Karen and Tommy Dingler's spacious home on a new residential development in Hiram, Georgia, appears to be the epitome of the American dream.

Look more closely, however, and the dream becomes a nightmare.

Hanging in the window beside the front door is a white banner with a red border and a gold star in the middle - a symbol marking the death of a family member during military service.

The Dinglers' eldest son, Joshua, was 19 and fresh out of high school when he and two other soldiers died in a Humvee accident in Iraq. Just over a year later his parents are still coming to terms with their loss.

"You live in denial for a long time," says Mrs Dingler, leafing through a photograph album. "Eventually you force yourself to say, 'The rest of the guys have come home and he's not coming back'."

As domestic opposition to the Iraq war edges higher with each month of bloodshed, the Dinglers have more reasons than most to voice dissent.

Instead, they remain -passionate supporters both of President George W. Bush and the cause for which they believe their son died.

"Joshua understood that if we didn't take the fight to them, they would bring the fight to us," says Mr Dingler, linking Iraq to the broader US war against terrorism. Whether you want to split hairs about whether the Iraqi situation is part of the war on terror is irrelevant to me. We are fighting an -ideology."

The Dinglers provide a reminder that, for all the predictions of Republican defeat in next month's mid-term elections, talk of a shift in national mood must be treated with caution.

A former Baptist pastor and now a salesman of family-friendly software that blocks offensive websites, Mr Dingler, like most people in Hiram, is a natural Republican. "I'm pretty much a Bible-thumping, conservative redneck," he says.

Hiram is in Paulding County, between rural Georgia and the affluent suburbs of northern Atlanta. Its most famous resident is Travis Tritt, a Grammy-winning country music star who has performed twice at Republican national conventions.

In the 2004 presidential election, more than three-quarters of Paulding's votes went to Mr Bush.

Joshua Dingler joined the National Guard six months after his 17th birthday in 2003.

He had wanted to be a soldier since joining the Boy Scout troop at the church where his father preached. But it was the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 that hardened his resolve to serve. "He would have signed up that afternoon if he had been old enough," recalls Mr Dingler.

Later Joshua hung a poster of Osama bin Laden on his bedroom wall with a red target on the al-Qaeda leader's chest.

Mrs Dingler says she would feel "ripped off" if the US withdrew from Iraq before terrorism was defeated.

"I'd feel my son died in vain," she says. "We might as well just open the door and say, 'Take us over', because that's what we would be doing if we don't complete the job."

Support for the war has remained more resilient in southern states, such as Georgia, than elsewhere in the US, reflecting the region's status as the bedrock of Republican power.

Only 35 per cent of Georgians favour immediate withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, compared with 60 per cent of New Yorkers, according to Strategic Vision, a polling firm.

But even in Georgia, approval of Mr Bush and his handling of the war has fallen to less than 50 per cent.

"Support for the war has declined in the south but it has not turned into outright opposition as it has in some places," says Matt Towery, a former Republican state legislator in Georgia and now chief executive of Insider Advantage, a polling firm.

Mr Towery says third party and independent candidates are polling strongly across the south as Republicans look to deliver a protest vote without defecting to the Democrats.

In Georgia, the Libertarian candidate for governor has risen as high as 8 per cent in some polls.

The softening in Republican support in the south does not appear great enough to alter the outcome of many congressional races. But if the party cannot energise its most reliable regional base, its prospects elsewhere in the country are grim.

Back in Hiram, Mr Dingler seems unlikely to abandon the Republicans.

However, even he expresses frustration with Mr Bush. "If there's one thing about my president I have an issue with, it's that he's just not conservative enough," he says.

"I would give my eye teeth to have Maggie Thatcher and Ronald Reagan cloned and put back in power."