Free Republic

Pull up a chair to the fireplace, crank up the lap top and join us for a Nite Cap and a cigar at NiteCap at Freedom Radio. This week we have 3 terrific guests. Nick Popaditch, aka "Gunny Pop", a fabulous Vet running for the House from southern California and author of "Once a Marine". Also welcome Susan Bonner, RN and author who has written a very timely book "Opening a Registered Nurses Eyes" Susan is also the producer of another show on BTR. We also are honored to welcome to the Freedom Radio family another Vet, Col. Frank Ryan...

As his M1 Abrams tank, nicknamed Bonecrusher, rolled through Fallujah, Iraq, Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch thought about the trail of dead insurgents left in its wake: “Fight and you die. Run and you die. Hide and you die. Hey, this works for me.” Popaditch, or “Gunny Pop” as his Marines called him, commanded a tank platoon during the first Battle of Fallujah in April 2004. Fighting only a week after four American contractors from Blackwater USA were captured, killed and their bodies hung from a bridge, Bonecrusher and Popaditch’s other tank were working with Marine infantry in clearing insurgents out...

Former Marine Nick Popaditch, aka the Cigar Marine, is running for the Republican nomination to challange the incumbent Democrat in the California 51st Congressional race for 2010. He needs your support. The district is heavily Democratic and he faces an uphill struggle but this Marine is one tough opponent. This man is a true war hero, not some "Swift Boat" wannabe. His slogan, "A Marines word is his bond", says it all. He gained national popularity when he was photographed atop his tank turret smoking a cigar at the fall of Baghdad. Later in the war he was seriously wounded...

Tonight on Red Eye: Author Sgt. Nick Popaditch. My God, what a difference.... Gunny Pop or Bobby "I make Waxman look handsome Filner...

Decorated Marine veteran Nick Popaditch on Tuesday announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination in the 51st Congressional District seat held by Democrat Bob Filner. Nicknamed “Gunny Pop,” Popaditch served two separate stints in the Marines. He was a tank commander during the Persian Gulf war and honorably discharged in 1992 after six years. Tiring of civilian life, he rejoined the Marines in 1995. A widely circulated photograph after the fall of Baghdad in 2003 shows the tank commander and platoon sergeant smoking a cigar in front of the statue of Saddam Hussein just before his unit helped tear it...

After a rocket-propelled grenade hit him in the head, Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch thought he had his hardest struggle in surgery. But it was the desk job that almost killed his soul. "I was in a job I didn't want, didn't know anything about and I sucked at it," the former Marine Tank Commander said. A San Diego resident and Silver Star recipient, Popaditch told the...Rotary club Thursday night about his experience at the invasion of Baghdad in 2003, his survival of the attack on his tank in 2004 and his recovery. A coauthor of the book "Once a Marine,"...

National Review Editor Rich Lowry first discussed President Barack Obama's speech last night and talked about his new book "Banquo's Ghosts." Next, we welcomed Co-Author of "Once a Marine," Nick Popaditch to share his story about the war in Iraq and his day-to-day life of a career Marine noncommissioned staff officer. In our final hour, Author of "All About All About Eve," "When Blanche Met Brando," "Close-up on Sunset Boulevard," Sam Staggs expounded on his new book "Born to Be Hurt," which takes on the classic 1959 Douglas Sirk film starring Lana Turner.

I know you are all busy, but you need to meet this guy. He is on his way today to NYC to speak to Marines and families tomorrow, on 9-11. He, too, has given a lot. I know a lot of you are strong supporters of our military and men and women who serve our country. Below is a link to a Hollywood-style book trailer on youtube.com we prepared for "Once a Marine: An Iraq War Tank Commander's Inspirational Memoir of Combat, Courage, and Recovery," by Nick Popaditch with Mike Steere (Savas Beatie, October 1, 2008). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPDpg7FC0sI YES, THAT IS...

My name is April Popaditch, wife of Gysgt Nick Popaditch (ret) AKA Cee-gar Marine to FreeRepublic. This web site was such a source of strength to my family and I when my husband was wounded in Fallujah, Iraq April 2004. The beauty of the words and prayers that we read on a daily basis from all of you, will stay in our hearts forever. Military life is a sacrifice but one you never regret. Support from people you've never met, is life affirming and gives us the strength to carry on our new missions in life. I hear on the...

Snowmass, Colo. -- April 7, 2005 -- Nicholas Popaditch, a Marine Corps veteran from Twenty-Nine Palms, Calif.,is enjoying the challenge of skiing, and an opportunity for self-development at the 19th National Disabled Veterans Winter Soprts Clinic. The Clinic is taking place April 3 - 8 in Snowmass Village, Colo. Established in 1987, the National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic is the largest annual rehabilitation event of its kind in the world. It is co-sponsored by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Disabled American Veterans (DAV). Popaditch, 37, a combat-wounded veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom/Operation Enduring Freedom, is among...

Letters from Munster students last spring lifted the spirits of a former region resident injured in Iraq, but a chance encounter thousands of miles away during summer vacation brought their teacher and the soldier together. Marine Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch, who lived in Hammond as a youngster, was made famous around the globe when a photograph appeared of him smoking a celebratory cigar in front of the toppled statue of Saddam Hussein. That's when Janet Salinas, a fourth-grade teacher at St. Paul Lutheran School, learned he was related to one of her pupils. Popaditch later lost his right eye and...

'Cigar Marine' gets hero's homecoming Hammond native returns to region from Iraq BY SUSAN ERLER Times Staff Writer HIGHLAND -- The war in Iraq took his right eye, nearly deafened his right ear and left scars, now nearly healed, on his otherwise smooth face. No matter. Marine Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch would go back in a heartbeat, he said Sunday. "I plan to go back once I get able to see the bad guy," said Popaditch at an emotional homecoming thrown by family and friends at American Legion Memorial Post 180. Popaditch, who grew up in Hammond before moving to...

U.S. Marine Corps Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch 'Cigar Marine' Returns Home Less One Eye, But With Spirit Intact By U.S. Marine Corps Sgt. Jennie Haskamp Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center TWENTYNINE PALMS, Calif., May 17, 2004 — As Marine Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch sat and watched his 10-year-old son play third base on May 8 at Luckie Park in Twentynine Palms, Calif., he couldn't hide his enthusiasm. Popaditch, a Hammond, Ind., native, hadn't planned on making it to these games. "One month ago, I was in Iraq, and I assumed I'd watch his first baseball season on video tape...

<p>A former Indianapolis man known for his smiling, cigar-smoking image aboard a tank during the capture of Baghdad a year ago Friday was seriously wounded this week after volunteering to go back to the war.</p> <p>Marine Gunnery Sgt. Nick "Pop" Popaditch, 36, suffered facial injuries and lost an eye after a rocket-propelled grenade hit his tank Wednesday in Fallujah, the military said.</p>

INDIANAPOLIS - A Marine from Indiana whose smiling, cigar-smoking image helped symbolize the fall of Baghdad a year ago suffered severe head injuries in fighting this week in the besieged Iraqi city of Fallujah. AP Photo Gunnery Sgt. Nick Popaditch, 36, of Terre Haute, marked Friday's one-year anniversary of the fall at a U.S. military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. Surgeons removed a piece of shrapnel that lodged near his optic nerve when a rocket-propelled grenade slammed into his tank Tuesday in Fallujah, his wife said Friday. "He had to have his right eye removed. He's very concerned about that," April...