To Quickly Recap the Riots

Haven't said much about the riots in France because

a) there is a major media blackout going down over there (the negative PR was too much for officialdom's refined sensibilities), and

b) been busy.

Perhaps the violence has cooled a bit, a good thing. We don't want Europe to fall apart, not that the Islamic jihadis are going to care what we want. The word is that about 100 vehicles per night are being torched, which is back to the pre-riot level. Charming.

And Johnny Depp says he may be coming home to America. France is not the peaceful land he envisioned. Don't know if he deserves that slap of reality, but he'll deal with it.

Some French politicians speculate that polygamy played a role in the riots. Too many kids, they say, because of too many wives. (Not enough father figure to go around?) Whatever. Do Islamic fundamentalists still encourage harems? Google didn't seem to know. (We thought Google knew everything.)

Finally, the total car torchings for the 17 nights of the rioting came to about 9,000, French officials say.

At $10,000 (dammit, we said dollars, not euros) that's about $90 million. Even if those cars were worth only half that amount, it's still $45 million in just over two weeks, not counting a couple of schools, a courthouse, a big factory, a subway station, and the cost of cleaning an electrical substation.

Costly tantrum.