The ruling states that the law — which amended the state constitution — violated the Establishment clause of the First Amendment by singling out one religion, Islam. In addition, the court noted that the proponents of the law, which passed November 2010 in a state referendum, could not identify one occasion in which Sharia was used in Oklahoma.

Too bad courts can’t comment on the stupidity of laws, too.

Oklahoma’s Islamophobic factions took the lead nationally in pressing for such a law, creating a nontroversy about “creeping Sharia” and Muslim infiltration of the USA. After the Sooner State’s successful ballot initiative, other states jumped on the bandwagon, fabricating Muslim threats from whole cloth.

The 10th Circuit got to the heart of the matter in its ruling: “Sharia? What Sharia?”

Appellants do not identify any actual problem the challenged amendment seeks to solve. Indeed, they admitted at the preliminary injunction hearing that they did not know of even a single instance where an Oklahoma court had applied Sharia law or used the legal precepts of other nations or cultures, let alone that such applications or uses had resulted in concrete problems in Oklahoma. See Awad, 754 F. Supp. 2d at 1308; Aplt. App. Vol. 1 at 67-68.

Given the lack of evidence of any concrete problem, any harm Appellants seek to remedy with the proposed amendment is speculative at best and cannot support a compelling interest.15 “To sacrifice First Amendment protections for so speculative a gain is not warranted . . . .” Columbia Broad. Sys., Inc. v. Democratic Nat’l Co., 412 U.S. 94, 127 (1973).

In other words, it’s a bit like locking the barn door to keep the horses from escaping before they are actually inside. Except in this case, there aren’t any horses, either. So, it’s both stupid and crazy.

Isn’t all bigotry like that?

Vote for me, the bigot!

Turner is running against Democrat David Weprin in a special election to fill the seat of Rep. Andrew Weiner (D-NY-9), who resigned his seat after a sexting scandal. It’s supposed to be a tight race.

I hope this flier backfires on Turner big time. Aside from the obvious bigotry, it lies like a dog. The Park 51 project is not at the site of World Trade Center (the so-called Ground Zero), is not a mosque, and doesn’t look anything like the gold-domed edifice in the flier. The project additionally does not violate any laws, local or national, and has even been approved by the local community zoning board.

Turner is a putz. Look it up at urbandictionary.com if you don’t know what it means.

“This is not about us and them,” said Dalia Mustafa, a student who attended mass at Virgin Mary Church on Maraashly Street. “We are one. This was an attack on Egypt as a whole, and I am standing with the Copts because the only way things will change in this country is if we come together.”

Good advice for us in the United States.

A photo slideshow is at Ahram Online, an Egyptian news site.

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* Peace be upon you; hello; goodbye — the equivalent in Hebrew is “shalom“

They believe that the evul Mooslims have infiltrated Campbell’s (and Kellogg’s, it seems) to sell halal food in preparation for some imagined large scale Mooslim takeover of the US of A.

Raving lunatic Pamela Geller (of anti-”megamosque” at “Ground Zero” fame) is encouraging a boycott of Campbell’s. Considering she has maybe 100 or so loyal followers — and that’s being generous — I doubt Campbell’s will much care.

Apparently, in their conspiracy-plagued minds, Geller, Robert Spencer and other wackjobs, if you connect the dots, somehow offering halal foods to American shoppers somehow translates into aiding and abetting terrorists and an Islamic takeover of the US legal system.

I buy halal hotdogs in my local supermarket here in Jishou, mostly to avoid eating yet more pork. (They are labeled “Muslim food,” so maybe they are not officially halal.) So, if we follow the “logic” of Geller, et alia, Jishou will soon be a satellite state of the Taliban, or something.

How long has kosher food been sold in the USA? As a wild guess, I’d say at least a century. Last I checked, the US has not yet become another Jewish state. Although as the on-air rants of former CNN anchor Rick Sanchez demonstrates, some people would say the verdict is still out on that possibility.

When Hebrew National and Manichevitz start selling halal hot dogs and Passover wine, THEN I will worry.

The comic of course is a play on the Where’s Waldo? children’s books. Then, there is the current phobia about anything even vaguely Muslim, Islamic or Arab. “The sky is falling! Terrorists! Mosques! AAGGGH!” You could also consider it a snark on the Muslim ban against depicting the image of Muhammad anywhere. Or the unsale-ability of the book title.

But, there’s another angle. You can’t find Muhammad (as in a common name for a Muslim guy) in the picture, because he probably looks just like anyone else. Just a regular guy, and not some crazy extremist ready to force sharia law on US citizens.

Of course, if you’re paranoid or watched too many spy movies, maybe you’d think Muhammad is disguised as the ice cream guy, who’s got a bomb in his cart. If you think that way, you need to get out more. Seriously.

Bary, the Christian convert teen who ran away from home last year alleging her Muslim parents would kill her, apparently is rejecting chemotherapy for her uterine cancer, claiming she was cured by a faith healer. She is also rejecting a reunion with her family, whom law enforcement officials say pose no threat to her safety.

