Iraq Deaths Taking Their Toll on Voters (Old Vet Repub is spitting mad)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-war-politics,0,2834687.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines

John Webb wears an 82nd Airborne Division cap atop his shock of gray hair and a grimace across his craggy face -- every pleat and pucker a memory from World War II.

He's gnawing a cigar, spitting bits of tobacco with each raw, angry word.

"It was a mistake to get into Iraq. It's a mistake not to get out. Got that? Mistake! Mistake! Mistake!" the Republican says, jabbing the air with his smoking spear. "You know what I'd like to tell the president? Get out! Get going! Get gone! Now."

Ranting outside American Legion Post 261, some 250 miles from the polls and politics of Washington, Webb stands testament to a sentiment that could threaten President Bush's re-election hopes. Death in Iraq is taking its toll politically as local media coverage of each body bag and burial drives home the costs of war.

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Women who once viewed Bush as a protector of their families after Sept. 11 now fear he'll send their children to war -- or war will make the United States a bigger target.