At West Point’s prayer breakfast, no room for hate By Sally Quinn They’ve done it again. This time the notorious retired Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin was invited to speak at the annual National Prayer Breakfast Service at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. This is the very same Boykin who was involved in the ill-fated Iranian Hostage rescue mission and the firefight in Somalia made famous in “Black Hawk Down” Boykin made fun of an adversary for believing he would be protected by Allah. Said Boykin: “I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol.” There’s more. He has claimed that the war was against Muslim radicals in a Christian struggle against Satan. He also opined that there should be “no mosques in America,” that “Islam is a totalitarian way of life, it’s not just a religion, ” that Islam “should not be protected under the first amendment.” He has said that “there is no greater threat to America than Islam,” and in a study he co-authored, “most mosques in the United States already have been radicalized, that most Muslim social organizations are fronts for jihadists.” How could this happen? It has only been two years since Franklin Graham, the son of Billy Graham, was invited to speak at a National Day of Prayer event at the Pentagon. Granted he was the son of the famous evangelist and an evangelist himself. Unfortunately, Graham had called Islam “a very evil wicked religion.” Later he would say, “Do they want to indoctrinate me? Yes. I know about Islam. I don’t need an education from Islam. If people think Islam is such a wonderful religion, just go to Saudi Arabia and make it your home.” Shortly after his remarks became an issue in the press, the Pentagon rescinded Graham’s invitation. Now some genius has decided it would be a great idea to have Boykin speak at West Point next week. A spokeswoman at West Point, Lt. Col. Sherri Reed, would only issue a statement to the Washington Post. “The U.S. Military Academy at West Point prepared cadets to be leaders of character with honor and consideration of others. In order to produce effective 21st century leaders for our Army, and our Nation, cadets are purposefully exposed to different perspectives and cultures over the course of their 47-month experience at West Point.” The statement continued, “The National Prayer Breakfast Service will be pluralistic with Christian, Jewish, and Muslim cadets participating. We are comfortable and confident that what retired Lt. Gen. Boykin will share about prayer, soldier care and selfless service, will be in keeping with the broad range of ideas normally considered by our cadets.” Reed would not speak to me about Boykin but later issued the following advisory:………………………………………………….Oh, and another thing: I’d like to suggest that the replacement speaker be a Muslim.