The teenager became a poster child for the anti-Muslim and/or born-again religious crowd after she ran away from her Columbus home to Orlando, Florida, claiming her parents would kill her because of her conversion to Christianity three years before she fled. She eventually ended up in foster care back in Ohio.

In May, the 17-year-old Sri Lankan native was diagnosed with uterine cancer, and has since had three operations.

According to news reports, documents filed by her parents in Franklin County Court state that Bary is refusing chemotherapy because she claims she was healed at an event in Youngstown last month. She was allegedly taken there without her parents’ consent, and her parents want the court to force Bary to undergo chemotherapy if she needs it.

A judge will decide on the parents’ motion today.

Meanwhile, Bary, who turns 18 next week, has refused to meet with her family. Her lawyers say the girl fears her parents still.

[Oh, ye of little faith. But I digress.]

Adding to the complexity of this passion play is the undocumented immigrant status of the entire Bary family. Rifqa is seeking to avoid deportation so she can continue her medical treatment … which her parents say she is refusing.

Confused yet? I’ve been following this story for a year, and even I have trouble understanding it.

If things weren’t already strange enough, it seems the neo-Pentecostal Christians surrounding Bary say she has a special prophetic role to play as someone who has escaped the “evil” of Islam.

Bary made a dramatic, and somewhat disturbing appearance on a telephone prayer call last year, at a time when she was supposed to be denied access to the people who helped her run lured her away from her home.

Islamophobe Pamela Geller has been touting Bary’s situation as another case of Muslim “honor killing” for apostasy (converting to Christianity), while accusing the girl’s parents of crimes they have neither committed nor seem inclined to commit.

The religious aspect of this family drama stinks worse than the Fulton fish market, as my mother used to say. This girl is being exploited by so-called faithful people who have no real regard for her welfare. They just want her to play a part in their imaginary End Times battle between Christians and Muslims.

If the girl had been helped by some wacko cult to run away from her Christian parents, the cult would have been vilified and the girl would be home now (maybe after some needed counseling). Does the name Elizabeth Smart ring any bells?

Instead, the supposedly well-meaning busybodies who interfered with the Bary’s family life — instead of going directly to civil authorities — get free passes because they are “Christian” and the girls’ parents are distrusted because they’re Muslim and in the State illegally.

It ain’t right.

His interview is worth reading, because it contradicts the wild assertions made by the likes of Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer, co-founders of Stop Islamization of America (SIOA).

Geller and Spencer consistently object to proximity of the project, which includes a mosque, to the former site of the World Trade Center about two blocks away. They claim the Muslim-backed center will somehow “desecrate the sacred ground” of the ruined buildings which entombed about 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001.

el-Gamal’s response:

We are not at Ground Zero. In fact we’re as close to City Hall as we are to Ground Zero. Lower Manhattan is pretty small. You can’t see Ground Zero from our current building and on completion of our planned building some years from now, there won’t be any views of the Ground Zero memorial from the building. To honor those who were killed on September 11th, we have planned for a public memorial within our future facility as well as reflection space open to all.

He also mentions that there are two other mosques in Lower Manhattan, which are too crowded. He doesn’t mention that there two strip clubs also near the “sacred” WTC site.

Geller characterizes the project as a “Mega-Mosque,” like it’s huge. In fact, the project is mostly to build a community center, and the mosque

… will take up only a small portion of the final space. [It's] a question of meeting a need. This mosque will be open to all. There are probably one million Muslims in the tri-state area and several hundred thousand in New York City. We should understand that Muslim New Yorkers are part of the city and have been for a very long time. Just a few days ago, I stopped to pray at a midtown mosque, and the congregation was led by a New York City Police Officer. He was a Muslim serving our city, keeping us safe.

Geller lives in the Bronx, so I suppose she complain about the project, though her home is miles away from Lower Manhattan. One wonders where she was on 9/11/01. Spencer is not a New Yorker, as far as I know, but he speaks as if he’s got the right to tell NYC what to do.

By contrast, where was el-Gamal on 9/11?

On September 11, 2001, I went down to the site of the attacks and spent two days handing out water to first responders and other victims. Hundreds of Muslims died on that day. New Yorkers of all faiths and no faiths died together. There are also hundreds of Muslims in our police force and fire department and many Muslims who volunteered to help the injured and the hurt. One of my close friends, a Muslim and a New Yorker, headed down to Ground Zero after the attacks, and helped set up a triage.

She was buried in the rubble when the towers collapsed, but she was dug out, thank God, and went right back to work. We understand the horror of that day because we lived it. Terrorists attacked our city and our country, and terrorists have continued to threaten our city and our country. We’re proud of the many Muslims who have worked with our fellow Americans to keep our city and country safe.

So, here’s the point. This project is by New Yorkers, for New Yorkers. It’s for the people who live and work in Lower Manhattan. No one is forcing Pamela Geller or Robert Spencer, or anyone else to visit the mosque. If they don’t like where it is, then they can just shut up. It’s none of their damn business.