Oh my goodness! What an Irony indeed.

Yes.... thanks... it IS the heart of it... future.. where... for whom???

See also http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11312300

+Thomas Morffew Oh yes; now one by one things surface.

I don't think this has anything to do with austerity, this is just opportunistic criminals

+Eugene Niemand It's certainly opportunistic. But there was a powder keg there waiting for a spark.

Certainly it's just opportunistic criminals Eugene, and the fact that there's so many opportunistic criminals has to do with austerity.

+Max Lansman I'm sorry but I dont agree, this is a cultural problem where these youngsters(yobs) have not been raised to work/earn what they want. It has always been handed to them on a platter and they also know that the police is polite enough to let them of with a caution should they be nicked. The only thing austerity is affecting is the number of police officers available to deal with the rioters.

I agree with +Eugene Niemand tone. To have an effective society one must first be personally responsible, then responsible for your family, then your extended family and finally community. All religions teach some form of self-responsibility, and its part of the basic social contract. We seemed to have a growing population of people who expect others to help and provide for them (we are devolving into makers & takers). It is not the gov't (meaning others) job to figure out how to make your way in the world - that's each individuals responsibility. It's also what makes the world a positive, energetic, creative place when individuals determine and make their own way - that creates and expands diversity. We don't need ever growing welfare states where we increase dependency on the gov't or others and are told what to do and given our roles in society- rather I'd prefer to see gov'ts simply be the referee and make sure the playing field is fair and agreed to rules of a civil society are followed. In my mind its asking more than enough of gov't institutions to just do no harm, asking them to actually be responsible for people and provide for the general welfare is not only outside their capability but morally & civilly wrong - one should not rule or control another be it one on one or through gov't.

This seems to me to be a terribly simplistic view. I'll happily argue for less government along with you, but in the next breath I'll be arguing for universal health care and universal education for the good of society as a whole. And if it's not provided by rich people and institutions out of long term self interest, it'll have to be provided by governments taking money by force out of those rich pockets and then providing it. And I'm right back to arguing in favour of more government.

There's a middle ground of basically capitalist but social democratic policy that Europe has been trying to follow since the last war. By and large it's worked pretty well. It's breaking down now for several reasons now not all to do with things internal to Europe. Tossing all that away and arguing for a fairly extreme US-style, right wing, libertarian, individualistic approach feels like a recipe for even more extreme divisions in society and ultimately a worse situation.

It's not surprising if Americans get upset about the rest of the world trying to tell them how to run their country. So don't be surprised if Europeans get upset when you do it back. Right now we don't feel like you're doing too well at it either so don't feel we have to pay much attention to your advice.