Are beards a political statement?

Yes, it was right of the police to announce quickly that they did not think terrorism was the motive in Monday’s Liverpool horror, thus heading off potential riots. The police also said the person arrested was a white man. If he had been a black man, would they have said that? If not, why not? Watching film of the incident, I felt uneasily reminded of the scene in Belfast in 1988 when two British soldiers in civvies drove out of a side road and found themselves in the middle of a Republican funeral cortege. The suspicious crowd began to threaten the car. The soldiers lost their nerve, one drawing his pistol, and the two men were dragged out and foully murdered. I wonder if the driver in Water Street feared that the boisterous Liverpool fans, one or two of whom were banging his windows, mig