Palace of Versailles: Everything You Need to Know

 From Architectural Digest:

The Palace of Versailles, known as château de Versailles in French, is a paragon of Baroque architecture that once served as a royal residence and the de facto capital of France—but its beginnings are far more humble. In 1623, King Louis XIII built a hunting lodge at Versailles for his own pleasure. It wasn’t until his successor, King Louis XIV, took the throne that Versailles was expanded to become a grand palace for the monarchy and home to the French government for over a century.

Now, Versailles and its gardens function as a museum that welcomes over 10 million visitors each year, making it one of the most frequented tourist sites in the world. To learn more about this icon of French history, architecture, and opulence, AD chatted with Mathieu da Vinha, director of the Palace of Versailles Research Center and author of several books about the reign of Louis XIV, and Thomas Garnier, official photographer of the Palace of Versailles and author of Versailles from the Sky. Here’s everything you need to know.

[...] 

The palace has 2,300 rooms, but a few stand out as the most spectacular. The Hall of Mirrors, for example, is a long, ornate gallery that overlooks the gardens. It was built by Hardouin-Mansart to replace a terrace that connected the king’s and queen’s apartments and exposed anyone traveling between the two to France’s unpredictable weather. The marble-clad hall features 17 arched windows opposite 357 mirrors, which majestically reflect the natural light and lush views. On the vaulted ceiling, Charles Le Brun painted an elaborate 30-scene fresco that depicts the first 18 years of Louis XIV's military and diplomatic victories. (Read more.)

 

 

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Biden in the Bunker

 From The Post-liberal Order:

 The second destructive action that Biden undertook was the prophylactic pardoning of his son, Hunter Biden, at the beginning of December. Superficially we might be able to attribute some positive motive to this decision by the president. Although by all accounts a vile individual, Hunter is still Joe Biden’s son, and the president may feel a fatherly need to protect him. But any understanding of the issues surrounding Hunter Biden soon puts this to rest. It appears that Hunter was the president’s own “bag man” in his potentially corrupt dealings with the Ukrainians. That is, Hunter was ultimately engaged in criminal acts at the behest of his father. The pardon then cannot be read as a modern-dayversion of the prodigal son. Rather it is as much about protecting Joe Biden himself as it is about protecting Hunter. The Biden family is not a normal family with bonds forged exclusively out of love, but rather a business enterprise where kinship relations are infused with monetary significance. (Read more.)

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Marxism and Religion

 From Hillsdale College:

The ideas of socialism have a powerful pull on the hearts of men.” These are the first words uttered by Hillsdale College Professor of Economics, Ivan Pongracic, in our newest course, “Marxism, Socialism, and Communism.” Yet, this political philosophy that claims to be for the people has only ever caused immense harm to the people.

On the surface, socialism presents noble and good ideas. One of the goals of socialism is to create a level playing field for all people. Some forms of socialism go so far as to suggest that the goal is utopia—a perfect society. No poverty, no war, and no suffering of any kind.

But considering the socialist societies throughout history, it takes no genius to realize that socialism achieves everything opposite to that for which it strives. Mass poverty, incessant war, and immense suffering are its results. As Hillsdale College Professor of Politics, John Grant, poignantly puts it, “attempting to eliminate all evils actually means you have to commit terrible, terrible evils, and you never get to a better place either.” (Read more.)

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A Wonderland of Christmas Joy

From House and Garden:

At the end of the garden is a picture-perfect Georgian house and standing in front of it is Richard, the white rabbit himself. He is as dashing and dandy as he was in his star-making debut in Withnail and 137 years ago, although his living quarters are a definite improvement on Withnail's decaying Camden flat. 'Come inside. People either really love it or they find it all just too, too much,' he says and, as we enter the house, he grins as my mouth falls wide open.

Richard and his wife, the dialect-coach Joan Washington, who died in 2021, spotted the house 35 years ago. They were actually viewing the house next door and this one - with the large garden and high ceilings that Richard wanted - was not for sale at the time. But five ears later it was and, as soon as Richard walked through the gate, he declared the house and garden to be ‘absolutely right’. (Read more.)

