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President showing signs of losing support among Ohio Republicans(Columbus Dispatch (Ohio) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Mar. 27--While Donna G. Pariseau's son was home from Iraq on leave, his squad was blown up in a Humvee. Everyone was killed except the driver, who remains in a coma. It was the driver who was taking her son Ethan's place. The Jackson widow said she was always a bit skeptical of the war but wanted to support her son. He tried returning to Iraq but couldn't take it, eventually accepting a medical discharge. Now she's enraged. "I don't think we should have gone in at all," the retired mental-health therapist said. "Iraq was not bothering us. I just don't see any reason for it, and we've lost more than (2,000) men and women." Although she is a registered Republican and once headed the largest GOP woman's club in New Hampshire, she is taking out her anger on President Bush. "I think he's inept. ... He's mishandled everything he's touched," she said. Although Pariseau's circumstances are unusual, her sentiments are not. Almost a third of Ohio's registered Republicans now dis- approve of Bush's handling of Iraq, a new Dispatch Poll taken in the days surrounding the war's third anniversary shows. The figure is almost the same on Bush's handling of the economy, with only slightly less dissent on his overall performance. Of course, that means a strong majority of Ohio Republicans still approve of the president. But with Democrats almost unanimous in their condemnation of Bush and independents' support shaky, the erosion of GOP backing is a key reason his national approval rating has remained mired near record lows for months. The Ohio rumblings are echoed across the country. Some Republicans are calling for a White House staff shakeup, while many in the GOP -- including Columbus-area U.S. Reps. Deborah Pryce and Pat Tiberi, usually reliable Bush backers -- openly questioned the administration's plan to hand over the administration of several large U.S. ports to a Dubai company. The Dispatch Poll, from March 15 through Friday, surveyed 2,874 Republicans and 2,894 Democrats and has a margin of sampling error of 2 percentage points. The mail survey included only registered party voters because independents do not vote for primary-election candidates. Another Republican poll participant who opposes Bush's decisions on Iraq is Robert Lee, 62, a retired engineer from Ottawa. "He never told us why we went over there," he said. "I knew it was for the oil, but he won't say it." Lee, an Air Force veteran who served in Vietnam, said the fight for oil is not worth an American soldier's life. "They're over there fighting for nothing," he said. "We didn't know what we were fighting for (in Vietnam), either." But many respondents said America must follow Bush's lead on Iraq. "If we weren't taking those people on there, they would be here. The terrorists seem focused on Iraq, which is much better than Columbus, Ohio," said Tom Scheiderer, a 61-yearold Republican from Logan County. Jack Hart, 53, a Republican from Waverly who served in the Army for 26 years, said the United States is not "going to win that war tomorrow. Those people have been fighting for 3,000 years. You've got to stay the course." One of the 9 percent of Democrats who back Bush on the war is Sara E. Williams, who lives in Frankfort, near Chillicothe. "I would like to be very popular and say no," said Williams, 73, whose husband served in the Air Force for 25 years. "I might be out of step with other (Democrats), but I'm not out of step with reality. I believe we are doing what we should be doing." But more typical of Democrats was the response of Virginia Bemis, 57, of Ashland, an associate professor of English at Ashland University, who said she disapproves of just about every aspect of Bush's presidency. "I disapprove of his handling of the economy. I disapprove of his Social Security policies. I really disapprove of every move he's made in Iraq," she said. "And I'm not happy about the way his administration handled Hurricane Katrina, either." . Not only do 91 percent of registered Democrats oppose Bush's Iraq performance, 73 percent of them do so "strongly." One of them is James Spader, 57, of Belpre, a retired pipe fitter and 30-year union member. "We were totally wrong in going to Iraq. He deceived us in a lot of ways. It's a hopeless war. It's terrible. "I didn't go to Vietnam but I lived through that time. This is a carbon copy." He said many Republicans he knows have turned their backs on Bush. "We have the worst debt we've ever had. ... I don't see anything good happening in the economy at all. The only new jobs are at Wal-Mart and McDonald's. "There's no manufacturing jobs. They're disappearing on a daily basis." Dispatch reporters Alan Johnson, Mark Niquette, Jonathan Riskind, Jim Siegel and Jack Torry contributed to this story. [email protected] [email protected] |