Euro Notes: Italy -- Mugger Attacks Woman...Who Is a Karate Champion.

Ah, self-defense is a wonderful thing. Turnabout is fair play, and I frankly love it when criminals and scumbags get what they deserve. This time some lowlife attacked a woman near Rome's train station. He thought she was an easy target. She turned out to be a world-class karate champion. What do you think happened? It's just awesome.

Incidentally, the news article at the end dissolves into a mess. It manages to go from reporting a discrete incident to muddling around trying to "explain" Italian attitudes and official policy toward immigrants. The writer thinks some Italian feeling toward immigrants is bad and that immigrants are being blamed for Italy's crime rates. OK, let's not all be xenophobic, but factually, in this particular incident, the attacker was indeed not an Italian, and the would-be victim was. She proceeded to defend herself by beating the snot out of him (which is, by the way, fine with me). I half-expected the writer then to accuse the woman of hating immigrants. Journalism is in a largely sorry state these days.