Free Republic

Howie live thread starting off with his Sunday Herald column

I wonder if anyone here imagines that Obama will do a Captain Queeg-like meltdown if the pressure grows? I would love to hear from others...

WASHINGTON, March 14, 2008 – Marine Capt. John Sand knows what it takes to be a good college student: go to class, read the book, and take good notes. And, for him, first spend four years in the Marine Corps. Marine Capt. John Sand is telling his story to audiences around the country as part of the Defense Department’s “Why We Serve” public-outreach program. Defense Department photo  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. This realization came after Sand spent a few years as a not-so-good college student after high school, he said. “I had a 0.8 grade point average...

WASHINGTON, March 7, 2008 – Air Force Capt. Edward V. Szczepanik thinks his experiences -- both good and bad -- can help the American people understand the challenges servicemembers face in the war on terror. Air Force Capt. Edward V. Szczepanik is one of 12 servicemembers who have deployed in the war on terror who are part of the Defense Department’s “Why We Serve” public-outreach program.  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The captain, a C-17 Globemaster III transport jet pilot based at McChord Air Force Base, Wash., is one of 12 servicemembers who have deployed in the war...

ELMENDORF AIR FORCE BASE, Alaska, March 4, 2008 – An Air Force fighter pilot assigned to 3rd Wing here will be among the contestants on the March 6 episode of “Jeopardy!” “Jeopardy!” host Alex Trebek and Air Force Capt. Timothy Bobinski, 19th Fighter Squadron chief of safety, pose on the set of “America's Favorite Quiz Show.” Bobinski was a contestant on an episode of the show taped in November. The episode is due to air March 6, 2008. Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures Television  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Capt. Timothy Bobinski, 19th Fighter Squadron chief of safety,...

BAGHDAD - There were no cheering crowds or ticker tape parade Friday along the dangerous airport road to greet Iraq's Asian Cup soccer champs. And the team's captain, a Sunni who scored the winning goal, didn't even return because he feared for his life. But several hundred fans waved Iraqi flags and scuffled with police as they pushed through airport security to greet the country's soccer heroes as they stepped off a charter plane about 7 p.m. Police wielded truncheons against some in the crowd who were trying to touch goalkeeper Nour Sabri. He was hoisted onto the teammates' shoulders...

The captain of Iraq's victorious football teams has said he will not return to his home country because he fears being killed. Younis Mahmoud scored the only goal of the game with a header in the 71st-minute to give win the Asia Cup for Iraq. But afterwards, the 24-year-old said he would not be returning to Iraq as he feared for his life if he went home to celebrate the victory.

The costume party caper in which police said a Melbourne doctor dressed as comic book superhero Captain America groped a woman at a city bar and battered her boyfriend has cost him his job, Local 6 News partner Florida Today reported.Raymond Douglas Adamcik, 54, was charged with misdemeanor battery, disorderly conduct, resisting an officer without violence and marijuana possession in connection with the April 21 incident at On Tap Sports Cafe and Lounge in Melbourne.Deborah Young, director of physician services for Melbourne Internal Medicine Associates, or MIMA, the group that oversaw Adamcik's practice in their Palm Bay facility since October...

West Point — A 2004 West Point graduate who found God after graduation has turned to the courts to win approval for a conscientious objector discharge. Capt. Peter D. Brown, currently stationed at Camp Stryker in Iraq, has retained the help of the New York Civil Liberties Union to battle Uncle Sam. "Jesus taught that I should bless those who curse me and not fight back against evil with force," Brown wrote in court papers filed last week in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. "So instead of paying back others with force, I am supposed to love...

Identical twins Capt. Jordan Burfield (left), Company C, 1st Battalion, 227th Aviation Regiment, 1st Air Cavalry Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division and Capt. Jonah Burfield, 47th Ordnance Company, 79th Ordnance Battalion, are reunited at the Al Faw Palace on Camp Victory in western Baghdad for their promotions to captain, July 1, 2007. This deployment has been the longest period of time the Lacrosse, Wis., natives have been separated. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Shea Butler U.S. Army Capt. Jordan Burfield U.S. Army Capt. Jonah Burfield Identical Twins Pin on Captain’s Bars Together By Spc. Shea Butler 7th Mobile Public Affairs...

