After two weeks of unrestrained violence across the country, France imposed curfews and a state-of-emergency rule on 24 of its provinces. The government certainly hopes that this wartime measure will quickly scale down the riots and it may well do that.

Yet history is more likely to look back on this not as the end of an irrational burst of urban violence, but as the first act in a protracted time of troubles for France and Europe that could ultimately lead to the demise of European civilization as we know it.

None of this is even remotely discernible in French political rhetoric or media coverage surrounding the violent events in the Moslem ghettoes. Yet, shying away from reality by France's ruling class does not change reality – and that stark reality is one of a civilized European nation sliding into barbarism.

While Persian (Farsi) is the official language, half of all Iranians speak a different language at home.¹ The languages and dialects spoken along the southern shore of the Caspian Sea continue to engross linguists and anthropologists.

The minority population is huge. More Azeris live in Iran, for example, than in independent Azerbaijan.² Both Iranian Azerbaijan and Kurdistan have a history of separatism, the latter sparked not only by ethnic discrimination, but also by anti-Sunni religious oppression.

Azeris and Kurds are not alone in exerting regional identities and, on occasion, pursuing separatism. Separatist violence is exploding among Khuzistan Arabs. Violence and lawlessness in Baluchistan is increasingly uncontrollable. Local disdain for Tehran is consistent with the historic pattern in which the periphery slowly spins away from central government control during periods of weakness.

The difference of commitment to sports versus academics by students and parents is striking, but don't believe for a minute that the same bias is not institutional as well. I have taught now at every level of American academia and I have yet to give a test or assign a project that was so important that it caused a game to be canceled or missed.

However, from elementary school to college, I regularly have had class time canceled, projects excused and test times altered to cater to athletics. In fact, it seems any academic activity humbly bows before the holy incantation, “Uh, I'm going to be gone; we've got a game that day.”

This explanation is not the bitter ranting of an egghead who was always picked last in gym class. Rather, I'm a former collegiate athlete and high school coach who is intrigued by what could be accomplished if we would bring our athletic commitment into the classroom.

And, because attitude is not enough, we should also contrast coaching to teaching, so that we might re-learn some valuable lessons about instructional methods. To this end, I see three prime areas for consideration.

Chapter Fifteen: The Hill of Tzompachtepetl

When, seven months ago, I finished writing my book, The West's Last Chance, London had not been attacked by Islamist terrorists, the Tate Museum in London had not removed an art exhibit because it offended radical Moslem sensitivities, and France had not yet experienced the explosion of violence from elements of its Moslem population in its "no-go zone" communities.

The fact that I predicted all those events in my book was not the result of clairvoyance. It was merely the result of a normally intelligent person looking at the facts, and their rather obvious implications, without the blinding effect of a politically correct mentality.