Free Republic

And so . . . 16-year-old Thomas Perotto was stabbed in the heart and the throat, and died Young French farmers from the villages of Saint-Marcellin and Pont-en-Royans organized a “farmers’ ball” on Saturday evening, May 24, held at the Murinais ballroom. It was to have been a night of innocent fun. They had not counted on Muslim immigrants from Saint-Marcellin showing up with mayhem on their minds. Six Muslims came to the hall, and waited outside. When two farmers left the ball, the Muslims attacked them and. began to beat them up. At that point, other farmers streamed out...

"All hell will break loose," said the voice on the radio. It was a call-in show - on a topic that is on many minds here these days: the fate of a 94-year-old man lying in a hospital bed in Pretoria, and the fate of South Africa once he is gone. For years people here have been understandably reluctant to discuss the death of Nelson Mandela - out of a profound respect for the man who, more than any other, steered this country from apartheid to democracy. But the passage of time, and the health scares of recent months -...