At 6 p.m. Monday, Sept. 8, three veterans participating in the McCain Vet Bus Tour are coming to campus to hold a roundtable with interested students, faculty and staff at The University of Findlay. This event, which will be held in the Endly Room of the Alumni Memorial Union, is occurring in response to a formal invitation that was sent to both candidates by the University earlier this year.
 
Those who wish to attend this roundtable are asked to RSVP to sga@findlay.edu as soon as possible. The Student Government Association, a non-partisan organization, will host a series of events related to the upcoming election in the next two months.

The McCain organization has provided the following information about the three veterans who will be visiting:

Col. Tom Moe (U.S. Air Force retired) — Moe went to Vietnam as a fighter pilot directly from training. He was shot down and captured in January 1968, and spent five years in the “Hanoi Hilton” with John McCain. They were released in March 1973.  Col. Moe later earned a master’s degree in international relations from Notre Dame University, where he later served as a professor of aerospace studies and commander of the Air Force ROTC program. He retired from the Air Force in 1995, and currently serves as the Ohio Veterans for McCain State Chair, and was mentioned in Gov. Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention.

Maj. Gen Ed Mechenbier (U.S. Air Force, retired) — A 1964 graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy, he was shot down over North Vietnam and captured in June 1967. He would be released from the “Hanoi Hilton” in March 1973, after more than five and a half years of captivity. He returned to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and in 1975 resigned his regular commission and continued to fly with the Ohio Air National Guard. He transferred to the Air Force Reserve in 1991, and retired in 2004 at the age of 62 years and 1 day, the maximum service age. Gen. Mechenbier currently serves as the 7th Congressional District Co-Chair for Veterans for McCain.

Leslie Smith (USA) — A public affairs officer with the 29th Infantry Division, she was shipped to Bosnia in 2001. Two weeks before she was to return, she developed a blood clot in her left leg. To her disappointment, it cut her tour short. When she returned to Walter Reed Medical Center, she was diagnosed with a rare blood disorder, and a severe allergic reaction to the treatment took her left leg and almost took her life. As she said in her remarks to the Republican National Convention, “And I am here tonight to testify that none of us are promised a life without difficulties. But what we are promised is that every day we are blessed to spend on this earth, in this great country ... an opportunity to make today better than yesterday... ”