I try not to cover the same stories as Atrios. He’s bigger than me, and it makes me look silly, but this one is far too much up my street to not mention. Gentlemen, ladies, may I introduce Gen. William �Jerry� Boykin, the US Deputy Undersecretary of Defense, with special responsibility for anti-terrorism. Oh, and a complete lunatic.
From MSNBC, quotes from the good General:
FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, BROKEN ARROW, OKLA., JUNE 30, 2002
[SLIDE SHOW, PICTURE OF OSAMA BIN LADEN] �And then we began to see this face�the face of Osama bin Laden. And finally we said, �There�s the enemy. That�s our enemy. That�s the man that hates us. And all of those that follow him.�
[PICTURE OF PRESIDENT BUSH] �And then this man stepped forward. A man that has acknowledged that he prays in the Oval Office. A man that�s in the White House today because of a miracle. You think about how he got in the White House. You think about why he�s there today. As Mordecai said to Esther, �You have been put there for such a time and place.� And this man has been put in the White house to lead our nation in such a time as this.
�But who is that enemy? It�s not Osama bin Laden. Our enemy is a spiritual enemy because we are a nation of believers. You go back and look at our history, and you will find that we were founded on faith. Look at what the writers of our Constitution said. We are a nation of believers. We were founded on faith.�
[PICTURE OF SATAN] �And the enemy that has come against our nation is a spiritual enemy. His name is Satan. And if you do not believe that Satan is real, you are ignoring the same Bible that tells you about God. Now I�m a warrior. One day I�m going to take off this uniform and I�m still going to be a warrior. And what I�m here to do today is to recruit you to be warriors of God�s kingdom.�
GOOD SHEPHERD CHURCH, SANDY, ORE., JUNE 21, 2003
CELEBRATE AMERICA EVENT
�And we ask ourselves this question, �Why do they hate us? Why do they hate us so much?�
Ladies and gentlemen, the answer to that is because we�re a Christian nation, because our foundation and our roots are Judeo-Christian. Did I say Judeo-Christian? Yes. Judeo-Christian.
�That means we�ve got a commitment to Israel. That mean�s it�s a commitment we�re never going to abandon.
�Go back and read the history books. Go back and read what the early founders of this nation said about Israel, about the Jews. John Adams wrote extensively of, he called it the Hebrews, the contributions they had made to our concepts of liberty and the importance of their contributions to the founding of this great nation.
�Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin each, independently, when asked to come up with a national symbol for this new nation, both came up with a national symbol that reflected on our Jewish heritage.
�One had Moses standing over the Red Sea with his staff and the water parting.
�The other had the Israelites coming out of bondage in the desert being led by a ball of fire. They recognized the importance of our relationship to the Jews and to Israel. Ladies and gentlemen, we will never abandon Israel, we will never walk away from our commitment to Israel because our roots are there.
Our religion came from Judaism, and therefore these radicals will hate us forever.�
FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, DAYTONA, FLA., JAN. 28, 2003
�There was a man in Mogadishu named Osman Atto. You see him in the movie [�Blackhawk Down�], smoking a big cigar and talking philosophically. How many of you have seen the movie? Acting like a big shot. Well let me tell you something. That�s not what Osman Atto did. The reality was Osman Atto was Aideed�s closest ally. He was Aideed�s top lieutenant. He was a multimillionaire financier for Aideed�s clan. And we knew if that if we could capture Osman Atto and take him away, that we could destroy Aideed�s network. So we went after Osman Atto about two weeks before the battle…. We went after Osman Atto. We got into a terrible fight. And I�m sad to say a lot of Somalis were killed as we went after Osman Atto.
But we missed him by seconds. He walked out of the facility that we raided, he walked down the street and blended in with the crowd and we missed him.
�And then he went on CNN and he laughed at us, and he said, �They�ll never get me because Allah will protect me. Allah will protect me.�
�Well, you know what I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol. But I prayed, Lord let us get that man.
�Three days later we went after him again, and this time we got him. Not a mark on him. We got him. We brought him back into our base there and we had a Sea Land container set up to hold prisoners in, and I said put him in there. They put him in there, there was one guard with him. I said search him, they searched him, and then I walked in with no one in there but the guard, and I looked at him and said, �Are you Osman Atto?� And he said �Yes.� And I said, �Mr. Atto, you underestimated our God.��
Well, I know I’d feel safe if I was in the US. The man has a picture of Satan. He also doesn’t seem aware that Franklin was a humanist or a deist (depending on who you ask.).
He calls Muslims idol worshippers. Last time I checked it was forbidden in Islam to have any physical representaion of Allah.
Hadith – Bukhari 3:428, Narrated Said bin Abu Al-Hasan
While I was with Ibn ‘Abbas a man came and said, “O father of ‘Abbas! My sustenance is from my manual profession and I make these pictures.” Ibn ‘Abbas said, “I will tell you only what I heard from Allah’s Apostle . I heard him saying, ‘Whoever makes a picture will be punished by Allah till he puts life in it, and he will never be able to put life in it.’ ” Hearing this, that man heaved a sigh and his face turned pale. Ibn ‘Abbas said to him, “What a pity! If you insist on making pictures I advise you to make pictures of trees and any other unanimated objects.”
You’d have thought the top anti-terrorist guy would make a point of knowing some basic Islamic factoids.