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So where WERE the police? Shopkeepers mystified at tactics that left them defenceless
Mail Online ^ | August 9,2011

Posted on 08/09/2011 1:46:54 PM PDT by Hojczyk

Officers accused of inaction as looting mobs go wild Cameron leads calls for more robust policing Top Yard commander: 'We need to do more for London' All able-bodied officers and special constables called in Plastic bullets would be used for first time 'if deemed necessary'

Shopkeepers joined an increasing chorus of voices today demanding to know what the police were doing as swathes of London descended into chaos last night.

Business owners accused police of adopting a softly-softly approach which left their shops and businesses vulnerable to attack by baying mobs.

While police were criticised in some quarters for being far too slow to get to riot scenes, officers were accused by shopkeepers in Hackney of standing just yards away from looters as windows were smashed and armfuls of goods were scooped up.

Cypran Asota, who has run the Boots opticians for 25 years, told the London Evening Standard how he watched as the shop was destroyed.

More...

Surrender! Powerless police let the mob seize the streets, looting shops and starting fires in their wake

London burns at hands of the mob as the PM finally flies home: Gangs armed with petrol bombs and poles on THIRD night of riots and cynical looting

Centuries of business up in flames: The family-run furniture shop razed to the ground by rioters' fire

We ran for our lives as thugs ambushed bus: Chaos across the capital as orgy of violence rages on

London-born Ferdinand calls for Army to patrol riot-torn streets of the capital

(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Crime/Corruption; Front Page News; Government; News/Current Events; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: gunban; gunfreezone
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To: ScreamingFist
They were in sensitivity training class . Taught by Sir Edmund Pantybottem when the activity broke out.
41 posted on 08/09/2011 2:37:41 PM PDT by fantom (,)
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To: abb

Wouldn’t that be great with the word ‘Again” handwritten after the sentence, “Send a Gun To Defend a British Home.”

And repeated after the sentence, “British civilians, faced with the threat of invasion, desperately need arms for the defense of their homes” - again.

And somewhere near the bottom - “just once more, this time will get it right (maybe)”.


42 posted on 08/09/2011 2:38:00 PM PDT by I cannot think of a name
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To: Da Coyote

And you are surprised? Both France and the UK have let an unbridled flow of Muzzie “immigrants” come in from their former “colonies.” The idea that the Brits would even allow the Muzzies to talk about “sharia law zones” tells you that they too have the wrong people running their government. At least here there are millions of guns in the hands of the citizens so the individual has something with which to fight back. The Europeans, “disarmed” as they are, are sitting ducks for these Islamic killers.


43 posted on 08/09/2011 2:38:20 PM PDT by vette6387 (Enough Already!)
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To: I cannot think of a name

44 posted on 08/09/2011 2:38:57 PM PDT by null and void (Day 929. When your only tools are a Hammer & Sickle, everything looks like a Capitalist...)
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To: Hojczyk
They are going to pass these out to the bobbies.

Man, I appreciate the 2nd Amendment.

45 posted on 08/09/2011 2:39:24 PM PDT by Yaelle
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To: Hojczyk
I don't know what the shopkeepers are complaining about. The police denounced the rioters in the strongest terms!

I saw one police officer nearly lost his composure during a press briefing and called the behavior "unacceptable".

46 posted on 08/09/2011 2:39:34 PM PDT by Never on my watch (WTF happened to my country?)
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To: gaijin

According to PC world, baseball bats have taken a jump in sales at Amazon UK.


47 posted on 08/09/2011 2:44:01 PM PDT by Jonty30
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To: Hojczyk

they need Sergeant Angel.

48 posted on 08/09/2011 2:44:25 PM PDT by BookmanTheJanitor
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To: null and void

IIRC. The Brits took those beautiful weapons, sent by families in the US, for home defense of the UK.....and destroyed them after the war......


49 posted on 08/09/2011 2:44:41 PM PDT by ScreamingFist (Quiet the Idiot)
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To: Hojczyk

Send in the Miami (FL) police department, they know how to shut down riots.


50 posted on 08/09/2011 2:45:44 PM PDT by Paradox (Obnoxious, Bumbling, Absurd, Maladroit, Assinine)
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To: BookmanTheJanitor

Where were the police?....

One huge thing Free Rebublic has taught me well about is when the stuff hits the fan you better be prepared to defend yourself.

Most know when you call police a crime can be in play and done long before they get there....that’s just a fact. We’ve seen these kids doing group crime across the USA as well....and the police arrive after the fact. The kids do hit and runs because it works.

