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MAF Presents: The Daily File
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Our rally in Houston, TX was also at another Wal-Mart. Our tour is structured so that we started out with some VFWs and American legion type halls, with a big chunk of Wal-Marts in the middle and finishing it off with a couple more non-Wal-Mart locations.
George Carson from Families United was there and taking pictures. He was telling Debbie Lee that they are working on another event for Texas coming up soon and that he is also looking forward to going BACK to Iraq to work again as a contractor.
We also had Sharon Burns, another Navy SEAL mom and her friend Tonie Ruddick who both live in Victoria, TX so they drove a little ways to get to our rally. Debbie Lee met Sharon Burn’s son Jared at a SEAL function, a funeral actually, I believe, and has kept in touch ever since. Debbie was extremely excited to finally meet Mrs. Burns finally and talk about what it’s like to have a Navy SEAL in the family, where you often don’t know where they are deployed or how dangerous the mission is.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Our rally in Austin took place pretty late in the day, 5:00 actually. That doesn’t normally seem like a late time for a rally but being that it’s winter time now we run short of daylight around that time. But, lucky for us, we were holding this rally at a Wal-Mart and we were graciously allowed to park between the two entrances and have the lights shining down upon us.
A little more about San Antonio
Just as a little supplement to the previous post I wanted to mention really quickly Nancy Ayala and Melissa Doyle who are a couple other attendees to the San Antonio rally who have a great story to tell for all our pro-troop readers.
Nancy Ayala is the wife of Pedro Ayala who, at 37 years old, has been in the army for 8 years. He is a patient recovering at the Brook Army Medical Center. He and his wife Nancy live at the Fisher House here in San Antonio while Pedro visits Brook Army Medical Center frequently for his serious affliction of seizures. Pedro suffered severe nerve damage when he was shot in the head during a firefight in Iraq where he served as well as in Afghanistan. The bullet grazed Pedro’s head and he suffered severe trauma. He has all but recovered except for the sudden, unexpected and immobilizing seizures he still often suffers from.
Nancy comes from New York City, where she grew up in Manhattan, and where her brother served as a police officer in the NYPD. Her brother was actually on duty on the day that terrorists attacked the World Trade Center towers on September 11th, 2001 and he was part of the first teams rescuing people and cleaning up the tragic scene. She says that her brothers is still permanently shaken by the carnage of that day and we are thankful for his service and for her husband Pedro’s service and sacrifice for this nation.
Melissa Doyle is originally from Arkansas and her husband Richard has been in the army for 7 ½ years. Richard is 28 years old and has served one tour of duty in Iraq, where he was stationed at Camp Liberty. One day the HMMWV he was driving was hit by an IED, not directly, but enough to roll the vehicle which cost Richard his leg. He is now recovering at CFI, Melissa told me, which stands for Center for the Intrepid and houses some of the worst injuries of any soldiers sustained in the war. Perhaps only Walter Reed in Washington D.C. houses more desperately injured soldiers than CFI. CFI covers many of the worst burn victims and amputees that result from combat in the War on Terror.
Luckily both Melissa and Nancy are confident that their husbands are going to make full recoveries, and speedy ones at that, but the months ticking by are difficult. In the meantime Melissa and Nancy both volunteer for Fisher House which provides temporary housing for military families and veterans who are seeking medical attention at nearby military hospitals, in this case BAMC and CFI. Their volunteer work there includes outreach for military families.
I personally have to just sit back and admire for a second the difficulty that the families have to go through when their loved ones are serving. So many of our supporters our there are part of Move America Forward BECAUSE they are Blue Star or Gold Stars or because they have a nephew, niece, brother or sister, boyfriend or girlfriend, some type of relation in the service. We do as much as we can for the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan but the families have it just as tough, and while there are so many support groups out there for families, a lot of those groups are started, supported and run by – of course – military families. It’s just another testament to the inner strength and the discipline that goes beyond just the soldier, marine, sailor or airman…it’s the support group behind them.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Welcome to my first blog post for the second annual "Honoring Heroes at the Holidays" tour.
Immediately we were greeted by several members of the media: KTSA 5500 radio, KENS CBS Channel 5, KABB Fox Channel 29, and of course our friends at Univision too. While Debbie Lee gave a heartwarming recount of the altruistic actions of her hero and son, I had a nice interview with Alicia from KTSA 5500. As you may know, Debbie Lee is a Gold Star Mom whose son, Marc Alan Lee, was the first Navy SEAL to lay down his life for freedom in Iraq.
The boys and girls who serve this country become men and women quicker than you can imagine. They serve because they love all of us- so that even people they don't know can exercise their God-given freedoms back home. Please continue to support America's bravest by sending them care packages this Christmas. When these mighty warriors receive this little piece of home they are truly touched. Write them a personalized message and let them know that you love and appreciate them- they are strong warriors with big hearts who believe in their mission and are willing to lay their life down so that others may live a better one.
