The lads of Leeds

Does it really surprise anyone that the bombers of London's transport system came from the West Yorkshire city of Leeds? Of course, surprise, when expressed, creates a space for rhetorical flourishes from the floor of parliament to fill. When the bombs went off, the eyes immediately scanned the horizon, towards Baghdad, Kabul, East London...locations that aren't a part of London or Britain, at a safe distance to pin a bit of blame to.

But it's like the bombers came from Michigan. The perpetrators of 9/11 were interlopers with fake passports and funny accents who moved about our Western world as foreigners. It allowed our blame to remain fixed far from here. But the boys who bombed London were Leeds lads, and who knows what the hell the country will find when it begins to plumb the depths of meaning in that. Shehzad Tanweer, Hasib Hussain, and Mohammad Sidique Khan, were born and bred in Britain, won trophies for sports, had parents who owned chip shops, worked with disabled children, called places like Beeston and Dewsbury home. They were rather unremarkable. They came from within.

I used to live in that part of England, in East Lancashire. The green hills were rather bucolic but the towns that grew in their folds were rather something else...pits of poverty, hells for asylum seekers, homes to racist British nationalists. It could be a long hot summer up there.

mammatus clouds over hastings, nebraska; hooters coming to block e; buy your drugs on bus number five; torrent: mitch hedberg