[AdobebePhoto]

As I posted here:
The torch relay that culminates in the ceremonial lighting of the flame at the Olympic stadium was ordered by Adolf Hitler, who tried to make the 1936 Berlin Games a celebration of the Third Reich. Hitler's Nazi propaganda machine also popularized the five interlocking rings as the symbol of the Games.

Now, both are universally recognized icons of the Olympics. But historians say neither had much, if anything, to do with the Games born centuries ago in ancient Olympia.

"The torch relay is so ingrained in the modern choreography that most people today assume it was a revival of a pagan tradition - unaware that it was actually concocted for Hitler's Games in Berlin," the author Tony Perrottet wrote in "The Naked Olympics" (Random House, 2004).
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The torch relay, memorialized in Leni Riefenstahl's film, "Olympia," was part of Hitler's elaborate attempt to add myth, mystique and glamour to an Olympics intended to intimidate pre-World War II Europe. In Hitler's eyes, the torch symbolized the perfection and victory of the German nation.
That individuals with a conscience are disrupting what is essentially Nazi propaganda is a good sign for humanity IMO.
Activists have been protesting along the torch route since the flame embarked on its 85,000-mile journey from Ancient Olympia in Greece to Beijing.

The torch's round-the-world trip is the longest in Olympic history, and it is meant to shine a spotlight on China's economic and political power. Activists have seized upon it as a backdrop for their causes, angering Beijing.

Political pressure against China is substantial in France.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has left open the possibility of boycotting the Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing depending on how the situation evolves in Tibet. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Monday that was still the case.
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To update my above post, Olympic officials in Paris have THRICE purposely extinguished the torch.