Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
FNC; CNN
June 2, 2008 Special Report With Brit Hume (FNC), 6:00 PM
BRIT HUME: President Bush today presented the nation’s highest military honor to the parents of a young soldier in Iraq who sacrificed his life to save several members of his unit. National security correspondent Jennifer Griffin reports on the story of an American hero.
MAN: Lord, we’re constantly amazed at the way you orchestrate events in a person’s life.
JENNIFER GRIFFIN: It is the highest award for valor in combat, the Medal of Honor, and the president has only awarded four for service in Afghanistan and Iraq before today, to recognize an Army private who threw his body on a grenade tossed into his military vehicle as it traveled in Adamiyah, Iraq, on December 4th, 2006. Private First Class Ross McGinnis was manning the 50-caliber machine gun on top.
DAN WALSH [White House Military Aide]: In a selfless act of bravery in which he was mortally wounded, Private McGinnis covered the live grenade, pinning it between his body and the vehicle and absorbing most of the explosion.
GRIFFIN: It’s what soldiers are trained to do, but few know if he or she would do the same.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Private McGinnis could have easily jumped from the Humvee and saved himself.
GRIFFIN: When asked in kindergarten what he wanted to be when he grew up, Ross McGinnis drew a soldier. One of three children from Knox, Pennsylvania, he is survived by his parents and two sisters. McGinnis worked after school at McDonald’s and signed up for the Army on his 17th birthday.
TOM MCGINNIS, FATHER: His life was very short. It wasn’t an exciting story until it got right to the end. But he just made the right decision when it was required.
GRIFFIN: The four men whose lives were saved that day were at the White House on this one.
SOLDIER: Yeah, I remember the whole thing. We all do, every day.
GRIFFIN: Staff Sergeant Ian Newland was severely injured in the blast. Shrapnel to his face and head forced him to retire.
STAFF SGT. IAN NEWLAND, U.S. ARMY: Life is the easy part now. Now our part’s over.
GRIFFIN: And the little things don’t seem to matter.
NEWLAND: It’s not something to get upset about when less than a year ago we were where we were.
GRIFFIN: Where they were is a very different place now, much improved in the 18 months since Ross McGinnis gave his life. His father said his son made a simple kindergarten mathematical calculation, four is greater than one. But it was one that was greater than the whole. At the Pentagon, Jennifer Griffin, Fox News.
The Situation Room (CNN), 5:00 PM
WOLF BLITZER: President Bush today presented the Medal of Honor to the parents of a soldier who died saving the lives of others in an act of heroism that took place in the blink of an eye.
Our senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JAMIE MCINTYRE: The few seconds it takes to look at this photograph of 19-year-old Ross McGinnis manning his 50 caliber machine gun is about the same amount of time McGinnis had to decide whether to jump out of his humvee and save himself or sit down and take a live grenade for his buddies. Inside, the platoon leader.
SGT. 1ST CLASS CEDRIC THOMAS, U.S. ARMY: You have a split second to make a decision. What are you going to do? Are you going to get out or are you going to sit on it?
MCINTYRE: The medic.
SPEC. SEAN LAWSON, U.S. ARMY: There's no right or wrong for that. If he jumped out nobody would have blamed him.
MCINTYRE: The soldier who saw the grenade come in.
STAFF SGT. IAN NEWLAND, U.S. ARMY: I gathered pretty directly what was about to happen. I dropped my rifle and started to put my hands up to cover my face.
MCINTYRE: And the driver who thought he was dead.
SGT. LYLE BUEHLER, U.S. ARMY: It was scary. I can tell you that. All I knew, I didn't know how much time I had. I just -- I didn't think I had enough time to get out of the truck.
NEWLAND: McGinnis yelled out grenade. By the time it registered what happened the grenade went off.
LAWSON: He wasn't going to leave us. He sat back down.
NEWLAND: McGinnis had jumped back on the radio where is the grenade was lodged welcome like a chair and he a sat back on it.
MCINTYRE: He saved your life.
BUEHLER: I think about it every day.
MCINTYRE: In a White House ceremony, Tom and Romayne McGinnis accepted the posthumous Medal of Honor from President Bush.
TOM MCGINNIS, FATHER: He was a very young man. He didn't have an exceptional adventurous life. His life was a short story with a sad ending.
MCINTYRE: The parents are proud but still grieving for a son who struggled but found himself in the Army.
T. MCGINNIS: Ross was a happy, very energetic, likable boy. I hesitate to say man because we didn't get to know him too well as a man. The lives of four men who were his army brothers outweighed the value of his one life. It was just a matter of simple kindergarten arithmetic. Four means more than one. He was a hero to us long before he died. Because he was willing to risk his life to protect the ideals of freedom and justice that American represents.
MCINTYRE: Jamie McIntyre, CNN, Washington. (END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: What a heartbreaking story that is. Jack, I don't know what to say. We've heard a lot of those stories. This is one courageous young guy.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed. There are more than 4,000 young men and women who paid the same price that young man did, perhaps not under the same circumstances. But they have nothing left to give. They're all gone.
