Manchester and Liverpool in the northwest and Birmingham in central England suffered the worst of the overnight violence, which broke out in north London on Saturday after a protest over a police shooting of a suspect two days earlier.
In Birmingham, police launched a murder inquiry after three Muslim men died after being run over by a car in the mayhem there. A friend of the men told BBC radio they had been part of a group of British Asians protecting their area from looters after attending Ramadan prayers at a mosque.
"The car swerved toward them. It was cold-blooded murder," the friend said.
London itself was largely quiet, with some 16,000 police -- 10,000 more than on Monday -- sent onto the streets in a show of force in districts where gangs of hooded youths had looted shops and burned cars and buildings on the previous three nights.
And while it is maddening that Ahmadinejad is trying to equate the riots in Britain with protests against actual dictatorships, we too must remember not to act like dictatorships.
And yes, it is maddening to see people rioting who obviously have more consumer goods than I possess (and maddening to hear the excuses that the left is providing the rioters).
But looting a department store is not a death-penalty crime. The idea that police should shoot into crowds of rioters just because they aren't protesting a dictatorship is madness. However repulsive this behavior is, deadly force should only be used to protect lives and not property (unless we're talking very sensitive property, of course). That's what I was taught about riot control when I was in the National Guard. Our job was to clear the streets and not to impose a death penalty on rioters who are, after all, fellow citizens however badly they are behaving. Leave the shooting of people on the streets to actual thugs.
By all means, tear gas the little darlings. It is quite possible that the police have been too restrained in countering the rioters with less-than-lethal means. Water cannons with riot control agent laced in the water are fine, too. Paint gun some of the rioters for later identification and arrest. If some rioters get hit with a baton when they don't run from an advancing line of police, I won't care.
And by all means, change the laws so law abiding people can defend their property without fear of being prosecuted for hurting one of the rampaging "youths." And maybe rethink the policy of subsidizing layabouts who have the time to get violently upset if their state payments are cut.
But we are better than the thug rulers who kill protesters and the rioters who destroy what they can't build. I won't condemn the British for their failure to use live ammunition on the rioters. I'll commend them for their restraint.
UPDATE: Mad Minerva has thoughts and links.
UPDATE: It is probably right that this isn't "rioting." This is looting, pure and simple. The barbarians are sacking the cities.
