Change of Heartland

The third anniversary of the Iraq invasion unleashed a surge of pessimism at a local farmers' market here, where stalwart Republicans, standing amid aisles of produce and miracle cures, said President Bush has messed up a war that looks more like Vietnam every day.

"It's chaos," said Roger Madaras, who voted twice for Bush.

"How many more people are going to be killed? We were going in to free the people of Iraq, but as far as I'm concerned, a lot of them are worse off today than they were under the dictatorship."

Madaras, the owner of a plumbing company, said he believed Bush when the president declared major combat to be over in May 2003, and is "disgusted" that Bush's rhetoric was hollow.

And he is far from alone.

Support for Bush and his handling of Iraq is sharply eroding across
the American heartland, where the overcast skies and the muddy fields
of late winter matched a sense of gloom about Bush and the war.

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