As rioting, looting, and torching of buildings spread from London to Liverpool and other British cities, Prime Minister David Cameron cut short an Italian vacation to take charge of the "terrifying" situation. The damage is already in the tens of millions of dollars, and one person has died from gunshot wounds. The riots started in the poor, minority-heavy London neighborhood of Tottenham on Saturday, after peaceful protests against the Aug. 6 police slaying of 29-year-old Mark Duggan, who is black, turned violent. Cameron recalled Parliament to session and ordered 16,000 police to the streets of London. Can he stanch Britain's worst rioting in decades?
Cameron needs to step up the use of force: If Cameron and London Mayor Boris Johnson want to stop this deplorable rampage of "brutal thugs," says Niles Gardiner in Britain's Telegraph, they need to treat it like the crime spree it is. That means backing the police to the hilt and giving them every resource available to "hunt down these violent hoodlums," lock them away, and "make an immediate example of them" by punishing them to the fullest extent of the law.
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