FOUR UNTOLD STORIES OF HEROISM BY IRAQ WAR VETERANS

You have to go to local newspapers and television stations to find reports on wounded veterans from the Iraq war because the mainstream media feels the wounded veterans are not that newsworthy.

Here are just four accounts culled from the local media across the United States re veterans wounded in Iraq and their long upward rehabilitation fight.

They are worth reading. Also, bear in mind the mainstream media in the United States no longer feels their stories are newsworthy. They have bigger fish to fry like what is happening with Britney Spears.

By Bill Corcoran, editor and host of this blog dedicated to the brave young men and women who serve our country in Iraq and Afghanistan and who have been forgotten by the mainstream press in the United States.

A year later Steve Holloway remains determined to beat his paralysis. Three times a week, the 34-year-old war veteran spends an hour in the therapeutic pool at Palms West Hospital. So far, he's gained movement in a hamstring and toe, he's worked himself out of a crouch and, most strikingly, he can walk in the water. On his stomach — from his sternum past his belly button — is a sign of war. The deep, inset scar bisects his belly where surgeon after surgeon sewed him back together. There's a scar on his back, too. That's where the Iraqi insurgent's 7.62mm bullet exited Holloway's body, taking with it his ability to walk. the bullet struck on Jan. 15, 2007.

Jaime Antolec, 28, got blown up on the Fourth of July. A roadside bomb in Baghdad exploded under the U.S. Army sergeant's tank, shattering his ankles, and leaving him bloody and unconscious -- but alive.

Marine Sgt. Gregory Edwards took his last step Oct. 21, 2006. Alpha Company was on patrol in Ramadi, Iraq, conducting house-to-house searches when a hidden explosive detonated. The blast left Sgt Edwards a double amputee with a shattered left hand. He has endured 37 surgeries and a painful physical regimen that he devised himself to strengthen the tender stumps that end just above his knees.

David Corley was on patrol when he was shot in the jaw by enemy fire. The bullet shattered his jaw and exited through his neck. He was immediately flown to Germany and treated by a spinal surgeon. They discovered the bullet just barely missed a majory artery in his neck. Corley is now recovering in a San Antonio hospital. "He's not moving his right arm at all. He has a tremendous amount of pain in his shoulders, neck and arms. And of course he can't speak with a trake, and his jaw is wired together," his father Ronald said.