Peter Pace (born November 5, 1945) is a retired United States Marine Corps general who served as the 16th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the first Marine appointed to the United States' highest-ranking military office. Appointed by President George W. Bush, Pace succeeded U.S. Air Force General Richard Myers on September 30, 2005. His other four-star assignments include being the 6th Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from October 1, 2001 to August 12, 2005 and as Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Southern Command from September 8, 2000 to September 30, 2001.

The Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced on June 8, 2007, that he would advise the President not to renominate Pace for a second term. Pace retired from the Marine Corps and stepped down as Chairman on October 1, 2007. He was replaced by Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Michael Mullen.

Pace was born on November 5, 1945 in Brooklyn, New York to Italian American parents (from Noci) and raised in Teaneck, New Jersey, graduating from Teaneck High School in 1963. He received his commission in June 1967, following graduation from the United States Naval Academy. He also holds a Master of Business Administration degree from George Washington University. Pace currently resides in McLean, Virginia; he is married to Lynne Pace, whom he met as a midshipman, and has a son, Peter, and a daughter, Tiffany. Pace is Roman Catholic.

Michael Glenn "Mike" Mullen (born October 4, 1946) is a retired United States Navy admiral, who served as the 17th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from October 1, 2007 to September 30, 2011. Mullen previously served as the Navy's 28th Chief of Naval Operations from July 22, 2005 to September 29, 2007. He was only the third naval officer in Navy history to be appointed to four different four-star assignments; the others being the Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe and Commander, Allied Joint Force Command Naples from October 2004 to May 2005, and as the 32nd Vice Chief of Naval Operations from August 2003 to August 2004. As Chairman, Mullen was the highest ranking officer in the United States Armed Forces. He retired from the Navy after over 43 years of service.

The eldest of five children of Hollywood press agent Jack Mullen and his wife Jane, who worked as an assistant to Jimmy Durante, Mullen was born in Los Angeles, California. He attended St. Charles Borromeo Church (North Hollywood) grade school, and graduated from Notre Dame High School (Sherman Oaks) in 1964. Mullen then attended the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, as a recruited basketball player, graduating in 1968.

Staff Sergeant Eric Fidelis Alva (born April 1, 1971) was the first Marine seriously injured in the Iraq War. On March 21, 2003, he was in charge of 11 Marines in a supply unit when he stepped on a land mine and lost his right leg.

Alva, a native of San Antonio, Texas, joined the United States Marine Corps in 1990 at the age of 19.

He began working as a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign in 2006. In February 2007, he joined Democratic Rep. Marty Meehan of Massachusetts and a bipartisan group of House members when they reintroduced the Military Readiness Enhancement Act, legislation that would repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" policy regarding service in the U.S. armed forces on the part of homosexuals.

Alva also served as the Grand Marshall of the 2008 Chicago Gay and Lesbian Pride parade on Sunday, June 29, 2008.

In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, General Peter Pace said, "I believe homosexual acts between individuals are immoral." Alva commented: "His remarks were insensitive and disrespectful to the thousands of men and women who are serving in the military at this current time under the policy." In December 2010, Marine Corps commandant Gen. James F. Amos said the presence of homosexuals in the marines would pose a "distraction" and that "I don't want to have any Marines that I'm visiting at Bethesda [National Naval Medical Center] with no legs be the result of any type of distraction." Alva commented: "He pretty much spit on me, my Purple Heart, and my 13 years of service. I would definitely ask Amos for a meeting to explain his comments, and I’d bring my Purple Heart with me."

Paula Ann Zahn (born February 24, 1956) is an American journalist, newscaster, former news anchor on ABC News, CBS News, Fox News, and CNN. On July 24, 2007, she announced her resignation from CNN. The final broadcast of Paula Zahn Now aired August 2, 2007. In January 2009, Discovery Communications announced that Zahn had entered into a development deal for a newsmagazine series, On the Case with Paula Zahn. The series, which profiles real crime stories, premiered October 18, 2009 on the Investigation Discovery cable channel.

Zahn was born in Omaha, Nebraska, to a schoolteacher/artist mother and an IBM sales executive father. She initially grew up in Canton, Ohio, with her parents and three siblings. The family relocated to Naperville, Illinois, as her father's job required them to move frequently. She once joked that "IBM" really stood for "I've been moved". She attended Washington Junior High School in Naperville and later graduated from Naperville Central High School in 1974. She also competed in several beauty pageants, making the semi-finals of the 1973 Miss Teenage America Pageant. Zahn continued her education at Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri on a cello scholarship, and received firsthand knowledge of the news business by working as an intern at WBBM-TV in Chicago, Illinois. She graduated in 1978 with a bachelor's degree in journalism. Zahn then spent the next 10 years working at local stations around the country, including WFAA-TV in Dallas, Texas, KFMB-TV in San Diego, California, KPRC-TV in Houston, Texas, WHDH-TV (then WNEV) in Boston, Massachusetts, and KCBS-TV in Los Angeles, California.

Terry Gene Bollea (born August 11, 1953), better known by his ring name Hulk Hogan, is an American professional wrestler, actor, television personality, and musician signed to Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA).

Hogan enjoyed mainstream popularity in the mid 1980s through the early 1990s as the all-American character Hulk Hogan in the World Wrestling Federation (WWF—now WWE), and was notable in the mid-to-late 1990s as Hollywood Hogan, the villainous nWo leader, in World Championship Wrestling (WCW). Following the closure of WCW, he made a brief return to WWE in the early 2000s before revising his heroic character by combining elements of his two most famous personas.

Hogan was later inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2005. He is a 12-time world champion being a six-time WWF/WWE Champion, six-time WCW World Heavyweight Champion, as well as a former WWE World Tag Team Champion with Edge. He won the Royal Rumble in 1990 and 1991, making him the first to win two consecutive Royal Rumbles. He was also the first WWE wrestler to win the WWE Championship three times. In his first reign as WCW World Heavyweight Champion, Hogan held the title for 469 days from July 17, 1994 to October 29, 1995—the longest ever reign for this championship.