The store owners finally got it and armed themsleves and stood together to protect their businesses.....even Cameron called people to stand against this.


51 posted on 08/09/2011 2:48:58 PM PDT by caww
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To: Hojczyk

What were they doing? Why, choking their chickens, to the tune of “Rule Britannia.”


52 posted on 08/09/2011 2:54:53 PM PDT by Mr Ramsbotham (Laws against sodomy are honored in the breech.)
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To: Hojczyk
Don't those ungrateful and gormless gits over there in Blighty realize that their police are too busy with speed camera management and maintenance to keep the real criminals, motorists who speed, in order?

I have never seen a more feckless police force than what pretends to be one in the UK.

53 posted on 08/09/2011 3:00:56 PM PDT by Lovely-Day-For-A-Guinness (Eenie meanie, chili beanie, the spirits are about to speak....)
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To: Hojczyk
How about an ARMED CITIZENRY?!
54 posted on 08/09/2011 3:05:02 PM PDT by Recovering_Democrat
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To: vette6387

I wonder if any of the Sharia no go zones were bombed, Yeah, didn’t think so....


55 posted on 08/09/2011 3:12:55 PM PDT by Engedi
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To: Hojczyk

“plastic bullets” I think the problem is obvious.


56 posted on 08/09/2011 3:22:06 PM PDT by exnavy (May the Lord bless and keep our troops.)
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To: savagesusie
In 1900 Englishmen had an almost unrestricted right to own any sort of firearm. Shoulder and hand weapons could be freely shipped through the mails. A strong common law castle doctrine existed and the right to use any necessary force in self defense was lso a common law concept.

This happy state of affairs was undermined by the social turmoil of the Edwardian era. Early in that monarch's reign a large violent strike paralyzed the Port of London and this began to focus the ruling classes fear of continental style class warfare coming to the UK. The constant and often violent strikes in the coal, cartage, and engineering sectors made rich Liberals and Conservatives alike fear the potential for armed mob action. This fear was aggravated by the so called Siege of Sidney Street where the Home Secretary Winston Churchill used regular army personnel for the first time in decades to confront a band of armed protocommunists who had killed police officers. Churchill was embarrassed by the blowback from Sidney Street introduced the first significant gun licensing and restrictive legislation.

After World War One with the specter of real armed revolt by communists haunting the UK and with armed riot and revolt the daily news from the continent and the terrifying example of the Russian Revolution and Civil War was fresh in everyone’s mind more gun control became the order of the day. After the General Strike of 1926 detailed registration laws were passed and ownership of hand guns tightly controlled.

In the 70’s and 80’s Tory and Labor were happy to strip gun owners of residual rights and after a mass shooting at a school in Scotland pistol ownership was forbidden and truly impossible restrictions on long gun ownership were put in place. Again this was a ruling lass issue. Lady Thatcher was no friend of gun rights and was always quite vocally contemptuous of the ‘American gun culture’. The same ruling lass types both Conservative and Labor have moved on from stripping the right of gun ownership to eliminating both the castle octanes and the right to pro active self defense.

The lesson for the US is that rights such to bear arms, castle doctrines and defense of person and property have to be written into law and constantly defended from erosion by governing elites for any purportedly
socially beneficial purpose.

The British seem thoroughly brain washed by a century of government action that self defense and owning and being comfortable with the willingness to use deadlyforce to defend home and person are impermissible doctrines. I will always remember the absolute contempt for ‘Americans and thier guns’ that one upper class older British woman spat out at me in a conversation. This woman was very much a Tory but could not grasp the need for any decent person to be able to really think of killing another ‘human being’ for any reason. That is what the police and those rough characters in the armed force's are for.

With the Muslims and the black underclass flexing their muscles these sniffy sanctimonious attitudes are going to collide with reality.

57 posted on 08/09/2011 3:26:44 PM PDT by robowombat
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To: Recovering_Democrat

I bet a lot of Londoners are thinking that an AR-15 might come in handy about now.


58 posted on 08/09/2011 3:28:09 PM PDT by gusty
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To: NikkiB

Does he have bullets and can he use it?????


59 posted on 08/09/2011 3:28:14 PM PDT by savagesusie (Virtue is a habit of the mind, consistent with nature and moderation and reason. Cicero)
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To: I cannot think of a name

60 posted on 08/09/2011 3:33:50 PM PDT by Teacher317 (really?)
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