the conspiracy theorizing. Absent any facts about the fire at Notre Dame, it is pure speculation, vandalism of other churches, Holy Week, Muslim immigrants, and the Illuminati be damned.

For if we don't, I theorize/speculate/make shit up that this thread will end up locked.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/u...d-st-patrick-n995701

Some dude with gas cans at St Patrick’s Cathedral in NY.

quote:

Originally posted by RAMIUS:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/u...d-st-patrick-n995701

Some dude with gas cans at St Patrick’s Cathedral in NY.

Likely a freak show that wanted attention being so blatantly obvious about it.

The Politics of Notre Dame
by Larry Alex Taunton

When you heard Notre Dame was ablaze, did you think Islamic terrorism might be involved? I did. And with the origin of the fire still uncertain, that remains a valid avenue of inquiry. Muslim extremists have attacked the landmark before, have threatened to attack it again, and are now gloating over the destruction of this symbol of Christendom. It may well be that the fire was an accident — let’s hope so — but no thoughtful investigator would rule out the possibility of arson with this religious motivation. It’s not like attacks on national symbols are contrary to the rules by which Islamic terrorists have played. Has the whole world forgotten 9-11?

But don’t mention any of this to the Washington Post. In a column titled “How the far right spread politically convenient lies about the Notre Dame fire,” columnist Talia Lavin, leaning heavily on BuzzFeed as if it were one of Notre Dame’s flying buttresses, finds the mere suggestion that Islam might have played a role in the fire nothing short of racism. (Note to the WP: Islam is a religion, not a race.) Lavin is right to condemn genuine racists or those who have attributed the cause of the blaze to Muslim extremists without any proof to support that claim. Insofar as she does this, Ms. Lavin is correct. But she goes well beyond her stated thesis.

In a bit of journalistic sleight-of-hand that is so characteristic of the Left, she uses outrageous tweets by racist Richard Spencer and claims published by the conspiracy theorist website InfoWars to de-legitimize any thoughtful critique of Islam. She goes on to dismiss the idea of a “civilizational conflict” between Islam and the West and, in an ignorant jab, criticizes conservative commentator Ben Shapiro for calling Notre Dame “a monument to Western Civilization and to Judeo-Christian heritage.”

At this point, I had to ask how this article got past the Washington Post editors. There is a civilizational conflict, and while things might seem rosy in Ms. Lavin’s Brooklyn — aren’t the Twin Towers visible from there? — I assure you that things look much different in other parts of the world. I have debated Muslims on Al Jazeera, CNN International, in London’s Hyde Park, and I have covered that conflict in Nigeria where Christians are being slaughtered by Muslims for their faith. Yes, the conflict is real. Ms. Lavin and her publisher would do well to remember — if they ever knew it — that Islam is a religion founded in violence, with a history of violence, and with many representatives who advocate violence. To wit: according to 2015 BBC poll, 25 percent of British Muslims — roughly 750,000 people — were sympathetic with the Charlie Hebdo attacks.

As for Notre Dame being “a monument to Western Civilization and to Judeo-Christian heritage.” Uh, it is, Ms. Lavin.

Recently, I visited the sites of the Charlie Hebdo and Bataclan terrorist attacks in Paris. It was my third visit to these places in the last year. Somehow, whenever I am in Paris, I feel that I should pay my respects to the victims of Islamic terrorism who seem to have been so thoroughly forgotten. No, that is not quite accurate. They have not been forgotten. The reason for their murders has been deliberately obscured and legitimate dialogue on the topic of Islam has been suppressed. This is no conspiracy theory, it is codified in EU law. According to the European Court of Human Rights, disparaging “The Prophet” Muhammad is punishable by fine, imprisonment, or both.

And this brings me to the point — the real point — of Ms. Lavin’s column: the suppression of free speech. She would have us believe the Notre Dame fire is, in effect, akin to the Reichstag fire of 1933. In that instance, the Nazis used the fire, which they likely set, as a pretext to persecute their political opponents and, most of all, German Jews. It was Jussie Smollett on a national scale, but with a different demographic in mind. Ms. Lavin sees the “far right” using the tragedy of Notre Dame to persecute Muslims. She ends her column with talk of “misinformation” and “conspiracy” raging “through our information sphere unchecked.” Then she says this: “It is past time that those who stoke inflammatory rhetoric, knowing its potential to catalyze racist violence, were made to stop playing with fire — before it’s too late to control the inferno.”

