[jennyp]

I got this in email. I'm sure it'll be posted at The Objectivist Center's website soon.

[Travis McGee]

We're going to find out, sooner or later,

If Abdul will pray, to a smoking crater.

[mrsmith]

Objectively speaking, I don't care what general Boykin believes in as long as he earnestly, efficiently and thoroughly seeks out and kills our enemies.

He seems well motivated to do that.

[fporretto]

General Boykin, an able and much-decorated soldier, has every right to his opinions, and to express them wherever he might find it appropriate to do so. However, it is questionable whether there's any good to be had in cross-identifying America's enemies with Satan.

Satan doesn't fight with earthly weapons. He distorts, beclouds, and tempts; that is all. Our enemies are human beings. While their minds are definitely in thrall to evil, that's not the same as being the actual moving spirit of evil for the entire universe.

We can beat Islamist terrorism and Islamic hegemonic ambition. If our task were to defeat Satan himself, I'd say we'd bitten off a good deal more than we can chew.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason:
http://palaceofreason.com

[marron]

Earth to General Boykin and his conservative allies: You are defending a country founded in the Enlightenment, the era when reason was finally recognized as the arbiter of truth. You are relying on America’s vast wealth, created by people who used their minds, not their prayers, to work and produce.

Earth to Kelley: We are the enlightment.

It takes men like Boykin to make a country like this one possible. Boykin is not a country-western analogue to Bin Ladinism, he is the kind of man that makes a country like this one possible. He believes that liberty is God-given. He believes that reason is god-given. He believes that there is an objective good and evil and he believes them to be real, and he is prepared to do combat in that arena. He believes that to the degree that this country embodies Godly virtue that it is worth the sacrifice of his own life and if necessary the lives of men under his command.

Men who believe that self-interest is the highest good are not going to line up to sacrifice their lives for someone else's self-interest, not unless they are motivated by something deeper than the philosophy that they explicitly claim. It takes men like Boykin who believe that there is a life beyond life, or at the very least, lives more important than their own.

There are men who have willingly sacrificed themselves for the master race, for the emperor, for the ummah. Boykin and men like him are prepared to sacrifice themselves for liberty. That makes them a different breed of cat altogether.

So mock them if you must, but just remember that there isn't an America without them.

[Chuckster]

Liberals denounced the general’s remarks as divisive and likely to offend Muslims worldwide

Yes, Heaven forbid we should do anything to offend muslims. Why, they might get mad and, I dunno, hi-jack an airplane and fly it into a bulding or something......Oh yeah, its been done.

Too bad no one has the guts to do what really needs to be done to end this problem. If anyone did they'd be crucified. Wouldn't be the first time. Look at what happens now to anyone who even suggests what the problem really is. OTOH, if Someone doesn't grow some Godilla sized cojones and deal with it, ultimately I fear a lot of Americans are going to die.

[jennyp]

Objectivism PING.

[RJCogburn]

Pointing to an unnatural-looking dark streak in the sky, he said, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your enemy. It is the principalities of darkness. It is a demonic presence in that city that God revealed to me as the enemy.”

Oh, boy.

[Mike Darancette]

I would agree with the Dump Boykin Crowd if;

It would save one soldier's life in Iraq;
It would stop one Palestinian Terrorist act in Israel;
It would stop one disgruntled impoverished Muslim youth from joining a terror cell;
It would stop one Islamist Cleric from calling for the destruction or subjugation of infidels or
It would gain us one jot of respect in the Muslim world.

Had Winston Churchill been dumped for his early inflammatory rhetoric concerning Nazi Germany the English Speaking World would be a footnote.

[xzins]

This author's ignorance of Christianity is the only reason he does not understand the rationality of Boykin's message. If he had even a smidgen of biblical literacy he would immediately realize the biblical allusions that Boykin was making.

But this author is uneducated. It isn't even a matter of being a believer in Christianity. He simply is illiterate regarding the western world's most enduring and treasured piece of literature. One can only wonder where he was trained.