WASHINGTON, April 11, 2007 – Much to her parent’s chagrin, when Jessica Murphy was in fourth grade she joined the boy’s flag football team. “I was a little 4-foot, 50-pound string bean,” she said. “I loved playing, but once I got to the age where the team started tackling, my mom made me quit.” The Milwaukee native said her can-do attitude and tendency to buck stereotypes carried through to her college years when, unbeknownst to her parents, she applied for and was awarded an ROTC scholarship. After earning a degree in political science from the University of Minnesota, Twin...

Captain Cook is scuppered by book By Nick Squires in Sydney Last Updated: 9:02am GMT 20/03/2007 The image of Captain Cook stepping onto the shores of Botany Bay has been a staple of British history books for generations but now it seems the explorer may have been beaten to Australia by the Portuguese, who arrived 250 years earlier. A new appraisal of 16th century maps offers evidence that a small Portuguese fleet charted much of Australia's coast as early as 1522. It has long been known that Cook was preceded by Dutch navigators, whose ships were wrecked on the coast...

11/12/2006 - LONDON (AFPN) -- The Royal Air Force Habbaniya Association honored Air Force Capt. Jutta Cortes by obtaining "exceptional permission" for her to march in the annual Remembrance Day Parade near the Cenotaph in London. Captain Cortes earned the honor after she responded to a special request from the association's honorary secretary, Dr. Christopher Morris. Last year, Dr. Morris read an article in an American military publication about Captain Cortes' unit training Iraqi police forces at what used to be RAF Habbaniya. After a few weeks of research, Dr. Morris contacted Captain Cortes requesting that she perform a traditional...

The captain of the USS Cole, who saved his ship from sinking after an al-Qa'eda suicide attack by speedboat, has lashed out at senior Pentagon staff blocking his promotion because of allegations that he could have done more to protect the ship. Commander Kirk Lippold, who now serves behind a desk at the Pentagon, accused the head of the navy, Admiral Mike Mullen, and the navy secretary of "over-riding the judgment" of officers who had recommended his promotion. He complained he was the only officer being held to account for the attack in Aden harbour six years ago. The Cole...

As far as the Mass. Turnpike goes, it’s “Fat Matt Who?” When it comes to turning someone into a non-person, the old Soviet Union had nothing on the modern Pike. All up and down the hack highway, Fat Matt’s name (and it was everywhere) has been either painted over or covered up with a piece of adhesive plastic. You’ll find more Pilgrim hats with Indian arrows through them on the Pike than signs with Fat Matt’s name. When you’re out, you’re out. Unfortunately, it’s going to be a lot more difficult to pry Fat Matt’s hacks out of the public...

(PRWEB) July 8, 2006 -- As Independence weekend celebrations spread throughout the United States, V.I.P. Promotions Founder/CEO Tommy Nero interviewed U.S. Army Captain James Van Thach while he was spending his July 4th, weekend deployed to Baghdad, Iraq on his first overseas tour of duty. "It's so unusual these days, Captain Thach, to find young people even thinking about devoting their lives to something greater than themselves May I ask why you volunteered to join the Infantry after finishing Touro Law School?" "Mr. Nero, there are higher callings in life than just focusing on building a very comfortable lifestyle for...

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. (Feb. 8, 2006) -- While fencing in high school and college, every elegant move made by Capt. Brain R. von Kraus was well thought out, even in the most heated duels. These same swift, but calculated decisions were made on Jan. 25, 2004 during an ambush where then 1st Lt. Von Kraus displayed exceptional bravery as he dismounted his vehicle and entered the enemy kill zone to aid his stricken Marines. For these actions, von Kraus was awarded the Silver Star here Feb. 8 by Maj. Gen. Richard F. Natonski, commanding general of the...

MANAMA, Bahrain (NNS) -- England’s Prince Andrew awarded Capt. John Peterson the Honorary Order of the British Empire (OBE) during an investiture ceremony Jan. 25 at the British Embassy in Manama, Bahrain. Peterson, chief of staff for Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, was given the prestigious award for his leadership of coalition forces, which included a large number of Royal Navy sailors and marines, in the campaign to secure Iraqi oil assets during the onset of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. Prince Andrew, who is the Duke of York, knight commander and aide-de-camp to Queen Elizabeth II, congratulated Peterson...

