KIRTLAND, Ohio, Sept 4 (AFP) - US President George W. Bush found strong support among voters in key states Saturday for Democratic Senator Zell Miller, who has broken with his party and raised eyebrows with attacks on Democratic White House hopeful John Kerry.
"Finally, a Democrat is speaking the truth," Jerry Jacobson, a Vietnam war veteran who served five years in the US Air Force, told AFP after Bush energized thousands in a sun-baked football stadium here.
"It's nice to see someone look at the issues and decide to vote for president Bush based on what is best for the country instead of sticking to party lines," said Tim Downs, 45.
On a frenzied two-day, five-state campaign swing, Bush won applause each time he mentioned Miller to approving crowds of Republican supporters, who had apparently feasted on the Democrat's red-meat rhetoric.
"You heard Zell Miller the other night. He represents a lot of folks who understand that, with four more years, Dick Cheney and I will make this country safer, stronger and better," he said here, drawing calls of "Go Zell!"
Miller raised eyebrows Wednesday with attacks on Democrats' patriotism and accusing them of undermining the war on terrorism, as well as a interview later in which he challenged a television journalist to a duel.
"At the same time young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats' manic obsession to bring down our commander in chief. What has happened to the party I've spent my life working in?" he said.
Democrats and Bush critics reacted angrily or mockingly, with some referring to the senator as "a rogue Zellephant" and others predicting his angry tone would not seduce mainstream voters.
But Bush campaign manager Ken Mehlman said the president endorsed everything Miller said in his speech and evidently enjoyed the senator's apparent popularity among Republicans far from his home state of Georgia.
"I talked to Zell this morning and I said to him 'you could run for mayor of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, or Milwaukee, Wisconsin,'" Mehlman told reporters. "He said he's not interested."
The accusation that Democrats are undermining the war on terrorism by criticizing Bush pleased Jacobson, who charged that Kerry is "working for the enemy" or is "being manipulated by the enemy."
Asked to explain what he meant, Jacobson, 52 struggled a little, finally settling on well-honed charges that Kerry is fickle on key national security issues: "He's a flip-flopper. Flip-floppers can't be patriots."
Bush's spotlight on Miller showed that, in the US heartland, relatively obscure politicians who break with their party on who should be president can outshine Hollywood stars who disagree with the White House on key issues.
Although action-movie hero turned California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a moderate Republican, also addressed the party's convention, Bush has yet to refer to him while campaigning.
The actor won applause from the flag-waving Republican faithful last week as he wove his autobiographical immigrant-got-rich story into the established script and attacked Kerry.
After months of maintaining an arm's length relationship with the Bush campaign, Schwarzenegger used his national political debut to unreservedly praise the president with whom he has had cool ties.
"Hes a man of inner strength. He is a leader who doesnt flinch, doesnt waiver, does not back down," Schwarzenegger said of Bush. "He knows you dont
reason with terrorists. You defeat them."
At this rally, however, the only Schwarzenegger reference came from a burly Bush supporter who shouted "vote for Bush, you girlie man" whenever male reporters passed near him.