Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
CNN
April 8, 2008
The Situation Room (CNN), 4:00 PM
WOLF BLITZER: President Bush fought back tears today at a Medal of Honor ceremony as he stood with the parents of a Navy SEAL who gave his life to save his comrades.
Here's CNN's Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr.
BARBARA STARR: Twenty-seven-year-old Navy Petty Officer Michael Monsoor already had earned a Silver and Bronze Star, when on September 29, 2006, he found himself on a rooftop in Ramadi, Iraq. On that day, suddenly, an enemy fighter hurled a grenade onto the roof. His platoon commander remembers.
LT. CMDR. SETH STONE [Monsoor’s Platoon Cmdr]: The grenade hit him in the chest. Fell to the ground. He recognized immediately the threat, yelled grenade, and, due to the fact that two other SEAL snipers, our brothers, could not possibly escape the blast, he chose to smother it with his body and absorb the impact and lost his life in the process.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: One of the survivors puts it this way, Mikey looked death in the face that day and said, you cannot take my brothers. I will go in their stead.
STARR: A president who has had to comfort so many families, now overcome with emotion. Once again, he stands with parents, who have had to bury a child.
Michael's sister Sara recalls a brother who also protected her, and how she felt when the terrible news came.
SARA MONSOOR [Sister of Michael Monsoor]: When I had heard this, it was almost like that last piece I'd been placed like, his job was done.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For conspicuous gallantly and intrepidity to risk his life, above and beyond the call of duty.
STARR: Barbara Starr, CNN, the Pentagon.
April 8, 2008
The Situation Room (CNN), 4:00 PM
WOLF BLITZER: President Bush fought back tears today at a Medal of Honor ceremony as he stood with the parents of a Navy SEAL who gave his life to save his comrades.
Here's CNN's Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr.
BARBARA STARR: Twenty-seven-year-old Navy Petty Officer Michael Monsoor already had earned a Silver and Bronze Star, when on September 29, 2006, he found himself on a rooftop in Ramadi, Iraq. On that day, suddenly, an enemy fighter hurled a grenade onto the roof. His platoon commander remembers.
LT. CMDR. SETH STONE [Monsoor’s Platoon Cmdr]: The grenade hit him in the chest. Fell to the ground. He recognized immediately the threat, yelled grenade, and, due to the fact that two other SEAL snipers, our brothers, could not possibly escape the blast, he chose to smother it with his body and absorb the impact and lost his life in the process.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: One of the survivors puts it this way, Mikey looked death in the face that day and said, you cannot take my brothers. I will go in their stead.
STARR: A president who has had to comfort so many families, now overcome with emotion. Once again, he stands with parents, who have had to bury a child.
Michael's sister Sara recalls a brother who also protected her, and how she felt when the terrible news came.
SARA MONSOOR [Sister of Michael Monsoor]: When I had heard this, it was almost like that last piece I'd been placed like, his job was done.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For conspicuous gallantly and intrepidity to risk his life, above and beyond the call of duty.
STARR: Barbara Starr, CNN, the Pentagon.