In past years we have seen schools and school boards remove all prayer from school, do away with Christmas plays and nativity scenes, and even shut off valedictory microphones for unapproved God-speak. In short, they have systematically prohibited any and all kinds of religious expression. So what is the next logical step? The New York City Department of Education approved a proposal to open a publicly funded Muslim school.

Without hyperbole, this is one of the craziest things I have ever heard. There can be no mention of God or Jesus in public schools. Vouchers are opposed at every turn. But a school dedicated to the Koran and Islam, no problem. The Thomas More Law Center is on the case. From CNA

The Law Center claims the school is nothing more than a thinly disguised incubator for Islamist radicalization. Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the Law Center, said an NYPD Intelligence Report warned Americans of the same thing about two weeks ago.

The school will immerse its students in Islamic culture and has three fundamentalist Islamist imams on its Board of Advisors, as well as other promoters with connections to militant Islamic organizations, the Law Center pointed out.

“Rather than use the public school system to assimilate Muslims and other immigrants into American culture, New York City is doing everything it can to keep them isolated – a target rich environment for recruiting potential new homegrown terrorists and a recipe for a future 911 disaster, according to my read of the NYPD Report,” cautioned Thompson.

The Law Center also noted that New York City School Chancellor, Joel Klein, who is aggressively promoting this Islamic school, also refused to allow two Christian students to display a Nativity Christmas. This is “another example of how political correctness is leading to a malicious double standard when it comes to religious expression in public schools,” said Thompson.

The Law Center argues that several factors, including an executive summary of the KGIA proposal, point to the school as anti-American, anti-Christian, and anti-Jewish.

Some of the school’s promoters have ties to questionable Islamic organizations, including the Council of American Islamic Relations. The group’s founder and chairman publicly stated in 1998: “Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith but to become dominant. The Quaran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth.”

Imam Talib Abdul-Rashid of the Mosque of Islamic Brotherhood is on the school’s advisory board. The Muslim Brotherhood website contains the ominous slogan: “The Qu’ran is our constitution/Jihad is our way/And death in the way of Allah is our promised end.”

Besides being one of the stupidest things I have ever heard, this quite easily ranks at the top of the list of the most outrageous double standards of all time. But I guess that without double standards they would have no standards at all.