Besides all that, he doesn't even mention that the media had a reporter tailing a general. He doesn't notice the media venues which broke this story.

Having shattered themselves on the solid rock of Schwarzeneggar in California, they turned in their fury against an innocent, unsuspecting man of deep faith.

How dare he speak in the language of biblical imagery.

[OrthodoxPresbyterian]

The crackle of small-arms fire you hear about General William Boykin is the sound of the latest skirmish in America’s culture wars. Boykin is the Pentagon’s head of intelligence in the war on terrorism. He is also an evangelical Christian who has told church groups that Muslim terrorists hate the United States because it is a “Christian nation,” that our real enemy is not Osama bin Laden but Satan, and that we will prevail only if “we come against them in the name of Jesus.”

And the ROAR of Counter-Battery Fire you hear against General William Boykin is the sound of whining Atheist Objectivists being pissed off that General William Boykin was smart enough to use the Islamic Radical's own Mohammedan Fundamentalism against them.

Here's the Scoop -- America is not in a Christian Crusade against Islam (according to the received teachings of Jesus, it is impossible for the Government of Caesar to either assist the True Religion of Christianity, or to prevent our ultimate triumph).

But you can be damn certain that the Islamist Radicals believe that's what this is about. They think that this is a Religious War (and I don't deny that some Christian Fundamentalists have added fuel to the fire). They think that is a World War between Religious Civilizations.

And in that respect, General Boykin has employed effective psychological warfare techniques against the Islamist Radicals. They claimed that "Allah would protect them" against American technology and war-making capability. General Boykin got in their face and basically told them that Allah can't protect them for shinola. He told them that their God is an Idol and can do nothing against the U S of A.

And then, he gave them cause to despair when he declared that, absent Jesus, they have no hope at all.

This is a vicious, brutal, and potentially-devastating psychological sucker-punch against the entire basis of Islamic Radicalism. General Boykin didn't waste time with "Tolerance" and "Political Correctness"; he followed the example of Sun Tzu, and decided that if you want to win a War, you go in underneath, and you Cut off their Balls.

I have always been entirely disappointed with the Objectivist Center's cheerleading for this morally unjust Iraq War. I never bought into the "WMD", and it turns out I'm right. As far as I am concerned, the only conceivable justification (at the outside of possibility) for any War against Iraq was the elimination of the Salman Pak airliner-hijacking camp, and the liquidation of the Regime which funded such Terrorists. And then we leave. We kill the bad guys and Go Home. We bring 'em back by Christmas (preferably, much before). A righteous man who kills a Robber is under no obligation to care for the Burglar's family. We save the $87 Billion, one dead soldier per day, and we GO HOME. The Middle East would be left in Chaos, of course. It will also be in Chaos twenty years from now. That's not our problem. We kill the bad Guys, and we GO HOME.

But the Objectivist Center seems to have overlooked these facts. The Objectivists seem to have signed on with George Bush and declared a "Global Crusade" against Statism and Islamo-Fascism, of which Ayn Rand would be proud.

• Well, look, folks -- I don't know about any "Global Crusade against Statism", I just want my Country back.
• And absent that, I'd be happy to have my State Government back.
• And absent that, I'd be happy to have my County Government back.
• And absent that, I'd be happy to have my Children and my Tax Dollars back. "SCREW THEM! SCREW THE GOVERNMENT!!" ~~ Sir Anthony Hopkins, "Legends of the Fall"

I'm not looking to make Ayn Rand proud. I'm not interested in a "Global Crusade" of any sort, Objectivist or otherwise.

But if you are determined to wage a Randian Global Crusade -- it is incumbent upon you TO WIN. And that includes efficacious psychological warfare, of the sort that General Boykin is waging against the Islamic Radicals.

You're just pissed off that Boykin happens to believe in his own Psychological Warfare.

In other words, you are willing to sacrifice Military Efficiency upon the altar of your own Atheism. As a commitment to your own atheistic "faith", one might say.

And here I thought that the Atheist Objectivists had read their Sun Tzu.

The Atheist Objectivists have, by their BIASES, disappointed me once again.