Mother of a killed American soldier waits for Bush’s explanations near President’s ranch

A desperate mother of an American soldier killed in Iraq says she is determined to continue protest against Bush’s policy in Iraq until the U.S. President speaks to her personally. Cindy Sheehan settled down near President George Bush's Texas ranch under the burning hot sun.

Cindy Sheehan's 24-year-old son - Army Spc. Casey Sheehan of Vacaville, California -- was killed in Baghdad's Sadr City on April 4, 2004. The Humvee mechanic was one of eight U.S. soldiers killed there that day by rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire.

They are among the 1,829 American troops, including 31 this month, who have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

The president - who is spending a nearly five-week-long working vacation at his Texas ranch - said in a speech Wednesday that the sacrifices of U.S. troops were "made in a noble cause."

Sheehan said she found little comfort in his comments.

"I want to ask the president, why did he kill my son?" Sheehan told reporters. "He said my son died in a noble cause, and I want to ask him what that noble cause is."

Sheehan said hers was one of a group of about 15 families who each met separately with the president one day last June, CNN reports.

"He wouldn't look at the pictures of Casey. He didn't even know Casey's name," she told CNN Sunday. "Every time we tried to talk about Casey and how much we missed him, he would change the subject."

Sheehan said she was so distraught at the time that she failed to ask the questions she now wants answered.

She said the meeting occurred two months after her son, Casey, was killed in Iraq. Since then, she said, various government and independent commission reports have disputed the Bush administration's claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction - a main justification for the March 2003 invasion.

"All of those reports prove my son died needlessly. This proved that every reason George Bush gave us for going to war was wrong," she was quoted as saying by Guardian.

Ms Sheehan has not seen Mr Bush, but she did talk on Saturday with Steve Hadley, Mr Bush's national security adviser, and Joe Hagin, deputy White House chief of staff, who went out to hear her concerns.

Recent surveys have shown decreasing public support for the war.

In a Newsweek poll released Sunday, 64 percent of those asked said they do not believe the war in Iraq has made Americans safer, and 61 percent said they disapprove of the way the president is handling the war.

The telephone poll of 1,004 adults was taken from Tuesday to Thursday last week and has a margin of error of 4 percentage points.