[SuziQ]

I just finished reading the autobiography of the man who designed those uniforms for Marines who had lost their hands or an arm in Iraq or Afghanistan. He talked to the men who had been injured, and they said they wanted to be able to dress themselves, so he came up with the band that includes Velcro closures.

His name is Vittorio Palumbo, now retired from his job as a tailor for the US Military, for many years, and specifically, in the final years, for the U.S. Marines. He is an Italian immigrant who arrived in the US in the mid-50s after having grown up in Mussolini's Italy. The book is "Italian Days, Arabian Nights", and deals with the family being part of plans to populate the area Mussolini considered Italy's Fourth Shore, in Libya. It is a fascinating book!

[pattyvita]

Great photos just posted on Pres. Bush's Facebook page. All from the GWB Institute's Voices of Freedom luncheon yesterday:

Bob Fu of China Aid Association presented President and Mrs. Bush with hand-copied bible pages from Chinese Prisoners which will be included in the George W. Bush Institute's Freedom Collection.

President Bush with Secretary General of the European People's Party, Antonio López-Istúriz White; Former President of the Government of Spain, His Excellency José María Aznar López; and former Cuban political prisoners Normando Hernández González, Regis Iglesias Ramírez, and Dr. José Luís García Paneque.

President Bush speaks at the George W. Bush Institute's Voices of Freedom Luncheon on November 1, 2011 in Irving, Texas.