Here's a phrase you never, ever want to hear from the person in charge of a country, in this case Egypt's interim prime minister Essam Sharaf, appointed by the governing military council: "The only beneficiary of these events and acts of violence are the enemies of the January revolution and the enemies of the Egyptian people, both Muslim and Christian." READ MORE

We'll learn more this morning but apparently the case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn is to be dropped. According to the New York Post, this is because his accuser has had... "questionable personal relationships"? (Uh, me too?) And was a "liar." According to the Times, "One law enforcement official involved in the investigation said no single problematic detail about Ms. Diallo’s background, or even all of them put together, had undermined the prosecution’s faith in its ability to present a viable case"—but that the department felt they couldn't put her forward as a viable witness. If the motion the DA's office files today resembles this patchwork of weird character/witness issues—and it should contain something more substantial than all this—then I'm not really sure what the point in having a DA is? What a mess: this freakshow was mismanaged by all parties, except apparently the people whose full-time job it was to leak things to the press. Those people should get a raise!

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We may be recalling the Los Angeles riots of 1992 but others are looking further back. Picture it: 387 AD. "In response to an unwanted tax imposed by the Emperor Theodosius, a mob of citizens and local officials of Antioch tore down painted wooden panels and bronze statues of the imperial family and dragged the loot through the streets. After setting fire to a house and attempting to ignite more buildings, the riot was finally quelled by law enforcement." Hey, let's not forget Constantinople in 388! And then in 532! The Nika Riots were half soccer hooligans at work, a quarter anti-tax zealots and a quarter paid agitators, basically. Only 30,000 people were killed! And then nobody got to have nice things (chariot races mostly) for a long time. Mm hmm. READ MORE

Today, London is tearing itself apart again—in Parliament, where they are talking, essentially, about how to reconfigure society. Prime Minister David Cameron would like, among other things, the ability to assess whether the state has the "right to stop people communicating via these websites and services." You know: by using, like, PHONES and stuff. Meanwhile, a man has been charged with "riot incitement" for his Facebook messages. My favorite bit of his speech: "Cameron said he would encourage people to shop their neighbours if they have mysteriously acquired a new plasma TV screen." (Yes: "shop" is "English" for "narc.")

And yes, why not, Newt Gingrich? Giuliani Partners already had a $4.3 million contract with Mexico City and another with Citgo Petroleum, AKA Hugo Chavez's oil company. (And see also: New York City, 1998, as Giuliani began bleeding millions in settlements for victims of his law and order.) So you know he knows the ins and outs of helping to form a restrictive state.

Chancellor George Osborne, once he found out that PM David Cameron left Tuscany just a few days after North London was overtaken by riots, "immediately" left California to go back and watch London and Manchester burn. (And observe its Diesel stores get their windows broken.) When will anyone ever get a long foreign holiday??? Not as long as angry jobless yobbos exist. READ MORE

After Mark Duggan was shot by police in North London, in Tottenham, four days ago, the family conducted a peaceful vigil and march to the police station (as one does in black communities around the world; standard practice in Oakland, East New York, etc.). There were discrepancies in the account of Duggan's death, as usual. (Police said he'd shot an officer; instead, as usual, an officer apparently shot an officer.) Family and friends waited outside the police station for hours and were ignored. Later that night, a different kind of demonstration emerged, and 26 police were injured in what ensued. Over the weekend, riots and mini-riots "broke out" from Tottenham to Brixton all the way down to Oxford Circus. "Most of the looters were young teenagers, many of them girls," says the Telegraph—interesting: how many looters were there? How many of them were girls?—and here it's helpful to note that Tottenham has the highest unemployment rate in London. Local businesses were trashed; in pictures, demonstrators seem nearly all young and of all races. Like many episodes of unrest, this is a fairly inarticulate class uprising, with a few goons and a lot of people without jobs who are pissed off about the police shooting people. And the further you get from London, it seems, the more the riots are treated as some act of chav hooliganry; it's paragraph 13 in the Times where Tottenham is described as a place where "a large Afro-Caribbean population has felt singled out by the police for abuse"—and Mark Duggan's name doesn't make an appearance until paragraph 15. Unfortunately, we don't get many good accounts of what's really happening, or why people are furious enough to put themselves in harm's way, at least in part because most members of the media didn't feel safe reporting from the area, and as well a few were attacked. (Photo by Tom Kay.)

An excellent point: "The photos of the Vancouver riots look like Cardiff on a Saturday night." It's true! This fantastic collection of photos and video from Vancouver last night—you see, Boston won the Stanley Cup? Which is the big prize in hockey, don't you know?—does bear a striking resemblance to any ordinary night of the glassing capital of the world over in Wales. And here is our favorite video from Vancouver. READ MORE

Maybe the kids are alright! "A crowd of more than 500 demonstrators rushed Covel Commons on Wednesday to protest a proposed 32 percent student fee increase."