Like Temple, Lou, Murph, others, I too have my own memories of Christmas in uniform. My recollections go back to a time close to when Lou was a captain aboard a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I was a Marine corporal on Okinawa, sitting on my rack in a dingy squad bay, listening over-and-over to a cassette tape of Christmas wishes from family and friends, eating some chocolate-chip cookies Mom had made for me, looking at family pictures, and doing what all American soldiers and sailors have been doing during the month of December since 1775 – dreaming of home.

Meet Brian Chontosh. Churchville-Chili Central School class of 1991. Proud graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology. Husband and about-to-be father. First lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps. And a genuine hero. The secretary of the Navy said so yesterday. At 29 Palms in California Brian Chontosh was presented with the Navy Cross, the second highest award for combat bravery the United States can bestow. That's a big deal. But you won't see it on the network news tonight, and all you read in Brian's hometown newspaper was two paragraphs of nothing. Instead, it was more blather about some...

Like the exploits of 21st-century special operators – including U.S. Navy SEALs, Army Delta soldiers, Force Recon Marines, Air Force commandos, and CIA paramilitary operatives – stories of men like Ortiz are rarely gleaned from books, newspapers, and magazines. Their incredibly dangerous work often goes unseen and is thankless.

Recruit Daniel Murphy, who in college was a 325-pound offensive lineman protecting quarterbacks and opening holes for running backs, lost 100 pounds to join the U.S. Marines, the military's swift-moving, expeditionary shock troops.

BAGRAM AIRFIELD, AFGHANISTAN, Aug. 11, 2005 — When Sgt. 1st Class Cliff Burgoyne decided to re-enlist in the Army, he needed an officer from his unit to swear him in. Luckily, his brother was available. Burgoyne, 39, from Slidell, La., is currently deployed to Afghanistan as the scout platoon sergeant with 1st Battalion, 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division. His brother, Capt. Jeffrey T. Burgoyne, 34, is the commander of the battalion's B Company. The captain re-enlisted his brother in front of a crowd of paratroopers during a short ceremony outside the battalion's tents here July 28. “It made...

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - An Army captain investigated for allegedly ordering his troops to kill suspected Iraqi insurgents in retaliation for a deadly U.S. base attack will not be prosecuted, Army officials said Friday. A prosecutor last month said he submitted three pages of possible charges against Capt. Matthew Cunningham, including solicitation of murder and involuntary manslaughter, and was waiting on his superiors to file charges. But 10 days later, Staff Sgt. Shane Werst, one of Cunningham's subordinates who shot an Iraqi during a raid, was acquitted of murder. Lt. Col. Jonathan Withington, a 4th Infantry Division spokesman, said...

former captain of the Black Panther Party, who was convicted of killing a park ranger near San Francisco 31 years ago, has been granted parole, though law enforcement officials made a last-ditch attempt Wednesday to block his release. Veronza Leon Curtis Bowers Jr., 59, is expected to walk free from a federal prison in Coleman, Fla., on June 21, according to officials at the U.S. Parole Commission. "If he gets into trouble, he could be kept in," said Tom Hutchison, a spokesman for the Maryland-based Parole Commission. But most inmates close to their release date, he said, "just bide their...

MADRID, Spain (AP) - The captain of the Greenpeace boat, "The Rainbow Warrior," was sentenced Tuesday to six months in prison for disobedience during a protest against the war in Iraq in 2003. Three other members of the group were absolved in the case while a fourth was fined, Spanish National Radio said. The case stemmed from the detention of the five on March 14, 2003, for staging a protest aboard the boat captained by Daniel Rizzotti, an Argentine citizen, near the U.S.-Spanish Rota naval base in southern Spain. Before being arrested, the activists managed to delay for a day...