El Paso Rally
We awoke in Tucson and left the hotel promptly at 8:30 AM. The sleep deprivation on these tours is something that starts to wear on you by about the 2nd or third day, especially if you didnt sleep much on nights leading up to the tour! I slept on the bus for a while, it was supposed to be a 4hour drive to get to El Paso and I slept for about an hour on the bunk in the bus so the time passed quickly.
We had budgeted lots of time to make the trip so we actually arrived an hour early. We asked the manager of this Wal Mart where we would be allowed to park the bus and they allowed us to put it right up front!!! Awesome!
There were lots and lots of people passing by, doing their holiday shopping and wandering curiously over to see what was going on and why there was a huge red bus sitting on the sidewalk at their local superstore.
Even though it was a Monday and therefore not the weekend, one might expect to have only a sparsely populated Wal-Mart at 2pm, actually though, the parking lot was absolutely JAM PACKED. Another thing you notice, walking through the store, is that El Paso is REALLY a military town! We saw soldiers from Fort Bliss walking around all over the place!
This is also the first stop on our tour at Wal-Martswe chose to do lots of Wal Mart stops to try and encourage new people to find out about MAF, instead of only those who hear about us and get our emails from friends. Well we also needed some more pens and we were sorely in need of more printer paper (you never remember what you forgot to pack until you need it!) so Calvin and I were secretly plotting a shopping list while we helped people get shirts and explained the Candy Diplomacy tins.
While standing around I met a wonderful lady, the mother in law of Sgt. Javier Cardenas who is in Iraq right now serving his country. Her daughter is still here in El Paso taking care of their little boy who is six years old and who already seems like he wants to follow in his daddys footsteps. She told me that when he hears the pledge or allegiance he knows how to salute, and does so. Just thinking about that caused her to shed a tear or two while Diana was singing our national anthem.
Let us also not forget Suzanne Pollack, whose son Robert Eby just joined the U.S. Army. She told me that her son Robert joined in the Armys delayed entry program, so he signed up even before he was 18 and went straight from high school right to basic training.
Robert is 18 now and is stationed at Ft. Gordon, GA in the Signal Corps. He is an only child which worries his mother sometimes, especially because its a very real possibility that Robert could go to Iraq next year. If he does get sent to Iraq, thats the real nail biter, Suzanne told me, but I am proud of him. I am so proud. Robert comes from a tradition of military service, his father and uncles served and that, his mother says, is what she thinks inspired him to join the Army.
We also got a chance to talk at length with Duane Simmons and Benny Modkins who work on Ft. Bliss. Duane, originally from Charleston, SC is an instructor and Benny, a native son of El Paso, is training for deployment to Iraq.
Benny told me he would be leading an infantry group on missions such as day to day security patrols but with the emphasis and lead taken by Iraqi security forces. He also emphasized the transition of Iraqi National Police and Sons of Iraq into a regular, more conventional police force. This transition is probably the most important mission our troops have right now and our troops are helping and training the Iraqis every day to take over security for their own neighborhoods.
It was an awesome time to be out there with all those soldiers walking around the Wal-Mart. This store really supports its troops and its community. Butleave it to Move America Forwardwe got there early and yet somehow managed to start late and run the program late!!! We were already pressed for time and we hadnt even made our supply run yet! After a rushed shopping spree where we got some Airborne to keep us healthy and some duct tape, we were off on the road again!
Monday, December 15, 2008
It has been a couple days since the beginning of the HHH-II tour but we found these videos and news reports from some of our stops! Enjoy!
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Wow that was an amazing little reunion, and we even made some new friends too!
Our first stop! Henderson, Nevada loves our troops !
We just finished our first rally stop since leaving Sacramento yesterday!
Saturday, December 13, 2008
The big day is here and Move America Foward has already held our first tour stop on the Honoring Heroes at the Holidays II tour. The Sacramento crowds were good as we all stood up to honor our men and women in the Armed Forces. The air was cool, as it should be in Northern California as we approach Christmas. Special attention today went toward our Vietnam Veterans, as Sacramento held a parade for them!!! It warms my heart that we in the United States are trying to make up for the horrible way we treated our warriors as they returned from Vietnam. No man or woman serving our country should EVER be spat upon or called a baby killer.
Gold Star Mom Debbie Lee, whose son Marc was the first Navy SEAL to give his life in Iraq, is traveling with us. She will forever have an empty place at her table and in her heart, but she wants to make sure that our troops are remembered every day. That is why she has taken time away from her family to travel with Move America Foward across the country to send a strong message: We REALLY support our troops AND their mission!!!!
