Paris still burning

This has gone on for so long now that I've lost count.  I think this is day 10.

Here is a pretty good summary of the story so far, from MSNBC/Newsweek.

Thousands of cars have been burned, hundreds of rioters have been arrested, says Yahoo News.  The same story also reports that police found "a stockpile of crowbars, petrol bombs, and iron bars," and that rioters are known by police to "have been seen using mobile telephones to relay police movements and Internet blogs to urge unrest elsewhere" -- meaning that these "riots" have been well-coordinated, probably from the beginning.

And the Washington Times is reporting that rioters have access to guns, grenades, and other non-improvised weapons.  Apparently these weapons have been smuggled into the country and have been stockpiled for some time.  The rioters, as noted above, are being directed by experienced criminals and anarchists via cell phones.

Perhaps it's time to review, once again, what got the French into this trouble:

• A socialist economy whose heavy taxation and regulations has put average unemployment around 10% to 12%

• Unrestricted immigration of Arab and African Muslims; unemployment among these immigrants averages 20% to 30%, with unemployment among young males peaking at 60%

• Segregation of the immigrants into Soviet-style high-rise tenement slums, resulting in cultural isolation.  Immigrants do not speak French or interact with French people.  Young males are educated but unemployed.  They are shiftless and have often turned to petty crime and sporadic violence in the recent past.

• Cultural isolation, combined with ( -- and please, let's be honest, OK? -- ) racism, bigotry, and intolerance carried forth from third-world cultures and fundamentalist Islam, has created a dangerous "us vs. them" attitude among these shiftless young male immigrants.  They are now tools that can be used for evil either by French criminals and anarchists, or by jihadist Muslim leaders.

It was Jesus Christ himself who reminded us that "man does not live on bread alone." One of the most dangerous ideas to precipitate from the rise of European socialism is the notion that a person who receives a housing allowance, health care vouchers, food stamps, and a meager sustenance benefit is "well cared for" by the state.  That is probably all the state itself can do, but such subsistence living leaves a huge hole in the soul of the individual.  It destroys the sense of purpose and self-worth that distinguishes the successful, working man from the man who sits on the street corner and waits for a handout.  (There is much more on this timely idea at Sissy Willis' blog.  Read it.)

The French economic and social policies have forced hundreds of thousands of Muslim immigrants into this situation.  It goes without saying that the young immigrants have found at least a temporary sense of meaning in burning down symbols of the poorly-understood establishment that not only perpetuates their squalid existence, but is, in the words of their religious teachers, the incarnation of Satan himself.

I have noticed scant coverage of these events on left-wing blogs. To understand why is not difficult.  Bush-bashing is such an ingrained belief among the howling left that they have plunged head-first into the idea that "the enemy of the enemy is your friend," and in doing so they have raised both Islamists and the French to new heights as allies and role models.  The riots show, however, that the traditional French solution -- bury your head in the sand, hand out money, and hope that the problem goes away -- isn't working very well right now.

[Update: Michelle Malkin points to this Bloomberg story - "In a bid to help cool tensions, de Villepin proposed boosting spending on training and education programs in poor neighborhoods..."  *sigh*]

No one on the Left wants to admit that rioting Muslim youths armed with Molotov cocktails and semi-automatic rifles are a real threat, because, well, that would almost make the policies of the Bush administration seem *gasp* correct.  And none of them wants to admit that waiting for the bad guys to turn good is a flawed and dangerous strategy because, again, it might vindicate the rationale behind the War on Terror.  Remember how sour-faced liberals were after the January elections in Iraq?  They're not going to let that happen again.  It is easier to pretend that reality doesn't exist, or to talk about Comrade Mama Moonbat whooping it up with the Revolutionary Communist Party in San Francisco.

So what is France, a small though consequential Satan in the eyes of radical Islamic jihadists, going to do?  They are putting out fires and arresting people, in between dodging gunshots, but their work seems to be largely in vain.  Morale among police is now very low.  It also seems very likely that officials have known about the existence of the immigrant gangs, stockpiles of weapons and drugs, and a flourishing underground criminal empire in Paris for some time now.  They did nothing about it, presumably because, well, you know, no one was really getting hurt and if the police actually raided one of these facilities the criminals would get really mad and goodness knows what they would do then!

