And now a New Jersey judge sees no evidence that a Muslim committed sexual assault of his wife -- not because he didn't do it, but because he was acting on his Islamic beliefs: "This court does not feel that, under the circumstances, that this defendant had a criminal desire to or intent to sexually assault or to sexually contact the plaintiff when he did. The court believes that he was operating under his belief that it is, as the husband, his desire to have sex when and whether he wanted to, was something that was consistent with his practices and it was something that was not prohibited."

Luckily, the appellate court overturned this decision, and a Sharia ruling by an American court has not been allowed to stand. This time.

This type of thing is going to become more and more common. Destroying the actual meaning of the Constitution has intellectually perverted our judiciary so that special rights for groups (Islam, homosexuality...) trump individual rights under the law.

Interestingly, the US Constitution says that the Federal government shall guarantee to each State a "republican form of government." This not only excludes monarchy but the Shari'a law of the Muslims.

Another important piece from Steyn in which he explores the new (and completely politically acceptable) antisemitism which unites Leftists and Islamists. Such a union has real consequences which are already being played out every day.

"By 2005, there were fewer than 150 Jews in Tangiers, almost all of them very old. By 2015, it is estimated that there will be precisely none. Whenever I mention such statistics to people, the reaction is a shrug: why would Jews live in Morocco anyway? But in 1945 there were some 300,000 in this country. Today some 3,000 Jews remain—i.e., about one per cent of what was once a large and significant population. That would be an unusual demographic reconfiguration in most countries: imagine if Canada’s francophone population or Inuit population were today one per cent of what it was in 1945. But it’s not unusual for Jews. There are cemeteries like that on the rue du Portugal all over the world, places where once were Jews and now are none. I mentioned only last week that in the twenties, Baghdad was 40 per cent Jewish. But you could just as easily cite Czernowitz in the Bukovina, now part of Ukraine. “There is not a shop that has not a Jewish name painted above its windows,” wrote Sir Sacheverell Sitwell, visiting the city in 1937. Not today. As in Tangiers, the “community” resides in the cemetery."

Few wanted to listen when it was pointed out — well before the Greek meltdown — that on key questions of demography and immigration, the future of the European Union was bleak. The very idea that, in historical terms, socialism, agnosticism, pacifism, and hedonism were not only interrelated and synergistic, but also suicidal for civilization, was considered crackpot.

Victor Davis Hanson needs to be read by more people.

On Tuesday, June 23rd 2009, an American Christian worker named Chris Leggett was gunned down by Al Qaeda for the alleged “crime” of trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. To give you an idea of what kind of man Chris Legget was, the 39-year old native of Cleveland, Tennessee not only taught computer science in a low-class neighborhood in the capital city of Nouakchott, he also, according to the Cleveland Daily Banner, worked with the prison systems to train and equip women and young boys to re-enter society, directed a training center providing training in computer skills, sewing, and literacy, and oversaw a micro-loan program which fostered the growth of hundreds of small businesses.

Although the miniscule media coverage has been fairly straightforward, I was saddened to see some of the nasty comments on the Huffington Post when Ahmed Mohammed posted the Associated Press story on the site. Although a few of the comments unequivocally condemned Leggett’s murder for what it is, a cowardly act of violence motivated by extremists, far too many seemed to think that Leggett was somehow “asking for it” because of the nature of his work in a Muslim land, as if Chris Leggett somehow deserved to die because of his passion for sharing his faith.

One commenter wrote, “Well, you know, it is their country. You go walking around with arrogant disregard of their laws, you better be prepared to pay the consequences. Non-story.” Another commenter cut from the same cloth replied, “I agree. It doesn't take much intelligence for non-military Americans to keep out of these countries. You not only go there at your own risk - you ask for it.”

My beef isn’t so much with the Huffington Post (who likely has little control over what people comment on the site), but to the people who made those nasty comments (there were some that were far worse) I would like to say feel free to criticize Christian missionaries working in Muslims lands, but I hope you realize that you’re criticizing from a position of privilege. Many of you live in countries that allow you to choose your religious beliefs without fear of torture, imprisonment, or death. Hundreds of millions of Muslims live in countries that deny them that right. How do you know that out of the worlds’ roughly 1.2 billion Muslims, that some of them don’t want to hear another perspective?

Chris Leggett most likely wasn’t banging the Bible over anyone’s head, but I wouldn’t be surprised if a few curious Muslims quietly asked him about his religious beliefs. After all, most Muslims I know-unlike most Westerners I know-like to discuss religion in every day conversation and enjoy hearing other people’s perspectives. If a few of these same Muslims through peaceful dialogue came to the conclusion that Chris’s beliefs were correct, where’s the crime in that? If Chris Leggett did break Mauritanian law, then it was an unjust law that he broke. Last time I checked, breaking unjust laws is called civil disobedience. Acts of civil disobedience have been crucial to every major advance in human rights.

Article by Aaron Taylor. Yes, it's easy to trumpet the cry of "human rights" but this is usually done on premises which honor them to some degree. Still no churches in the Kingdom of Saud.

Why?