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    • Damaged but not defeated: The story of two wounded warriors overcoming their injuries

      By Martha Raddatz, Hank Disselkamp, Richard Coolidge & Jordyn Phelps | Power Players – 15 hrs ago

      On the Radar

      Memorial Day is a time when the country pauses to remember those in the military who have made the ultimate sacrifice for the country. It’s also a reminder of the soldiers who have come back from war alive but wounded in irreversible ways.

      Lt. Jason Pak and Lt. Eric Zastoupil, both graduates of the West Point Military Academy, are among over 1,500 soldiers who have lost limbs fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and this special Memorial Day edition of On the Radar follows their journeys of recovery.

      Pak was on patrol in southern Afghanistan when the unexpected happened.

      "I stepped on a mound and I just blew up,” Pak told On the Radar, “and then the next thing you know, my guys were rendering first aid."

      The former West Point soccer player lost both of his legs and two fingers that day. Zastoupil similarly fell victim to an IED explosion Afghanistan, losing his left leg. While both soldiers faced challenging recoveries following their injuries, neither lost their

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    • Scout’s Honor? Gay rights advocate seeks to overturn ban on gay Boy Scouts

      By Rick Klein, Olivier Knox, Richard Coolidge, and Jordyn Phelps | Power Players – Wed, May 22, 2013

      Top Line

      As the Boy Scouts of America prepares to vote tomorrow on a proposal that would change its long-standing policy of excluding gay boys from Scout units, the executive director of Scouts for Equality, a gay rights advocacy group, is hopeful that the proposal will pass--but says this is just the first step.

      “This is a good step in the right direction, we want youth protection throughout the entire program, and it looks we'll be able to see that on the 23rd,” executive director Zach Wahls tells Top Line. “But after that, we have to make sure that we are telling Scouts that when you turn 18 you are still welcome in the program.”

      The proposal up for vote will not change the BSA's policy of banning gay adult leaders. To Wahls, changing that policy is not just political, it's personal.

      “As the straight Eagle Scout son of a lesbian couple, I know exactly how important lifting the ban on adults is," he says. "I got to see first-hand when I was growing up in Iowa the impact that great,

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    • Sen. Jeff Sessions almost single-handedly trying to derail ‘Gang of Eight’ immigration bill

      By Jim Avila, Richard Coolidge, and Jordyn Phelps | Power Players – Tue, May 21, 2013

      Power Players

      When it comes to immigration reform, perhaps no senator has been more vocal about their displeasure with the newest bill, drafted by the group of bipartisan senators known as the "Gang of Eight," than Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.)--the Republican many blame for the defeat of the last immigration reform bill in 2008.

      “This bill, written by the 'Gang of Eight,' without public process, that stacked in the committee and determined to move it through with little or no changes, it,” Sessions said.

      But many pro-immigration reform voices are suspicious that the 49 amendments Sessions has filed, second only to the whopping 77 amendments filed by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), are designed to kill the bill rather than change it. Sessions says that's not so.

      “We create amendments that reveal the problems with [the immigration reform bill], and I think that's kind of what's been happening,” he told Power Players. “We are beginning to show that there are weaknesses in it.”

      He points to

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