Support our troops

Iraq, Support our troops, Vets for Freedom

Minneapolis high school cancels former student’s and Iraq vets’ talk

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Students skip school to see Iraq speech

CLICK ON IMAGE ... Pete Hegseth is a Minnesota, MN, native, he attended Forest Lake High School there, and graduated from Princeton University. He was awarded the Bronze Star for Meritorious Service for his 2005-2006 tour of duty in Iraq where he served as an infantry Platoon Leader in Baghdad and later as a Civil-Military Operations officer in Samarra. He also served in Guantanamo Bay for a year on a security mission with his National Guard unit and currently serves in the 1-69 Infantry, New York Army National Guard as a Captain.

Minneapolis’ Channel 5 News (KSTP.com) reports:

A veteran’s bus tour featuring decorated veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is stopping in the Twin Cities today. But controversy at Forest Lake High School forced the tour to make a change in plans. Capt. Pete Hegeseth founded the group Vets for Freedom. He is an Iraq War vet and a Forest Lake High School graduate. He received word yesterday that the school did not want the bus rolling through, calling the talk too political for a public school. He said parents and an outside group threatened to protest if they came. Instead, the group spoke at the Forest Lake American Legion. Dozens of students at Forest Lake High School were so upset that they skipped school to go see the speech [emphasis added mine].

CLICK ON IMAGE to view video and news report - Forest Lake High School student Elijah Miller

CLICK ON IMAGES FOR MORE INFORMATION

Among other Iraq War veterans denied the chance to speak at Forest Lake High School was Congressional Medal of Honor nominee and Silver Star recipient David Bellavia:

CLICK ON IMAGE - Medal of Honor nominee and Silver Star recipient David Bellavia

Today, after the visit to Forest Lake High School was cancelled, Staff Sergeant Bellavia spoke with Townhall.com talk-radio host Michael Gallagher. Here is the audio:

Accompanying Hegseth and Bellavia on the Vets for Freedom National Heroes Tour are:

Navy Cross recipient Marco Martinez

Navy Cross recipient Marcus Luttrell

Navy Cross recipient Jeremiah Workman

Bronze Star with 'V' device recipient Steve Russell

Michelle Malkin here and here has a lot more.

And Jim Hanson at Blackfive has this report and the following video of “…the event too dangerous for High School kids to see.”:

Go to the Vets for Freedom web site to learn more.

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9/11, heroes, Support our troops, World Trade Center

9/11 hero FDNY LT Kevin Dowdell’s sons answer the call

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The Dowdells

In his New York Daily News column today, Michael Daly writes of brave men:

Fire Lt. Kevin Dowdell was killed at the World Trade Center, but his living spirit carried one son into the FDNY and another to West Point. The older son, 24-year-old Army 1st Lt. Patrick Dowdell, departed for Iraq on St. Patrick’s Day. He was in the air even as his brother, 23-year-old Firefighter James Dowdell, marched in the parade for the first time as a member of the FDNY Emerald Society Pipes and Drums. The father was as fine a man as I have met, and the sons are everything he could have hoped they would become … I only wish I had known what to say. I would have had a hard enough time mustering the right words if he were going to a war with the whole country behind him, but when Americans think about the Iraq war at all, a majority think we should just leave…
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Patrick was on the way when Flaherty donned his big bearskin hat and raised his staff and led the band up Fifth Ave. Among those who followed was James Dowdell of Ladder 174. At the postparade gathering, Flaherty informed everybody not already aware that Patrick was on the way to Iraq, appropriately with a stopover in Shannon, Ireland. The band then played “The Army Goes Rolling Along,” the official Army song, in his honor.

The Dowdell boys’ mother was there, rightly proud of the two phenomenal sons of a phenomenal dad. Rosellen Dowdell has already lost a husband. Now her older son was heading into a war where the American toll has reached 4,000 dead. Still, she manages to laugh when she recounts what Patrick and James say to her as they place themselves in harm’s way. “They tell me, ‘It’s what we do,'” she said.