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Massacre on Bourbon Street

 From Leo's Newsletter:

The FBI has been all over the board when it comes to its description of the New Orleans truck jihadist who killed 15 people and wounded 35 on New Year’s Day.

First, they said it was not an act of terrorism, then they said it was indeed terrorism and the jihadist, Shamsud Din Jabbar, did not act alone but as part of a larger cell. Now they’ve switched back to saying he did act alone.

Which theory should we believe?

Former FBI agent Bobby Chacon told Fox News that he believes Mr. Jabbar was likely part of a sleeper cell that had been activated and included at least three or four other people. This indicates we should expect more terrorist attacks in the final 19 days before Trump’s inauguration, and likely even more after he’s sworn into office.

The more chaos the better, as far as the globalists are concerned. But they will also use law enforcement and the media to continue propping up the matrix, a society where a large segment of the population continues to live in ignorant bliss, for as long as possible.

The reason law enforcement changed their tune and said Jabbar acted alone was because the alternative was too scary and would have caused people to lose business leading up to tonight’s big Sugar Bowl college football game. If there are three or four other terrorists at large in the New Orleans area, that’s bad for business. Too many football fans pack up and go home under that scenario, before emptying their wallets at the city’s restaurants, hotels and bars.

So, the cops changed their story and said Jabbar was a lone-wolf terrorist, not part of a cell.

The truth is, we have many sleeper cells awaiting activation here in the United States of America. (Read more.)

 

 From Coffee and Covid:

Officials provided even more detail, including describing an improvised explosive device found in the car, inside a cooler filled with nails. They reported finding two more cooler-bombs placed “nearby” on Bourbon Street. And, get this, officials already reported having surveillance footage that shows at least three men and one woman planting possible explosives at various locations throughout the French Quarter before the deranged truck attack.

It was the first time in recorded memory that the FBI identified, confirmed, and described a mass killer within twelve hours of the attack. It might be the only time the FBI ever speculated about a possible broader conspiracy within the first day, never mind describing in real time what they saw on incoming security footage. Weird. But if it’s a new trend of transparency, it’s welcome.

Also weird is the hint of a conspiracy. The FBI historically has been, well, reluctant to find co-conspirators for these types of attacks. Remember, the FBI never found anyone else involved in: the Las Vegas shooting, the Oklahoma City bombing, the Centennial Park Bombing (also a US Army veteran) the Matthew Crooks assassination attempt, or the Ryan Routh assassination attempt, just to name a few. (Read more.)

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Unveiled by Ancient DNA

 From SciTechDaily:

A new analysis of DNA from ancient modern humans (Homo sapiens) in Europe and Asia has determined, more precisely than ever, the time period during which Neanderthals interbred with modern humans, starting about 50,500 years ago and lasting about 7,000 years — until Neanderthals began to disappear.

That interbreeding left Eurasians with many genes inherited from our Neanderthal ancestors, which in total make up between 1% and 2% of our genomes today.

A more precise timeline for modern human interactions with Neanderthals can help scientists understand when humans emigrated out of Africa and peopled the globe, while understanding the DNA that Neanderthals shared with our ancestors provides information on the role Neanderthal genes play in human health. (Read more.)

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A Gloucestershire Farmhouse

 From House and Garden:

Phoebe and Luke moved in over a whirlwind two days, thanks to the family’s unpacking practice. ‘Every time any of us move, everyone in the family, including our cousins, descends to help. We each have different responsibilities – my father hangs the pictures, Octavia styles every room and our mothers unpack the kitchen. The bonus is that we all know where to find everything in each other’s homes,’ says Phoebe. The house itself aided their speedy settling in. ‘It barely needed anything doing to it because Adrian and Lucretia had looked after it so well,’ says Phoebe. Gradually, however, with Octavia’s help, changes are being implemented. A sofa is reupholstered, a room repainted, a carpet replaced – and insulating the whole house is firmly near the top of the list. ‘The pipes tend to freeze rather too often,’ observes Luke wryly. (Read more.)