That misinformation rages through our “information sphere” is not in question. What is troublesome is that Ms. Lavin and the Washington Post, like all would-be censors, do not see themselves as occasional contributors to that misinformation but instead see themselves as arbiters of truth, the high priests so to speak, who will determine for the rest of us what we should or should not have access to. In the end, they are guilty of the very thing they condemn — they have leveraged a tragedy for political capital against their opponents.

https://spectator.org/the-politics-of-notre-dame/

VDH On The Lessons Learned From Notre Dame — The Ingraham Angle 4/16/19

Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMaY4KqG_d8

Wow. Watching that drone footage, it's hard to believe the scaffolding didn't buckle and collapse from the heat!

Yeah, I hope that the people who have to disassemble all that are good at Jenga. . .

Notre Dame: Symbol Of A Failing Culture

Like many I was horrified on so many levels by the news of the fire which engulfed the iconic Notre Dame cathedral in Paris.

The thing that makes me truly sad is that my first reaction to the news wasn’t basic human safety concerns. My first reaction was to jump to the political ramifications and ask cui bono?

Who benefits from this?

In this hyper-politicized world, every act has an agenda. And with so many false flags, failing governments, simmering (or actually boiling) culture wars and rampant ideological insanity it is nearly impossible to dismiss them.

Meanwhile, one of the great symbols and repositories of human achievement was nearly destroyed by either carelessness, neglect, malicious intent or a sinister combination of all three.

And people were cheering this.

While I’m lamenting my cynical initial reaction there were people all across the globe cheering the destruction of an integral part of human history.

That should frighten you.

It shows just how deeply ingrained the current divides are.

It shows how fallen and corrupt of spirit the culture has become.

It’s religious significance is secondary to this. If it was just an expression of the rivalry between Islam and Christianity that would be regrettable if understandable.

What’s worse to me is descendants of those that built Notre Dame cheering this event because they’ve been inculcated to hate religion of all forms by their Marxist education.

They’ve been effectively immunized against feeling anything but contempt for themselves and their history.

History is history. It doesn’t have an agenda. It exists, for better or worse, to remind us that who we are today is the sum total of who we were then.

Marxists fundamentally believe in creating a man without a history, without connection to his past to mold him into the New Soviet Man.

Argue with me about this all you want Bernie Bros, Corbynites and Richard Wolff acolytes, this is the point of this French post-modernist “life is an absurd simulation” nonsense. It’s simply an excuse to justify the inherent envy at the core of all Marxist thought.

And yet, for as much as I despise Marxism in all its forms, if instead of Notre Dame the Gulag History State Museum in Moscow burned up I would feel just as sad.

The Russians Embrace Their History Rather than Run From It.

I no more want to see statues of Confederate Generals removed or the Stars and Bars wiped from our collective memory than I want to see anyone ever be sold into chattel slavery.

Because a people without a past, incapable of facing the evil they’ve done, is a people on a path to self-righteous crusades that far exceed any horrors previously committed.

Think about the insane atrocities of the 20th century and then remember it was done in the name of creating a better human.

People without history have no context. They are unstuck in time having to relearn lessons which our ancestors built monuments to remind us of what we’re capable of for better or worse.

While the French government took years to raise €12 million to renovate Notre Dame despite having the highest tax rate in the world, private donations to rebuild it topped $1 billion in the first 48 hours after the fire was put out.

This is gratifying in a way that is almost beyond words.

And it makes a mockery of the statist arguments for government to replace private charity and private property.

If the French, themselves to birthplace of this post-modern and most sinister form of Marxism, had left even a smidge of capital for their people to enjoy maybe we wouldn’t be mourning/cheering Notre Dame today.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news...mbol-failing-culture

Bill Whittle's reveille for the French


Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56tPjl9NsAI