Friday, Nov. 7, 2003 | 9:17 a.m.
IT CAME AS no big surprise that Nevada's Marybel Batjer is leaving as Gov. Kenny Guinn's staff chief for California. The talented Carson City native loves a challenge and, as cabinet secretary for California Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger, she will have plenty of them. None of these new challenges will get the best of her or the staff she assembles.
I was pleased when she joined Guinn three years ago, but thought she would return to Washington, D.C., in a year or two. Asked about it, she replied that she and her sister wanted to be close to their father, former Nevada Supreme Court Justice Cameron Batjer. It wasn't long before her friend Secretary of State Colin Powell and several others in the new Bush administration were tempting her to return. Batjer, an accomplished skier and outdoors enthusiast, was home where she wanted to be. I first remember her as a skier when she was attending Carson City High School.
Sacramento, just over the hill, is still acceptable to meet her family needs and lifestyle. After leaving Washington with the first Bush administration, she had an executive role in the administration of California Gov. Pete Wilson. In Northern California she could come home to Nevada for dinner with her family and return to Sacramento in a few hours.
During her 11 years with the Reagan and George Bush administrations, her father was also in Washington where he served on the U.S. Parole Board. She earned high marks for her work from National Security Council and Pentagon observers. When working on a team of outside experts at the Pentagon in 1999-2000, I found her name still being recalled as having a special place in military memories.
Schwarzenegger has made a wise choice and Batjer is still close to the place she loves -- Carson City and Reno.
California Gov. Gray Davis showed real class as he helped Gov.-elect Schwarzenegger find the ropes that run the state's government. At the same time he was with the firefighters and evacuees of the Southern California wildfires several days and nights. His conduct should remind us that he is the same man who served in Vietnam during the war.
Television viewers will be able to watch a movie about former POW Jessica Lynch or they can read her book, written for a $1 million advance.
Even more impressive has been the conduct of Spc. Shoshana Johnson who was shot through both legs before being taken prisoner during that attack. Her humility and quiet personal pride was recently on display in Las Vegas.
Eric Slater of the Los Angeles Times followed up on the final investigation of what happened that night and found Pfc. Patrick Miller a hero during the ambush. The investigators say that Miller "may have killed as many as nine Iraqi combatants." Slater writes, "With a seemingly inherent aversion to speculation or bragging, the small-town Kansan has no doubt about what he did or did not do, how many he killed or wounded: 'Seven in the mortar pit, one in the tree line, and I ran over one guy.' If it wasn't for his actions during the ambush, which earned Miller one of the military's highest awards, the Silver Star, several soldiers feel certain they would not have survived." Nevertheless, Miller is still a Pfc.
Slater also interviewed the other former prisoners and writes, "Few from the 507th seem to resent the diminutive Lynch's fame and fortune. Separated from the other POWs and badly injured when her Humvee crashed, 'Jessica is a hero in every way. Tiny little thing, she survived all that by herself. It's amazing,' Johnson said, summing up the sentiments of many from the unit. "At the same time, some are less than pleased with the way the Pentagon and media have handled Lynch's story. Both got much of it wrong in the beginning, erroneously reporting that she fought to her last bullet despite gunshot and stab wounds, when in fact she was likely unconscious and probably did not fire a shot, investigators say."
Johnson gives a glowing account of Miller's actions during the attack and when a POW. She said in captivity Miller got the worst of it because "he was always mouthing off. And they knew he'd killed a lot of Iraqis."
Slater's story in the newspaper has the grist necessary to make an accurate and audience-pleasing television movie. Miller, a 23 year-old who chews tobacco, isn't cute nor petite but neither was Sgt. Alvin York.
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