France Burns ... With Irony

It took 12 nights of destruction for the French to finally declare that something of an emergency was afoot in their otherwise flawless country, and that curfews just might be a good idea. But that's not the most remarkable thing about this story.

For authority to declare a curfew, the French turned to a 50-year-old law, passed to quell riots in their then-colony of Algeria. Now the grandchildren of those Algerian rioters are rioting in France. It's the rotteness of colonialism coming home to roost, as the French are faced with the reality that they've treated their at-home Muslim/Africans no better than they treated their over-there Muslim/Africans.

Promises of a payoff to quell the violence won't turn back 50 years of hypocrisy. Pomposity has its price.