Former Marine and current Penn State student Ben Askin stands behind the bar at the local VFW, tapping beer for veterans from America's last half century of armed conflict.

He is also standing behind President George W. Bush.

Bush, he said, understands that the war on terror will not be won overnight, and that military action is a necessary tool in winning the fight.

"I think Bush is a little more realistic about the war," said 24-year old Askin (junior-political science), who added that he feels the war is the most important issue for him this election year.

His two stints in the Marine Corps ended last October. He said the experience gave him a perspective on the world that he has brought back stateside, into his worldview and into his classroom experience.

Askin received what he called his first lessons in politics under the U.S. Central Command, the same leadership overseeing military operations in Iraq.

His unit, the Combined Joint Task Force - Horn of Africa, is the lead military operation in eastern Africa. It is an area of the world close to the Middle East that he said also shares many similar views with the West.

But Askin said most of the work he has seen by the military overseas has been positive, adding that the current environment of tension will easily go away. He is voting for Bush because he said he feels the current commander in chief has a better understanding of that fact than his opponent.

Askin joined the military after high school because he said he was not ready for college, and the discipline he learned is helping him as he pursues his degree. The war in Iraq would not change his decision to enlist, he added.

He also said his real world perspective sometimes puts him at opposite ends of arguments during classroom discussion.

"It is hard to have an informed opinion when you're just in a classroom," Askin said.

Don Stine, steward of Veterans of Foreign Wars post in State College, said most veterans who frequent the Barnard Street veteran's club share Askin's view.

"Most of the military guys in here, yes, they are voting for Bush," said Stine, who served in the military during the last years of the Cold War. "Everybody is pretty much dug in."

VFW Post Commander George Zonge, a lifelong Democrat whose first wartime president was Franklin Roosevelt, agreed.

He added that in every election he's seen, soldiers and veterans, such as Askin, stand by the sitting president, including a war in Vietnam Zonge said was run by "idiots."

In this war, he also said Bush is far and away the better leader.

"I don't think Kerry is qualified to be president," Zonge said, a two-time Purple Heart winner, adding that he believes Kerry's wounds in Vietnam were too superficial to merit his decorations. "I will definitely be voting for George W. Bush."

But despite protests from Zonge and others about Kerry's war story, Askin said the issue did not figure into his choice for president.

"I wasn't there that day, so I wouldn't know," he said.