Caption The Captain The Navy is commissioning a Nuclear Attack Submarine and naming it after one of the worst presidents ever to reside in the White House. -- Caption or Photoshop this scene --

A new book reveals Iraqi insurgents were paid to take out U.S. Army Capt. David Rozelle in June, 2003. In Back in Action Rozelle details the conversations he had with friendly Iraqis alerting him to the sinister plot. "Captain, there are men in town who are planning missions in our mosques, under the command of clerics here and from Ar Ramadi." Rozelle, at the time, was the de facto sheriff of the region, which included a Ba'ath Party headquarters called Hit (pronounced "heat."). "These men I do not know," continued his trusted Iraqi translator, "but they are dangerous. Some are...

Ken Freiberg, who loved to ride in an old fire engine as founder of Captain Ken's Firehouse Baked Beans in the Minnesota State Fair parade, died Monday of cancer. He was 91. Freiberg rode in the parade for 28 years, usually in his beloved 1923 Ahrens Fox antique fire engine, before finally taking his last parade ride in September 2000 at age 87. "It comes a time you have to quit," the Marine on St. Croix resident said in a Pioneer Press interview for his last ride. "You don't know what's going to happen at my age." It was a...

Sloniker Sends: Got the following from an Army Guard pilot from Missouri currently serving in Balad Iraq: Jim, I will do my best to recount what happened on November 12, 2004. I will only try to relay the facts. It is Standing Operating Procure for us to fly in pairs. Nov 12 was no exception. After what seemed like a routine flying mission over Baghdad. Dan Milberg was leading his flight of two UH-60 Blackhawk's back to our base at Balad. They were about 20 miles from Balad flying over a large date palm grove. The area North of Baghdad...

In the opening scene of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, a Zeppelin docks with the airship mooring mast atop the Empire State Building. In the real world of yesterday, this feat was attempted only once, and was abandoned as being far too dangerous. This failed effort demonstrated the peril of trying to make real what begins as marketing hype. The mooring mast had only been added to the architectural designs of the Empire State Building in order to make it taller than the competing Chrysler building. Sky Captain also falls into a trap laid by its own hype....

<p>April 9 (Bloomberg) -- You don't have to ponder the absence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq to notice the Bush administration has trouble admitting it erred.</p> <p>Consider a smaller, quieter misadventure. Consider the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's war on hemp, a harmless and healthy food source.</p>

A-10 Pilot Wows Smithsonian Crowd by Senior Master Sgt. Rick Burnham Air Force News March 30, 2004 WASHINGTON -- The Iraqi republican guard may have had luck on their side that miserable Baghdad day, but they did not know who was flying the A-10 Thunderbolt II they had just hit with a rocket. It was April 7, 2003, and an elite unit of Iraqis had U.S. forces pinned down along the Tigris River, firing rocket-propelled grenades into their position, not far from the North Baghdad Bridge. The word from the forward-air controller on the ground with the U.S. forces indicated...

Fire captain wins discrimination case Jury orders city to pay Alan Silvester $250,000 02/07/04 By JOE DANBORN Staff Reporter Federal jurors on Friday ordered the city of Mobile to pay more than $250,000 to a white Fire-Rescue Department captain who was passed over for promotion in favor of a black colleague with considerably less seniority. The eight-member jury -- which included one black -- concluded that department officials, particularly Chief Steve Dean, discriminated against Capt. Alan Silvester on the basis of race, then retaliated against him for suing over the matter. Paul Carbo, a lawyer for the city, said he...

<p>CNN) -- Television's Captain Kangaroo, Bob Keeshan, died Friday morning in Vermont, a family friend told CNN. He was 76.</p> <p>Keeshan as Captain Kangaroo in 1981.</p> <p>He died after a long illness, his family told The Associated Press.</p> <p>"Captain Kangaroo," a children's show, featured the walrus-mustached, bowl-haircut Keeshan entertaining youngsters with his gentle, whimsical humor. Among the show's other characters were the puppets Bunny Rabbit and Mr. Moose, as well as Dancing Bear and the laconic Mr. Green Jeans (Hugh Brannum).</p>

NEW YORK (AP) - The captain involved in last week's Staten Island Ferry crash that killed 10 people will be suspended for refusing to cooperate with the federal investigation, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Wednesday. The captain, Michael Gansas, sent a letter to city officials saying he was refusing to talk, Bloomberg said. "It's an outrage that somebody who can give us information to perhaps find out how we can improve service refuses to talk," said Bloomberg. "A person like that has no business working for the city, and we will take every legal action we can to get his testimony."...

