Bird’s Eye: Al Jazeera nails it, in this quote. “A young man in Tottenham was asked if rioting really achieved anything:

‘Yes,’ he said,’You wouldn’t be talking to me now if we didn’t riot, would you? Two months ago we marched to Scotland Yard, more than 2,000 of us, all blacks, and it was peaceful and calm and you know what? Not a word in the press. Last night, a bit of rioting and looting and look around you.’ The riots left a blot on England, and like a Rorschach test, people interpreted that blot differently. The Telegraph called for a “moral reformation”; Tony Blair denied it was needed. Cameron said poverty wasn’t a factor; the Guardian’s Datablog proves it was. (Thanks, Dave!) And here are some people with longer overviews.

* Daylight Robbery, Meet Nighttime Robbery Naomi Klein The Nation

England is not Latin America, and its riots are not political, or so we keep hearing. They are just about lawless kids taking advantage of a situation to take what isn’t theirs. And British society, Cameron tells us, abhors that kind of behavior. This is said in all seriousness. As if the massive bank bailouts never happened, followed by the defiant record bonuses. Followed by the emergency G-8 and G-20 meetings, when the leaders decided, collectively, not to do anything to punish the bankers for any of this, nor to do anything serious to prevent a similar crisis from happening again….

This is the global Saqueo, a time of great taking. Fuelled by a pathological sense of entitlement, this looting has all been done with the lights left on, as if there was nothing at all to hide. There are some nagging fears, however. In early July, the Wall Street Journal, citing a new poll, reported that 94 percent of millionaires were afraid of “violence in the streets.” This, it turns out, was a reasonable fear.

Of course London’s riots weren’t a political protest. But the people committing nighttime robbery sure as hell know that their elites have been committing daytime robbery. Saqueos are contagious.

* UK Riots Were Product Of Consumerism The Guardian

The recent riots in London and other big cities were the product of an “out-of-control consumerist ethos” which will have profound impacts for the UK economy, a leading City broker has said. The report … warns: “We conclude that the rioting reflects a deeply flawed economic and social ethos… recklessly borrowed consumption, the breakdown both of top-end accountability and of trust in institutions, and severe failings by governments over more than two decades.” A typical internet user sees a hundred adverts an hour, the report says, and the underlying message many receive is: “Here’s the ideal. You can’t have it.”

* Rioters on Wall Street! Sherry Wolf Sherrytalksback

As I write these words, out-of-control hordes are swarming throughout downtown Manhattan. Their disregard for human decency, for the sanctity of people’s homes, jobs, property and health is beyond anything seen since the Dark Ages. These men and women, almost all of them white and disturbingly antiseptic …  tap away ceaselessly at handheld digital devices, even as they walk the streets. I’m told each tap can lead to hundreds, even thousands of jobs destroyed. With a phone call or text, this marauding band of rioters can foreclose on a person’s house, pillage the 401-K of any nurse or teacher and even transfer whole industries from one country to another leaving entire communities devastated.

* How The Next 20 Odd Years Will Play Out Ian Welsh

Ok, let’s get down to brass tacks.  The riots in Britain are an important event, and combined with the decision to double down on austerity they tell us a lot.  This is my baseline, loose model for the next generation.

The decision has been made by Cameron and society in general that the way to respond to the riots is to crack down, hard.  They are sentencing people to long sentences for minor crimes (a year for stealing a bottle of water) and they are extending the punishment to families, kicking people out of housing if a member of their family was arrested.  They are discussing cutting people off from social networks … Likewise the increase in punitive sentences is a mistake, pure and simple, because it means people have less to lose.  If a relatively minor crime gets you in for years, and destroys your life, many will make the calculation that they might as well fight, might as well use violent force, rather than be taken.