"NO GREATER GIFT: In 1943, tiny box warmed lonely Michigan soldier's heart on Christmas
by Jeff Seidel, Free Press staff writer, December 23, 2004
Christmas Eve, 1943, Bougainville Island, South Pacific
As darkness fell, the bombing began again.
Leonard Owczarzak, a 19-year-old private first class from Detroit, hunkered in a hole, firing a .50-caliber antiaircraft machine gun at Japanese bombers.
"They bombed us all night," Owczarzak remembers. "They knew damn well it was our holiday. They kept us up, all night long, continuously."
There was no pattern to the attacks. One plane. Three planes. Two planes. They seemed to come every hour, all night long"
"Bush to Renominate Judges Blocked by DemocratsLink
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush (news - web sites) said on Thursday he would renominate a group of controversial judicial nominees who were blocked by Senate Democrats, signaling the start of a second-term battle over the make-up of the nation's top courts.
Emboldened by his re-election victory and gains by Republicans in the Senate, Bush plans to renominate a total of 20 nominees to the nation's court of appeals and district courts, the White House said.
"The president nominated highly qualified individuals to the federal courts during his first term, but the Senate failed to vote on many nominations," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.
During the hard-fought presidential campaign, Bush sought to brand Senate Democrats, who blocked 10 of his judicial nominees, as obstructionists. Democrats accused Bush of trying to tilt the courts with "right-wing extremists."