Yet another public servant trying to appeal to a paranoid electorate.
In this week's episode of Today in Islamaphobia, an assemblyman with the Runyonesque name of Ronald Dancer has decided that Sharia Law is a threat to American jurisprudence, so he wrote a bill that will prohibit the enforcement of "foreign laws" in New Jersey's courts.
Didn't know it was a problem? The Ocean County Republican explains, "When people come here, regardless of their religious beliefs, they should not expect that our law will be set aside to accommodate a different set of values."
Seven years ago, Sharia Law was cited in a domestic sexual assault case involving a Muslim couple. It was reversed on appeal - and universally denounced by legal and Sharia scholars alike - and never came up again.
Still, the paranoia lingers, so now we wonder whether Dancer is fear-mongering or deliberately ignorant.
We found a Sharia expert to explain to him how it works: "No religious code can replace American law," said James Sues of the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). "Article VI, Clause 2 of the Constitution clearly states, 'This Constitution. . . .shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby."
Still, anti-Muslim animus has had quite a ride through our national psyche in the past year, fueled by the blowhards in Dancer's party.
Donald Trump, the man who sees people dancing on rooftops, proposed a ban on Muslims entering the country. Ben Carson called for a presidential religion test because "the Islamic faith might interfere with carrying out the duties of the Constitution."
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These two drew big crowds in Iowa, where 30 percent of Republicans told a pollster that Islam should be outlawed in the U.S. You read that right: One in three GOP Iowans wanted to criminalize a religion.
"And Ted Cruz claimed that Islamic terrorism is our greatest threat," Sues added, "when statistics show over the last 10 years that Americans were more likely to die from choking on peach pits."
We checked. He's right.
Now we have Dancer, who probably should explain why he is trying to misinform and divide New Jerseyans with useless legislation, the kind that should be dropped into the Big Government, Small Minds file.
More: Recent Star-Ledger editorials.
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