Aaah, the French.

Of course the worst thing that could happen is a surrender by the French, in which they effectively relinquish all French government control of certain neighborhoods in exchange for "peace."  Street gangs, drug dealers, petty criminals, and jihadists will then set up shop in those neighborhoods.  The criminals and jihadists will get along for a while, but sooner or later the jihadists will claim total control over the neighborhoods, including their commerce, and they will go to war with the criminals.

Interestingly, that would be another chance for the French to (regrettably) assault their own capitol city, take control, kill, expel, or permanently imprison the troublemakers, and put an end to la petit andalusia.  But if you surrender once, it becomes too easy to just keep on surrendering.

If I sound pessimistic about this situation, I am.  I may disagree with a lot that George W. Bush has done, but I thank God every day that at least he has the fortitude to recognize evil, call it by name, and stand up to it.  And I thank God that brave men and women are willing to give their lives in order to try to stamp it out.  As cliche as it sounds, I'm proud to be an American.

(Previous Paris riot posts here and here.)

Rush Limbaugh today:

Anyway, 1,400, 5,000, we need to start a car fire count just like the media does a body count of American soldiers in Iraq. We need to get gleeful when we get to 1,500 cars, then start counting up to 2,000. If it's 5,000 we get gleeful when it gets up to 5,100, whatever it is. Because I'll tell you what's happening over there. This is not just the burning of Paris and the burning of France, but I will guarantee you, even if these are just ruffled French ruffians, youth, if you will, I guarantee you that there are jihadists all over Europe watching the reaction to this, gauging it, and making plans based on how much easier they think it might be to get away with this kind of thing in certain countries.

Gateway Pundit reports:

A typical reaction from Reader Sensible Mom:

"I wonder how the French, who are very critical of Israel's use of force in its territories, will decide to handle a problem in their own "occupied territories." Will they be hypocrites and use force or will they cede their land to the "oppressed?" And if the French use force, how soon until suicide bombers start blowing themselves up in Paris to gain control of the land? If the French use force will other European countries criticize them as they did the Israelis or will they rally around the French hoping it will help quell any chance of violence in their own countries?

As elitists it was so easy for the Europeans to criticize the Israelis when the violence was far away, but now it's in their own backyard. Either they'll be hypocrites or cowards.

And check out this story from the AP, which sounds like it could have been written by a reporter interviewing teens in downtown Detroit or east Philly:

Theirs is a drab life of days spent smoking hashish, hanging out on street corners. They fidget and talk big. The only things they have in abundance are time and rancor. Ask what their dreams are, the response is blank stares.

... "You wear these clothes, with this color skin and you're automatically a target for police," said Ahmed, 18, pointing to his mates in Izod polo shirts, Nike sneakers and San Antonio Spurs T-shirts.

I believe it was the great philosopher Eric Hoffer who (correctly) observed that the ranks of the Nazis and Bolsheviks and Maoists did not swell with the poorest of the poor; instead it was the educated though jobless sons of middle class citizens, those who did not have to labor each day just to eat.  The youth living in the run-down public housing surrounding Paris are not "middle class," but the government provides them with a roof over their heads, food on the table, and a little money in their pockets.  And they have plenty of time on their hands.  What is the old cliche?  An idle mind is the devil's playground.  Or in this case, a jihadist's.

It appears that the only thing missing from this scene is Jesse Jackson trying to shake down the French government for "racial profiling."  We'll see how long it takes for that (or something like it) to happen.

Answer: not very long --

Iran’s Association of Muslim Journalists (AMJ) issued a statement on Sunday condemning the violation of Muslims’ civil rights in France and calling on the French government to cooperate with them in establishing a fact-finding commission in order to investigate the conditions of French Muslims. The AMJ said that the mistreatment of Black French Muslims over the past two weeks has deeply influenced Iranian public opinion.