We are especially excited about this year's tour because we have a surpise ending!!! Due to security concerns, we cannot disclose our final destination. But we can tell you that we will be bringing holiday cheer to our brave men and women who have given their lives to the effort of American safety and security.
Our next stop is at 9 a.m. Sunday 9 a.m. tomorrow) in Henderson, Nevada, at the American Legion Post 40 425 E Van Wagenen St.
From there we will go to Phonenix, Ariz., for a 4 p.m stop and rally at the Veterans of Foreign Wars 804 E Purdue Ave. During these stops, you may sponsor a care package for our troops and drop off Christmas cards that we will deliver to our troops!!!
Please keep coming back here and to MoveAmericaForward.com for continual updates.
Friday, December 12, 2008
When Move America Forward kicks of our Heroes for the Holdidays II tour tomorrow, we do it for the men and women who give their all while we’re warm at home. We do it for guys like the Green Berets who will get Silver Stars for kicking butt and destroying terrorists. Hooah!!
Here’s the Washington Post story about the heroes in action:
By Ann Scott Tyson
After jumping out of helicopters at daybreak onto jagged, ice-covered rocks and into water at an altitude of 10,000 feet, the 12-man Special Forces team scrambled up the steep mountainside toward its target—an insurgent stronghold in northeast Afghanistan.
“Our plan,” Capt. Kyle M. Walton recalled in an interview, “was to fight downhill.”
But as the soldiers maneuvered toward a cluster of thick-walled mud buildings constructed layer upon layer about 1,000 feet farther up the mountain, insurgents quickly manned fighting positions, readying a barrage of fire for the exposed Green Berets.
A harrowing, nearly seven-hour battle unfolded on that mountainside in Afghanistan’s Nuristan province on April 6, as Walton, his team and a few dozen Afghan commandos they had trained took fire from all directions. Outnumbered, the Green Berets fought on even after half of them were wounded—four critically—and managed to subdue an estimated 150 to 200 insurgents, according to interviews with several team members and official citations.
Today, Walton and nine of his teammates from Operational Detachment Alpha 3336 of the 3rd Special Forces Group will receive the Silver Star for their heroism in that battle—the highest number of such awards given to the elite troops for a single engagement since the Vietnam War.
That chilly morning, Walton’s mind was on his team’s mission: to capture or kill several members of the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin (HIG) militant group in their stronghold, a village perched in Nuristan’s Shok Valley that was accessible only by pack mule and so remote that Walton said he believed that no U.S. troops, or Soviet ones before them, had ever been there.
But as the soldiers, each carrying 60 to 80 pounds of gear, scaled the mountain, they could already spot insurgents running to and fro, they said. As the soldiers drew closer, they saw that many of the mud buildings had holes in the foot-thick walls for snipers. The U.S. troops had maintained an element of surprise until their helicopters turned into the valley, but by now the insurgent leaders entrenched above knew they were the targets, and had alerted their fighters to rally.
Staff Sgt. Luis Morales of Fredericksburg was the first to see an armed insurgent and opened fire, killing him. But at that moment, the insurgents began blasting away at the American and Afghan troops with machine guns, sniper rifles and rocket-propelled grenades—shooting down on each of the U.S. positions from virtually all sides.
“All elements were pinned down from extremely heavy fire from the get-go,” Walton said. “It was a coordinated attack.” The insurgent Afghan fighters knew there was only one route up the valley and “were able to wait until we were in the most vulnerable position to initiate the ambush,” said Staff Sgt. Seth E. Howard, the team weapons sergeant.
Almost immediately, exposed U.S. and Afghan troops were hit. An Afghan interpreter was killed, and Staff Sgt. Dillon Behr was shot in the hip.
“We were pretty much in the open, there were no trees to hide behind,” said Morales, who with Walton pulled Behr back to their position. Morales cut open Behr’s fatigues and applied pressure to his bleeding hip, even though Morales himself had been shot in the right thigh. A minute later, Morales was hit again, in the ankle, leaving him struggling to treat himself and his comrade, he said. Absent any cover, Walton moved the body of the dead Afghan interpreter to shield the wounded.
Farther down the hill in the streambed, Master Sgt. Scott Ford, the team sergeant, was firing an M203 grenade launcher at the fighting positions, he recalled. An Afghan commando fired rocket-propelled grenades at the windows from which they were taking fire, while Howard shot rounds from a rocket launcher and recoilless rifle.
Go to the Washington Post for the rest of the story.
So what do you say you come out to show our thanks for the great soldiers like these Green Berets? Move America Forward will kick off ourHhonoring Heroes for the Holdiays II tour this morning at 9 a.m. in Sacramento, Calif.. at the Vietnam Memorial/Parade, 216 O St.
See you there!!
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