Libyan Rebels Enter Bani Walid in Final Push

At Telegraph UK.

9/11: Radical Islamists Burn U.S. Flag in London Protest (VIDEO)

From Telegraph UK:

And from London's Daily Mail, "100 protesters burn American flag outside U.S. embassy in London during minute's silence for 9/11."

RELATED: "Progressives Shame the Country on the 10th Anniversary of 9/11."

'Time'

Heard this on the way home from "The Undefeated" the other night. And come to think of it, The Sound has been playing a lot of Pink Floyd:

P.S. I'll try to post my thoughts on The Undefeated later today.

The Return of Elitism?

An interesting piece, at Telegraph UK, "David Cameron: we need elitism in schools":

David Cameron will signal a return to “elitism” in schools in an attempt to mend Britain’s “broken” society and secure the economic future.

The Prime Minister will attack the “prizes for all” culture in which competitiveness is frowned upon and winners are shunned.

In a significant speech, he will outline Coalition plans to ensure teaching is based on “excellence”, saying that controversial reforms are needed to “bring back the values of a good education”.

Failure to do so would be “fatal to prosperity”, he will say.

The comments mark the latest in a series of attempts to focus on education in response to the riots that shocked London and other English cities last month.

Actually, we could use less elitism on this side of the Atlantic, and more back to basics, common sense, values-based instruction.

Bob Iritano and the Politics of Health Care

An excellent set of letters to the editor yesterday, at Los Angeles Times, "On health insurers rationing care...." And the last one:

Please. Everyone who hasn't lived under a rock all their lives knows the bad stories about national health coverage.

We have a friend who lived in Britain for many years. It took her two years to get a hysterectomy that would have taken her two weeks at an HMO here — two days if her condition were life-threatening. The numbers don't coincide with your version of reality.

This death is a sad thing. But his extra year and a half of life was won by a successful struggle that he and his family could not have waged against the bureaucracy of, say, Britain's healthcare system.

Your argument is driven by political hope, not reality.

Joan Moon

Burbank

And the initial article to which readers were responding: "Putting a price on prolonging a doomed life."

Unseen Photographs Throw Light on First World War

At Independent UK, "Exclusive: The unseen photographs that throw new light on the First World War."

A treasure trove of First World War photographs was discovered recently in France. Published here for the first time, they show British soldiers on their way to the Somme. But who took them? And who were these Tommies marching off to die?

The slideshow display works pretty well. Scroll forward to picture #46 to see a black artillery soldier flanked by two white comrades. That's gotta be trippy for 1915.

Woman's Breast Implant Explodes After Being Hit By Paintball

I wonder if anyone got that on video.



At LAT, "Woman's breast implant explodes during paintball: New high-impact sports risk?":

Here's an unusual risk of playing paintball: A British woman's breast implant reportedly exploded after she was hit in the chest by a paintball, which can travel at 190 mph.



UK Paintball has now adjusted its policies accordingly. "We respectfully ask that any ladies with surgical breast implants notify our team at the time of booking," according to a statement on its website. "You will be given special information on the dangers of paintballing with enhanced boobs and asked to sign a disclaimer."



Just wait, it gets better: "You will also be issued with extra padding to protect your implants while paintballing," the statement says.



This, of course, happened within days of an FDA official reaffirming that silicone breast implants on the market were safe to use.



But then again, when they talk about the dangers of breast augmentation, paintball is not usually one that comes to mind.

The Desperation-of-Deprivation Myth

From Mark Steyn, at National Review, "The West has incentivized non-productivity on an industrial scale" (via Glenn Reynolds).



Just go read it all.

New Issues Emerge for News Corporation in Britain

At Wall Street Journal, "New Evidence Adds Pressure to News Corp."

And at Telegraph UK, "Phone hacking: 'orchestrated cover-up' of hacking at News of the World."

More at Mediagazer.

Pat Condell on the London Riots

Via Blazing Cat Fur:

The New Britannia

From Mark Steyn, at National Review:

The trick in this business is not to be right too early. A week ago I released my new book — the usual doom’n’gloom stuff — and, just as the sensible prudent moderate chaps were about to dismiss it as hysterical and alarmist, Standard & Poor’s went and downgraded the United States from its AAA rating for the first time in history. Obligingly enough they downgraded it to AA+, which happens to be the initials of my book: After America. Okay, there’s not a lot of “+” in that, but you can’t have everything.



