The Times' public editor blows whistle on goofy op-ed

Remember that stinker of an op-ed by Edward Luttwak that the New York Times published back in May about how Obama was an "apostate Muslim" according to sharia (Islamic law) and that he would be the target of assassination attempts because of it? (I don't recall a 10-minute rant from Keith Olberman about how it was wicked for the Times to use the word "assassination".)

Careful readers (like Neil at The Blue Voice) could see that it reeked, even without consulting with experts on Islamic law.

Weeks later, the Times public editor Clark Hoyt comments on the article in Entitled to Their Opinions, Yes. But Their Facts? New York Times 06/01/08. Short version of Hoyt's conclusions: "I interviewed five Islamic scholars, at five American universities, recommended by a variety of sources as experts in the field. All of them said that Luttwak’s interpretation of Islamic law was wrong."

And, in what was apparently a further display of total ditziness, Luttwak sent Hoyt what was supposed to be a defense of his claim in the op-ed:

Interestingly, in defense of his own article, Luttwak sent me an analysis of it by a scholar of Muslim law whom he did not identify. That scholar also did not agree with Luttwak that Obama was an apostate or that Muslim law would prohibit punishment for any Muslim who killed an apostate. He wrote, “You seem to be describing some anarcho-utopian version of Islamic legalism, which has never existed, and after the birth of the modern nation state will never exist.”

Tags: edward luttwak, islamic law, sharia