June 2, 2008 Special Report With Brit Hume (FNC), 6:00 PM
BRIT HUME: President Bush today presented the nation’s highest military honor to the parents of a young soldier in Iraq who sacrificed his life to save several members of his unit. National security correspondent Jennifer Griffin reports on the story of an American hero.
MAN: Lord, we’re constantly amazed at the way you orchestrate events in a person’s life.
JENNIFER GRIFFIN: It is the highest award for valor in combat, the Medal of Honor, and the president has only awarded four for service in Afghanistan and Iraq before today, to recognize an Army private who threw his body on a grenade tossed into his military vehicle as it traveled in Adamiyah, Iraq, on December 4th, 2006. Private First Class Ross McGinnis was manning the 50-caliber machine gun on top.
DAN WALSH [White House Military Aide]: In a selfless act of bravery in which he was mortally wounded, Private McGinnis covered the live grenade, pinning it between his body and the vehicle and absorbing most of the explosion.
GRIFFIN: It’s what soldiers are trained to do, but few know if he or she would do the same.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Private McGinnis could have easily jumped from the Humvee and saved himself.
GRIFFIN: When asked in kindergarten what he wanted to be when he grew up, Ross McGinnis drew a soldier. One of three children from Knox, Pennsylvania, he is survived by his parents and two sisters. McGinnis worked after school at McDonald’s and signed up for the Army on his 17th birthday.
TOM MCGINNIS, FATHER: His life was very short. It wasn’t an exciting story until it got right to the end. But he just made the right decision when it was required.
GRIFFIN: The four men whose lives were saved that day were at the White House on this one.
SOLDIER: Yeah, I remember the whole thing. We all do, every day.
GRIFFIN: Staff Sergeant Ian Newland was severely injured in the blast. Shrapnel to his face and head forced him to retire.
STAFF SGT. IAN NEWLAND, U.S. ARMY: Life is the easy part now. Now our part’s over.
GRIFFIN: And the little things don’t seem to matter.
NEWLAND: It’s not something to get upset about when less than a year ago we were where we were.
GRIFFIN: Where they were is a very different place now, much improved in the 18 months since Ross McGinnis gave his life. His father said his son made a simple kindergarten mathematical calculation, four is greater than one. But it was one that was greater than the whole. At the Pentagon, Jennifer Griffin, Fox News.
The Situation Room (CNN), 5:00 PM
WOLF BLITZER: President Bush today presented the Medal of Honor to the parents of a soldier who died saving the lives of others in an act of heroism that took place in the blink of an eye.
Our senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JAMIE MCINTYRE: The few seconds it takes to look at this photograph of 19-year-old Ross McGinnis manning his 50 caliber machine gun is about the same amount of time McGinnis had to decide whether to jump out of his humvee and save himself or sit down and take a live grenade for his buddies. Inside, the platoon leader.
SGT. 1ST CLASS CEDRIC THOMAS, U.S. ARMY: You have a split second to make a decision. What are you going to do? Are you going to get out or are you going to sit on it?
MCINTYRE: The medic.
SPEC. SEAN LAWSON, U.S. ARMY: There's no right or wrong for that. If he jumped out nobody would have blamed him.
MCINTYRE: The soldier who saw the grenade come in.
STAFF SGT. IAN NEWLAND, U.S. ARMY: I gathered pretty directly what was about to happen. I dropped my rifle and started to put my hands up to cover my face.
MCINTYRE: And the driver who thought he was dead.
SGT. LYLE BUEHLER, U.S. ARMY: It was scary. I can tell you that. All I knew, I didn't know how much time I had. I just -- I didn't think I had enough time to get out of the truck.
NEWLAND: McGinnis yelled out grenade. By the time it registered what happened the grenade went off.
LAWSON: He wasn't going to leave us. He sat back down.
NEWLAND: McGinnis had jumped back on the radio where is the grenade was lodged welcome like a chair and he a sat back on it.
MCINTYRE: He saved your life.
BUEHLER: I think about it every day.
MCINTYRE: In a White House ceremony, Tom and Romayne McGinnis accepted the posthumous Medal of Honor from President Bush.
TOM MCGINNIS, FATHER: He was a very young man. He didn't have an exceptional adventurous life. His life was a short story with a sad ending.
MCINTYRE: The parents are proud but still grieving for a son who struggled but found himself in the Army.
T. MCGINNIS: Ross was a happy, very energetic, likable boy. I hesitate to say man because we didn't get to know him too well as a man. The lives of four men who were his army brothers outweighed the value of his one life. It was just a matter of simple kindergarten arithmetic. Four means more than one. He was a hero to us long before he died. Because he was willing to risk his life to protect the ideals of freedom and justice that American represents.
MCINTYRE: Jamie McIntyre, CNN, Washington. (END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: What a heartbreaking story that is. Jack, I don't know what to say. We've heard a lot of those stories. This is one courageous young guy.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed. There are more than 4,000 young men and women who paid the same price that young man did, perhaps not under the same circumstances. But they have nothing left to give. They're all gone.