Press Painting Kerry As Too Emotional

Maybe it was the ginger tea or the homemade brownies, but Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry ran a gamut of emotions on Wednesday, angrily denouncing President Bush as "dead wrong" on Iraq and shedding tears at a jobless woman's story.

Crying in New Hampshire, site of the first major primary of election seasons for the past half century, proved disastrous to another Democrat's White House campaign.

Edmund Muskie's 1972 presidential bid sank after he teared up because of media attacks on his wife. But times have changed. Both the current and previous Presidents Bush are well known for struggling publicly with tears.

Kerry, a senator from Massachusetts and a Vietnam combat veteran with a reputation for aloofness, lost his composure when Barbara Woodman of Concord told him how she was battling to educate her children after being laid off from a publishing company.