- Bush Says "Lives Not Lost In Vain" -

Washington D.C. - President Bush called it a day of reflection. He never explicitly said why, but the reason was clear 4,000 U.S. dead in Iraq.

That is the new toll of the five-year old war, the kind of raw, rounded number that sticks in the public's mind.

So on a day that began with so much lightness Bush hugging the Easter Bunny, cheerful children frolicking on the South Lawn the president ended up offering sympathy for grieving families.

"One day people will look back at this moment in history and say, "Thank God there were courageous people willing to serve, because they laid the foundations for peace for generations to come, "Bush said in unscheduled remarks at the State Department.