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Are Smells Racist?

From Right Flank:

Reading Shakespeare under a Marxist lens–Shakespeare knew nothing about Marx because Marx had yet to be born–is absurd. Absurdity is an absence of meaning. It would be like attempting to fix a 1947 Ford pickup using 2024 Tesla parts. Barthes may as well have titled the essay “The Death of Western Civilization.” With the death of the author, God dies too. Where there is no truth, anything goes. Satan, no matter Milton’s intent in Paradise Lost, becomes a hero to whom many a college student willingly signs over their soul. Maybe that’s why “Enrollment in the humanities is in free fall at colleges around the country,” and The New Yorker pronounced the English major as good as dead in 2023. (Read more.)

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'Nosferatu' (2024) is a Frightening Wake-up Call

I hate vampire movies of any kind but this review is interesting. From The Catholic World Report:

It is appropriate, therefore, that Eggers is now able to offer his own Nosferatu to the same movie-going public that might otherwise buy a ticket to the latest Avengers copy of a copy or run-of-the-mill horror film. And as for the latter category, while his film is not exactly jump-out-of-your-seat terrifying, it is a whole lot scarier, not to mention gorier and more sexually explicit, than its two predecessors. Most importantly, Eggers’ Nosferatu is a major artistic achievement that engages with the realm of the spirit even more profoundly than his previous efforts.

Eggers sticks with Murnau’s version in using the German instead of English names for the characters. He also broadens the Romantic-era female passion of the character of the young bride, Ellen, played in a show-stealing performance by Lily-Rose Depp. We learn early on that Count Orlok is drawn from Transylvania to the German town of Wisborg (a fictionalization of Wismar on the North Sea) precisely because of Ellen, who had had an erotic experience with the demon count in a moment of juvenile longing. The theme of the danger of sexual awakening is only hinted at in Murnau’s original and ignored completely in Herzog’s remake, but Eggers is right to make more of it than his predecessors. He invites the audience to think about how, even in our disenchanted age, the few spiritually sensitive souls around us may not only be in danger themselves, but may also bring risk to the rest of us. Without a culture-wide understanding of good and evil, their passions make them sitting ducks for dark opportunists.

And yet, while it may have been Ellen’s confused pubescent desires that initially made her susceptible to Orlok’s sorcery, the door is open for her passions to be redirected to good. There is a tender conclusion to a brutal scene in the film where Ellen confesses her shame to her husband, played by the excellent Nicholas Hoult, and she thanks him for giving her the appropriate avenue in holy matrimony for her God-given fervor. In the end, Ellen takes the opportunity to redeem the world around her, just as the female protagonist in Murnau’s version does, only more dramatically. The final sequence between Count Orlok and Ellen is a shocker, but Eggers pulls out all the stops to show how the light ultimately knows no equal in the darkness. By sacrifice, darkness is banished and order is restored. (Read more.)

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The Passing of Arthur

One of the most stirring passages from Tennyson's Idylls of the King are the last stanzas of "The Passing of Arthur," in which the wounded king is spirited away to the "island-valley" of Avalon.

And slowly answered Arthur from the barge:
‘The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
And God fulfils himself in many ways,
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?
I have lived my life, and that which I have done
May He within himself make pure! but thou,
If thou shouldst never see my face again,
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice
Rise like a fountain for me night and day.
For what are men better than sheep or goats
That nourish a blind life within the brain,
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves and those who call them friend?
For so the whole round earth is every way
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.
But now farewell. I am going a long way
With these thou seest—if indeed I go
(For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)—
To the island-valley of Avilion;
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow,
Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies
Deep-meadowed, happy, fair with orchard lawns
And bowery hollows crowned with summer sea,
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound.’

So said he, and the barge with oar and sail
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted swan
That, fluting a wild carol ere her death,
Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood
With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere
Revolving many memories, till the hull
Looked one black dot against the verge of dawn,
And on the mere the wailing died away.

