Free Republic

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – An Afghan insurgent's homemade bomb shattered Marc Esposito's lower legs, broke his back and knocked him cold for four days. But the Air Force staff sergeant says the worst part was being torn from his Special Operations teammates who stayed in the field after he was evacuated. A year later, Esposito says, he's found a new team fighting a different kind of battle — the U.S. military's first Warrior Games for wounded servicemen and women at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. "Just like you would in a wartime scenario or a battlefield, you...

CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE BASRA, Iraq, Nov. 4, 2009 – The game is dominoes on this autumnal night on Camp Savage. Army Maj. Joan Carrick shuffles the small spotted tiles, then sends them skidding around the card table. Across the table sits Carrick’s dominoes partner, Army Staff Sgt. Larry Saunders. To her left and right sit her opponents for the night, Army Capt. Timothy Vandewalle and an Iraqi interpreter known as Denzel. Army Maj. Joan Carrick, Army Capt. Timothy Vandewalle, Army Staff Sgt. Larry Saunders, and an Iraqi interpreter known only as Denzel play dominoes on Camp Savage, Iraq, Oct. 14,...

Passion Two weeks before Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ flashed onto movie screens, online ticket merchants reported that up to half their total sales were for advance purchases for The Passion of the Christ. One Dallas multiplex reserved all 20 of its screens for The Passion. That said, I am neither a prophet nor a movie critic. I am merely an Orthodox rabbi using ancient Jewish wisdom to make three predictions about The Passion. First: Mel Gibson and Icon Productions will make a great deal of money. Those distributors who surrendered to pressure from Jewish organizations and passed on...