But the news cycle moves on, and a day or two later, the news shows were filled with scenes of London ablaze, as gangs of feral youths trashed and looted their own neighborhoods. Several readers wrote to taunt me for not having anything to say on the London riots. As it happens, Chapter Five of my book is called “The New Britannia: The Depraved City.” You have to get up pretty early in the morning to beat me to Western civilization’s descent into barbarism. Anyone who’s read it will fully understand what’s happening on the streets of London. The downgrade and the riots are part of the same story: Big Government debauches not only a nation’s finances but its human capital, too.

Keep reading.



It's really astounding, the prophecy in that book. Don't miss it.

Anne Wilderspin, Sister of Murder Victim Richard Bowes: 'It is sad these rioters have not found a purpose in life'

Richard Mannington Bowes was murdered in Ealing as he confronted mob youths set to burn down the town.

Richard Bowes died from head injuries days after the attack in Ealing on Monday night.



He was pictured lying face down in a pool of blood after being assaulted while trying to stop youths setting fire to large rubbish bins across the green from the flat where he lived alone.



His sister said, "I feel sad that these rioters haven't found another purpose in life rather than just destructive violence."

Check the Independent UK as well, "Ealing reflects on the death of a 'shy, quiet, quirky-looking' man," and "Man arrested following Ealing riots death."



And since I've mentioned Irish commie Henry "erect cocks" Farrell, check the thread at Crooked Timber, where the commenters are fully down with the rioting hooligans: "London."

African Indigents with Massive Erect Cocks?

Hey, that's not me, sheesh!



It's freak Irish commie Henry Farrell, at Crooked Timber, '“The Duty of Journalists is to Tell The Truth”.'



Henry "erect cocks" is alleging that the Irish Independent's Kevin Myers is --- wait for it! --- racist. See, "Feral rioters all have one thing in common -- a lack of father figures." (It's a good piece, but no talking honestly with the left's "elite" opinion police.)



Anyway, I left a comment for Henry "erect cocks," which is probably not likely to make it out of the moderation queue, naturally:

Oh, bugger off, Henry. You’ll change your commie leftist beliefs about as fast as Michael Moore trims down to a slim 180 pounds American.



And “African indigents with massive erect cocks”?



Quite a racist flourish there yourself. Sure would look great in the pages of, say, Foreign Affairs, eh?

RELATED: Melanie Phillips has some updates, thank goodness.

Rioters to Be Stripped of State Benefits in Britain's Online Petition

At Telegraph UK, "UK riots: we will make criminals suffer, say MPs." Also, at Montreal Gazette, "Britons call for looters to lose benefits":

And at London's Daily Mail, "Rioter's family is first to be kicked out of their council house because of teenage son's 'looting'."

On the Road to Vegas for Beatles LOVE Cirque du Soleil

I imentioned it a week or so back. As this post goes live, I'm heading out the I-15 to catch up with my family at the MGM Grand Las Vegas. My oldest boy invited his (sorta) girlfriend along, so it's a big deal. A couple of weekends ago my wife and I went over to talk with (sorta) girlfriend's mom for a couple of hours. We shared stories and (sorta) girlfriend's mom laid down the line. She said she trusted her daughter. It was everybody else she was worried about. We assured her that we don't give our son too much free rein, that he's only allowed to walk across to the New York New York Hotel to ride the roller coaster there. All the hotels are connected by walkways so it's not like you're being accosted by a bunch of drunks or beggars down on the Strip. Anyway, girlfriend's mom loves my son so much permission for her daughter to go with us was a foregone conclusion.



The show's tomorrow night. I'll have regular blogging tonight, once I get set up in Vegas.



PREVIOUSLY: "The Beatles LOVE Cirque du Soleil." Plus, "'A Day in the Life'," and "Impressions: The Beatles LOVE Cirque du Soleil."

UK Riots: Young Yobs Back on Streets Despite David Cameron's Pledge

At Telegraph UK (via Theo Spark).

Prime Minister David Cameron Vows Crackdown on Rioters

Cameron wants to go after street thug anonymity, "Social Media, and Facemasks, Are Targets After British Riots." The full text of the prime minister's speech at BBC, "Riots: David Cameron's Commons statement in full."



Social media's not the problem. And amazingly, some folks are still debating the causes of the rioting, as if sheer hooliganism and evil needed further explanation. More at London's Daily Mail, "Unmask the thugs! Looters will no longer be able to cover up, says PM as he also promises a crackdown on social media AND cash for the rioters' victims."

'Descent Into Evil'

I had this at the blog-item finder, and now it's an essay at New York Post, from John Hinderaker:

What makes the present such a frightening time is that a number of nightmarish phenomena that we had thought consigned to the dustbin of history are reappearing. Rioters in the streets. Burning buildings. Plunging markets and the threat of depression. The scent of socialism in the air.



