This one has me shaking my head in wonder.? How is it a Marine traveling with his whole unit from Iraq, in uniform and with a Marine Corps ID is prevented from getting home because he is on the Federal Watch List:

You’ll hear a lot of mottos in the military. One key phrase is “hurry up and wait,” which definitely applied to the friends and families of 29 Marines returning from Iraq Tuesday.

They spent a couple extra hours waiting at Fort Snelling because one Marine had to spend a couple extra hours at a Los Angeles airport.

“My surprise was when he told me he wasn’t making the flight with the rest of his unit,” says Terry Brown, mother of Staff Sergeant Dan Brown.

Brown, who has now served two tours of duty in Iraq, couldn’t get through LAX security.

“They took him aside and said, you need to come with us, you’re on the federal watch list, you’re not gonna be able to fly,” says First Sgt. Drew Benson, a family readiness officer.

When Brown left the Twin Cities for Iraq last June, airport security found traces of gun powder on his boots from his first tour of duty. Brown was briefly detained then but didn’t know he was placed on a watch list.

The unit had no choice but to fly out of L.A. without Brown. But they refused to drive home without him.

“They left here together as a unit, they’re coming back to this site as a unit,” says Cary Brown, the Marine’s father.

All in all it was only a few hour delay but just another example of a bureaucracy out of whack.? The story is also a good example of good soldiers never leaving one behind.