KING FOR A DAY (OR ANYWAY UNTIL 2012)

Rep. Peter King (R NY)--the same Peter King who once lauded the terrorist IRA as "freedom fighters"--is set to turn his powerful Congressional investigative lens on radical Islam and its threat to God's country. Here is what will likely happen, after the King investigations have run their course.

Congress will pass a “Defense of American Law” against Sharia that will probably have about the same effect the “Defense of Marriage Act” had on the spread of gay marriage and civil unions. Then Muslims will go back to enforcing Sharia law on themselves, as they are doing even now where it doesn’t too blatantly violate ours. Some will push for toleration of more and more extreme Sharia practices, others will shrug and go on with their lives as they are doing now. Here and there, some understanding of Sharia may prevail in the state and Federal courts, e.g., that Muslim women cannot be forced to expose their faces but may submit fingerprints, DNA or iris scans for identification purposes.

There will be no public beheadings or stonings, and the White House will not sprout minarets. The Republicans will continue to raise a Muslim Scare, the Democrats will scurry along after them. Some terrorist plots will be broken up, some innocent Muslims may be victimized, until the government overreaches or people simply lose interest and move on to the next thing.

In all these ways, our current Islamophobia is not much different from the alarms over French-inspired Jacobinism in the 1790s, over “popery” in the mid-19th century, and over communism during the Cold War. In all these instances, there was a combination of an external threat with internal subversion, which though real enough, was exaggerated by some for mostly political reasons and made the occasion for a debauch of investigation, denunciation and ritual expurgation. In each case, the alarms and excursions peaked after the real threat was past.

We can take heart, though! One of the things that makes America great is that sooner or later, we get over it. A century hence, Americans will celebrate Muslim holidays in the same superficial, commercialized way they presently celebrate St. Patrick’s Day and Cinco de Mayo–minus the alcohol, one hopes.