A Riverdale police captain accused of urinating into a pond at a Metro Atlanta theme park turned himself into authorities in Fayette County Wednesday. "He had every intention of turning himself in right away as soon as he could talk to me about the charges," said attorney Leslie Miller Terry. Riverdale Police Captain Carl Freeman is accused of relieving himself while outdoors at the Dixieland Fun Park in Fayette County. The incident happened as Freeman stood on a bridge over the "feed-the-fish pond." "On Monday, Labor Day, Mr. Freeman was allegedly observed by the park owner urinating in a man-made...

<p>GALION -- A 19-year-old Galion woman was charged with several counts involving drugs after consenting to a vehicle search as police investigated her claim she was raped.</p> <p>A Galion Police Department report said officers stopped the woman at Portland Way South at Grove Avenue for speeding at 1:26 a.m. Tuesday.</p>

This is the captain speaking. Who wants to get off? By Paul Stokes (Filed: 12/08/2003) Fourteen passengers, including a former pilot, refused to rejoin a holiday flight after they were involved in two high-speed test runs to check a faulty warning light. The light came on as flight MYT392, a Boeing 757-200 operated by MyTravel, was preparing to take off from Minorca with 230 passengers bound for Leeds-Bradford airport. It indicated that the aircraft was airborne when it was still on the ground. The captain used the recognised procedure of accelerating along the taxiway, a test area beside the runway,...

UWAJIMA, Japan (AP) - In a highly emotional visit Sunday, the former captain of a U.S. nuclear submarine that collided with a Japanese fishing boat laid flowers at a memorial for nine people to offer his personal apology. Retired U.S. Navy Cmdr. Scott Waddle was at the helm of the USS Greeneville when it surfaced beneath the Ehime Maru on Feb. 9, 2001, sinking the student fishing vessel off the coast of Hawaii, killing nine of the 35 people aboard. Wearing a black suit and a tie, Waddle bowed deeply as he entered the victims' school with two American lawyers....

PHILADELPHIA (AP) . Marvel Comics is shaking up one of its iconic superheroes . and some fans . with a series that imagines the original ``Captain America'' as a black Army recruit. Since 1941, the series has followed the escapades of Steve Rogers, the scrawny, white Army reject who gained supernatural powers after drinking super-soldier serum. In the new prequel, called ``Truth: Red, White & Black'' . which Marvel Comics feted at a launch event in Philadelphia on Friday . the Army first tests the serum on three black recruits, one of whom gains superpowers. ``(The concept) is that basically...

<p>SYDNEY, Australia (Reuters) --Captain Cook fans who credit the English explorer-adventurer with the formal "discovery" of eastern Australia may have to think again.</p> <p>History teacher Greg Jefferys said on Tuesday he believed he had found remains of a Portuguese warship buried under a beach in what is now the state of Queensland and he had dated the wreck to as much as 200 years before James Cook landed in Botany Bay.</p>

AL-MUKALLA: The explosion which crippled a French supertanker off Yemen could not be due to a technical fault, the ship's captain, Hubert Ardillon, told reporters here on Tuesday. "The way the explosion happened it could not be due to a technical problem," Ardillon said. "A member of the crew told me he saw a small boat approach and I believe him." A US official said on Monday that initial evidence suggested that Sunday's explosion that crippled the Limburg was accidental, as Yemen has claimed, and not terrorism.

The cheating captain loved PVC on his privates THE Army officer who seduced his corporal's wife liked to wear a shiny black PVC thong under his Princess of Wales Regiment uniform. Immaculate Captain Allan Appleby even had Alison Carter's red G-string stuffed in his trouser pocket as he barked parade ground orders at unsuspecting Corporal Ronnie Carter. And as Appleby's affair was probed by the Army's Special Investigations Branch this week, 34DD Alison revealed the full range of his kinky urges to the News of the World. "His nickname for me was 'frilly knickers'—hardly surprising because he was obsessed with...