Who, as of, say, 1989, could have imagined that in barely 20 years, what was then known as the Free World could sink so far?



What we are seeing in London and other English cities is an outpouring of evil. To try to explain evil as the result of something else is almost always a mistake.

London Riots Make Front Page at Los Angeles Times

Yesterday's cover at the Los Angeles Times was a register of global social breakdown. At the left-hand side, "London Looks Inward, Lashes Out":

Facing a storm of criticism for remaining on vacation while his city burned, London Mayor Boris Johnson returned Tuesday to tour Clapham, a well-off south London neighborhood that was one of many stunned by three nights of hopscotching riots that left one man dead and littered the urban landscape with hundreds of damaged businesses and residences.



The shaggy-haired conservative was greeted by crowds of furious store owners asking where police were as their livelihoods were destroyed.



"I felt ashamed," he said after viewing the damage, "that people could feel such disdain for their neighborhoods."



Community leaders, sociologists, police and lawmakers were left groping for a meaning for the worst social unrest to hit London in a generation. The riots laid bare a phenomenon that has stirred deep unease in Britain in recent years: "yobbery," the anti-social behavior of a generation believed to be so alienated from the norms of civilized society that pockets of some cities live in fear.

Also at the paper, upper right, "Divided Fed Has Surprise for Markets." And then below that, "Angst on Main Street Threatens Recovery."



And at bottom is a story about long-shot GOP presidential candidate Fred Karger, "No Illusions, Just a Message for Gays":

Karger finally came out to his parents in 1991, after nursing a friend who died of AIDS. They accepted him, Karger says, but never seemed entirely comfortable. So he kept closeted, which was also better for business. Although he told his business partners — "it wasn't a surprise, and didn't change who or what he was," says one, Lee Stitzenberger — maintaining his secret kept Karger's sexuality from becoming a campaign issue.



When his parents died and he retired, Karger finally came out publicly. It was 2006 and he was 56 years old.



There was no grand announcement. He simply took a lead role in the unsuccessful campaign to save a Laguna Beach gay bar, the Boom Boom Room. Three years later, he founded Californians Against Hate to oppose Proposition 8, the measure banning same-sex marriage, and used his expertise to expose secret funding of the measure by the Mormon Church.



To some extent, his presidential campaign is an extension of that effort. By nudging Mitt Romney, the GOP front-runner and a prominent Mormon — preferably on stage, in front of a national TV audience — Karger would like to stop the church crusade against same-sex marriage. In his view, Romney could make that happen with a phone call.



Romney's feelings are unknown. His campaign declined to comment.

Karger might be a nice guy personally, but he's aligning himself with the progressive hate industry. And the Times is wrong on Mitt Romney. Romney recently "came out" and signed onto the pledge from the National Organization for Marriage to oppose gay marriage.



And last but not least, the one piece of front-page news that reflects the flip side of social decay, "Outlines of Downtown Stadium Deal Approved." There's a cool little graphic as well. We were just down there for X-Games and I was really impressed with the upbeat climate around Staples Center. That graphic looks like the stadium would be kinda crammed in there tight, although I'd have to spend more time downtown and get familiar with the area. The main thing though is that it would likely bring NFL football back to L.A., and needed jobs and civic vitality to go with it. That's the reverse of the social breakdown that seems to be breaking out everywhere these days.

'I don't call it a riot... I call it an insurrection of the masses of the people...'

When the riots first broke out I checked over at a couple of the anarchist "occupy everything" blogs and it seems like a lot of them are silent, apparently frustrated at the slow development of revolutionary consciousness. But one needn't look too hard to find deep sympathy for the hooligans (at Comment is Free, for example). Hard-left progressives see in the micreants' criminal thuggery some long needed blows against the capitalist state, even if those were mostly just some deviant losers robbing the shelves blind of goods for which they actually had enough money to purchase. It's not deprivation driving unrest, but hatred of conventional goodness, nurtured by decades of socialist progressivism, manifest in the left's deliberate breakdown of the common family structure, which has left generations of "yobbers" free to destroy property and the sense of sanity in society. Jawa Report posted this video, of Darcus Howe, in which he calls the unrest some kind of dialectical historical moment, "London's Thuggery, Murder, Neo-Marxist, Socialist, etc., etc. Mahem + USDayofRage."

Not surprisingly, BBC is now apologizing for suggesting that the bloke might have been involved. See Telegraph UK, "London riots: BBC apologises for accusing Darcus Howe."



We are witnesses the Mad Maxification of society in the early 21st century.