No insights to offer here. I just found it interesting:
As the Iraq war approaches its fifth anniversary and 4,000th U.S. military fatality, about three dozen cities with populations above 100,000 have not lost a servicemember in the conflict, according to the Pentagon's list of the deceased's hometowns.
The fact that so many relatively large cities have been spared a fatality in Iraq underscores how sporadically the war has affected much of the American home front.
The story offers a couple of explanations. One is that recruits tend to come from rural areas and small towns more than big cities. Another is sheer chance. With 4,000 dead out of a population of 300 million, there is a big random element involved.
