Well, if your bicycle is stolen in a big city feel feel free to discuss how important the law is with an officer at your local station; you aren't going see it again.
The "law is law" response to "code is law" is terribly uninteresting. It's just semantic shuffling.
I don't think it is because "law is law" has physicial enforcement behind it (in many cases) while "code is law" doesn't (unless through the regular legal system which won't enforce "illegal" smart contracts)
In a more practical sense (some) human opinion is influential enough to make that distinction useless
(Feel free to discuss the fundamental nature of laws with your cell mate)