Our dear friend and fellow patriot, David Bellavia to receive the Medal of Honor.

It is with great honor and humbleness that we here at Stew and the Nunn can officially announce that our great personal friend and multi-time guest, David Bellavia, will finally be recognized for this brave and awe-inspiring actions almost 15 years ago in November 2004 by having his already-awarded Silver Star upgraded to the Congressional Medal of Honor. As the only living recipient of this recognition from the entire war in Iraq, and could very well be the last one ever given for that war, makes this an even more special event. 

This is news we have sat on for a while but kept secret while bursting with excitement and pride for Dave. Over the next few weeks you will see and read interviews with him, snippets of his story from those days, etc. but none of them will do his actions justice like reading his book, House to House (which will probably stay sold out on Amazon until the publisher can get a new print run complete) or see the documentary from the embedded reporter, Michael Ware, who was with Dave’s unit as these actions unfolded in the horrible battles of Fallujah. The HBO released documentary is called “Only the dead see the end of war” (Plato’s famous quote). It is also available on Netflix streaming as “Only the Dead”. Warning, it as raw as the book that Dave wrote with imagery and sounds that will take you as close to Fallujah as possible without ever having to go there. 

Last Friday this news was leaked by the Army Times, breaking all protocols with the White House by jumping the gun and performing a very unforgiving act. It is an unwritten rule that when things are embargoed by any Administration that the media does not release it until authorized to do so. Now that the news has been announced, we here at Stew and the Nunn feel compelled to say our congrats and also repeat the news. We knew this news well before Friday but took the high-road and didn’t breathe a word. Even though it went public on Friday and a number of small western New York outlets carried the story, we here at Stew and the Nunn (just like every major news outlet) refused to repost this story, mention in publicly or acknowledge it. Even though Dave told Stew on Saturday that we could because the story was out and many others threw up congrats to Dave, Stew told him that both he and Nunn were in sync that out of respect we would allow the President to give the first official announcement. This was just the right thing to do and we are proud of that decision. 

We don’t need to be first, because when this is all over, we will have some of the best first-hand coverage of the entire ceremony and the other events that are wrapped around the actual medal presentation. So stay tuned to this website, our Twitter, Instagram and Facebook because you may very well see and hear things that you won’t find anywhere else. 

Again, huge congrats to our man “Bell” and we look forward to this huge new chapter in his life and being able to share some of it with him. 

Go back and listen to some our previous episodes with Dave.

You can read the entire official White House press release at www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/president-donald-j-trump-award-medal-honor-8/