McQ notes a number of polls breaking down different voting blocs, with interesting commentary. One significant group:
A Rasmussen Reports survey shows that military veterans prefer George W. Bush over John Kerry by a 58% to 35% margin. Those with no military service favor Kerry by ten percentage points, 51% to 41%.
McQ notes one obvious reason for this:
I�m pretty plugged into the vets community and I�ve never, ever heard talk like I�ve heard about John Kerry among veterans. Let me succintly characterize it by saying the comments could easily interchange “Fonda” for “Kerry” if you know what I mean. There are a great number of vets who are still angry about those two and intend to demonstrate that anger on Nov. 2nd.
The line you often hear quoted, from various sources, is about a Kerry defeat being the parade Vietnam vets never had. Of course, consider this in tandem with the 75% or so support that Bush appears to get from both active-duty military and from the Guard and Reserves, and the overall picture is not one of great love for Kerry by his fellow veterans and soldiers.
Count me as another vet that wouldn’t spit on Kerry if he were on fire. I’d say numbers are closer to 80% for Bush amongst career military.