But when that moan had past for evermore,
The stillness of the dead world’s winter dawn
Amazed him, and he groaned, ‘The King is gone.’
And therewithal came on him the weird rhyme,
‘From the great deep to the great deep he goes.’

Whereat he slowly turned and slowly clomb
The last hard footstep of that iron crag;
Thence marked the black hull moving yet, and cried,
‘He passes to be King among the dead,
And after healing of his grievous wound
He comes again; but—if he come no more—
O me, be yon dark Queens in yon black boat,
Who shrieked and wailed, the three whereat we gazed
On that high day, when, clothed with living light,
They stood before his throne in silence, friends
Of Arthur, who should help him at his need?’

Then from the dawn it seemed there came, but faint
As from beyond the limit of the world,
Like the last echo born of a great cry,
Sounds, as if some fair city were one voice
Around a king returning from his wars.

Thereat once more he moved about, and clomb
Even to the highest he could climb, and saw,
Straining his eyes beneath an arch of hand,
Or thought he saw, the speck that bare the King,
Down that long water opening on the deep
Somewhere far off, pass on and on, and go
From less to less and vanish into light.
And the new sun rose bringing the new year.

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China Hacks U.S. Treasury

 From The National Pulse:

The Biden-Harris government announced on Monday that a state-sponsored actor from China breached the U.S. Treasury Department. According to federal officials, the attack allowed the hackers to access workstations used by government employees and obtain unclassified materials. This development follows recent reports that Chinese entities had infiltrated U.S. telecommunications networks, gaining access to the conversations and text messages of American officials.

On December 8, BeyondTrust, a third-party software service vendor, alerted the Treasury Department about the security breach. The hackers had secured a security key, enabling remote access to certain department workstations and associated documents. The Treasury Department communicated this information to lawmakers in a formal letter. (Read more.)

 

Communism is alive and well and trying to spread. From Sinocism:

The Party’s leadership gathers a tremendous force for building Chinese modernization. Our Party profoundly understands that Chinese modernization is a cause of hundreds of millions of people, and that the people are the principal force behind Chinese modernization. Therefore, we must rely closely on the people, respect their creative spirit, and gather the wisdom and strength of all, so as to continuously advance Chinese modernization. We uphold the Party’s mass line, focusing on gauging the people’s sentiments, addressing their concerns, reflecting their aspirations, and enhancing their well-being when considering issues, making decisions, and handling affairs. We strive to secure the people’s wholehearted support for the Party’s theories, guidelines, principles, and policies. We remain committed to taking the people’s aspirations for a better life as our goal, upholding a people-centered development philosophy, prioritizing efforts to protect and improve people’s livelihoods, and focusing on solving their most pressing difficulties and concerns. By doing so, we ensure that the fruits of building Chinese modernization benefit all people more equitably. Our Party develops whole-process people’s democracy, broadens democratic channels, diversifies forms of democracy, and expands the people’s orderly participation in political affairs. This ensures that the people can, in accordance with the law and through various channels and means, manage state affairs, economic and cultural affairs, and social affairs, and thereby devote themselves with great enthusiasm to the cause of modernization as masters of their own country. The Party uses the vision of Chinese modernization to motivate, inspire, and galvanize people. It effectively promotes harmony in relations between political parties, ethnic groups, religions, social strata, and between compatriots at home and overseas, and encourages Chinese people worldwide to unite in pursuit of common goals, thus forging a mighty force for fully building a modern socialist country. (Read more.)

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King Baudouin: ‘A Witness to the Living Christ’

 From the Catholic News Agency:

Baudouin came to the throne at age 19, and the beginning of his reign was marked by a deep crisis known as the “Royal Question” related to the controversy over the decisions of his father, Leopold III, during World War II.

“He suffered a lot because of all this, but I know that it was his faith that helped him overcome it,” one of the relatives said.

His upbringing was greatly affected by a Dominican priest from Switzerland who “had a great spiritual influence” during his youth. He was also guided by Cardinal Leo Jozef Suenens, whose meeting with him in the autumn of 1959 left a deep mark on him until the day of his death. (Read more.)

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