Like Charles says, you have to read it to believe it. It’s a whitewash for the ages, beginning with a sneering dismissal of right-wing worries about a “society where women are second-class citizens, same sex relationships a crime and Sharia law enforces terrible public disfigurement and death” and segueing into section by section hosannas to the genius of Islamic civilization. From the prostration during prayers, which keeps the joints supple, to the health benefits of banning alcohol and enforcing halal dietary laws to the “revolutionary effect” it would have on education and self-discipline if schools had a little more of a madrassa vibe to them, we’re in for a golden age, kids. Through it all, two themes recur: the author’s blithe insistence that any failings in the Islamic world are due to “social factors,” not religion, and the contempt he shows for his own culture, most notably in his description of eating habits and the genuinely astonishing assertion that London on balance will become “a little less cruel” thanks to the compulsory donations to charity. As for the section on inter-faith relations and “the guiding hand of Islam,” the less said, the better.

I do like how he regards concerns about this scenario as being exclusively the province of the right-wing, though. Too true, my friends, too true.