Republicans Pissed at Double Standard

On another note, this story about students learning Islamic dogma in the classroom caught my attention. Republicans are furious with the Ninth Circuit's ruling that a three-week course on Islam did not violate the separation of church and state, and frankly I agree. The interesting thing to me is that the Republicans have left themselves with a choice between two equally untenable positions. Either they think that separation of church and state is good, so god should be taken off the money, out of the pledge, etc. along with all this Allah crap, or they think that separation of church is bad, god gets to stay, and public schools should be able to instruct their kids in how to become a muslim.

The text of the decision itself is unpublished, but the briefs for each side are of course available to the public. The most shocking thing is that the school district defended the program by saying that none of the students demonstrated "devotional intent," as though the kids had to start praying to Mecca five times a day before this can be considered a problem. The case is Eklund v. Byron Union School District, 2005 WL 3086580.