Actor known for his military roles lobbies for bill on naming of Marine department

The Hill ^ | 2-06-09 | Roxana Tiron

[444Flyer]

The actor who played the drill sergeant in “Full Metal Jacket” is coming to Washington, D.C., next week to lobby Congress to pass a long-stalled bill.

R. Lee Ermey is the national spokesman for a growing grassroots effort behind legislation sponsored by Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) that would rename the Department of the Navy as the Department of the Navy and Marine Corps.

Ermey, who was in the Marine Corps for 11 years, has been in over 100 movies, including “Apocalypse Now,” “Dead Man Walking” and “Leaving Las Vegas,” according to imdb.com.

Over the past decade, Jones has repeatedly pushed his colleagues to pass his bill. Jones’s bill has 367 co-sponsors. Roberts (R-Kan.), a Marine Corps veteran, introduced companion legislation last year.

The Marine Corps League, which is orchestrating the grassroots effort with Ermey, has started a petition-writing campaign and is bringing supporters of Jones’s legislation to Capitol Hill on Thursday.

“Marines have fought and died with their Navy brothers and sisters for more than 200 years,” said Michael Blum, Marine Corps League executive director in a statement. “It’s finally time to give the Marine Corps the recognition the branch has long deserved.”

Although the Marine Corps has been a separate service since the National Security Act of 1947, it does not get equal billing with the Navy, Air Force and Army, each of which has a Pentagon department named after it. Since the Marine Corps’s earliest days, it has operated under the Department of the Navy.

[Grimmy]

“I could go along with that! One giant USMC! (Except all the other pogues would have to go thru Boot Camp!)”

After they get a proper hair cut!

[USMCPOP]

Thanks, everyone, for the encouragement. The press conference went well though I haven’t seen a video of it. Gunny Ermey is a real hoot. He’s a Marine and a straightforward guy, no doubt about it. Congressman Walter Jones is a heck of nice guy as well.

Interestingly, at the get-together at a local watering hole afterwards, I bumped in to a guy who was a platoon-mate of my son’s about 6 years back! He spotted me - it’s sometimes a good thing to be a small, skinny, scruffy guy with a beard. :)

[444Flyer]

Thanks for the update Pop. What a good story. Running into that platoon-mate of your son’s must have been the capper on the whole day. Wonderful.

Here’s to winning the battle.:)

“For over 221 years our Corps has done two things for this great Nation. We make Marines, and we win battles.”

~Gen. Charles C. Krulak, USMC (CMC); 5 May 1997