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Explainer: What’s Happening With the London riots?

From Tottenham to your terminal, the latest updates on anarchy in the UK.

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fastcompany:

Captain Wayne Porter of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps Colonel Mark Mykleby, who wrote the paper for the Woodrow Wilson Center, argue that the United States has its policies all wrong. America’s greatest national security threats aren’t terrorism or foreign armies—they are a crumbling infrastructure at home, the depletion of natural resources, climate change, and an overdependence on what they call “defense and protectionism.” Counterintuitively, this paper from special assistants to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen, argues that America’s best hopes for world leadership lies in classical left-wing tropes of conservation, soft power, and aggressive humanitarian work abroad.

Click through for their four biggest (and most controversial) suggestions on the best path to maintaining America’s global hegemony.

This is nothing short of revolutionary. Read it!

(And in case anyone gets confused: That’s not CAPT Porter or COL Mykleby. It’s an Aussie officer and a USAF cameraman. And a solar cell. Rock on, military solar cells.)

"The military operations are finished. In 48 hours everything will be over. Our forces are close to Benghazi. Whatever decision is taken, it will be too late."

— Gaddafi’s son Saif al-Islam, poured scorn on talks at the UN and elsewhere to impose a no-fly zone over Libya, predicting fall of rebel-held Benghazi ‘within 48 hours’ (via newsflick)

"Just how American bullets make their way into Bahraini guns, into weapons used by troops suppressing pro-democracy protesters, opens a wider window into the shadowy relationships between the Pentagon and a number of autocratic states in the Arab world."

— Nick Turse lays it all out in “America’s Bahrain Cop-Out.”

Plymouth Rock, N.H.; or, Why Michele Bachmann Won’t Be President.

Real Clear Politics:

“I’m thankful that you are the first in the nation state because you are the liberty state,” Bachmann said. “That is your charge. You keep that baton of liberty. You’ve done it very well for almost 20 generations from the time the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, and I’m sure the very first one came up to New Hampshire and said, ‘This is where I want to be.’”

Several school-aged children attended the event, which was held at the site of a planned private high school.

Bachmann sprinkled in remarks related to her concerns about the public education system with her calls for fiscal restraint.

“I don’t think that our public schools are necessarily the place where one fixed set of political beliefs should be imposed on students,” Bachmann said. “I think that knowledge, facts, and information should be on the table, and let students decide what their beliefs should be.”

Speaking of beliefs, Michele Bachmann, I believe that the Pilgrims did land at Plymouth Rock, and that Plymouth Rock isn’t on New Hampshire’s 18-mile coastline. But everyone’s entitled to their beliefs, right?

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pantslessprogressive:

Bahrain. March 13. [iShaf3i]

Updates on Bahrain:

774 people were injured and 107 were hospitalized on Friday during clashes in the town of Riffa. [CNN]

Three human rights activists received online death threats on Friday. Their photos were posted on Facebook, along with a request for them to be ‘killed and liquidated’. More on these threats at BBC. [The Canadian Press]

Demonstrators confronted police on the streets of Financial Harbor on Sunday. [Reuters]

More on the Financial Harbor clashes at NY Times, Guardian, Bloomberg and WSJ.

Multiple reports say police are firing tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters. [AJE; AFP; Washington Post]

A video shows a Bahrain protester getting hit with tear gas at point blank range. Another video shows use of tear gas and rubber bullets here. [AJE]

Secretarian strains continue Sunday as Shiite protesters and Sunni protesters clashed at Bahrain University. [LA Times]

On Saturday, the crown prince said Bahrain may hold a referendum if talks with opposition leaders produce an agreement. [Gulf Daily News]

Defense Secretary Robert Gates flew to Bahrain Saturday to meet with Bahraini leaders. Gates said leaders are serious about reform. [Voice of America]

In a statement released today, the White House urges the Bahrain government to ‘pursue a peaceful and meaningful dialogue with the opposition rather than resorting to the use of force.’ [Ha’aretz]

(Source: pantslessprogressive)

MJ’s friend, video journalist David Botti, is crushing it for the New York Times in Libya. Today, he offered an intimate portrait of Omar al-Sigury, a recently married Benghazi construction worker who is joining the rebels’ front lines. When asked if the rebels are well-equipped to fight Qaddafi, al-Sigury — one of seven siblings — answers:

No. We have nothing. We have faith. We have trust in God that we’ll get victory. We’re going but we don’t even know if we’ll come back.

Watch, then pass it on. And to catch up on Libya’s latest, read “What’s Happening in Libya Explained.”

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Um. Okay. That wouldn’t have been the story angle we picked. #SighMSM

“Cameras Capture Qaddafi Bombing Libyans”

Once again, Anderson Cooper seems to be the only MSM anchor not obsessing over Charlie Sheen and the opening-bell price of crude oil.

What’s Happening in Libya Explained (AND UPDATED)

Last week, Libyan dissident Najla Aburrahman begged western media to pay attention to the bloodbath unfolding in her country. “If the Libyan protesters are ignored,” she wrote, “the fear is that [Libyan dictator Muammar] Qaddafi— a man who appears to care little what the rest of the world thinks of him—will be able to seal the country off from foreign observers, and ruthlessly crush any uprising before it even has a chance to begin.”

Says MJ’s friend Anup Kaphle: “Gaddafi spoke this morning, said he is like the Queen of England, and the internet obliged.”

(Via NY Mag)

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Trending: #ReasonsMubarakIsLate

Love this. An eight-year-old girl in Saudi Arabia breaks it down for Mubarak. “Your police are taking off their jackets and joining the people.”