President Bush's nomination of doctrinaire conservative Samuel Alito -- "there will be no one to the right of Sam Alito on this Court," says NBC legal analyst/George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley -- is clearly a move to wipe the legal and ethical issues surrounding the administration and the GOP off of the front pages. But it is also an attempt to distract from real and pressing issues facing the country, such as the growing American death toll in Iraq. The AP's Thomas Wagner passes on the disturbing numbers from October.

Six American soldiers were killed in separate attacks Monday and a Marine died in action the day before, making October the deadliest month for U.S. troops in Iraq since January. U.S. jets struck insurgent targets near the Syrian border and at least six people were killed.

Four soldiers from the Army's Task Force Baghdad soldiers died Monday when their patrol struck a roadside bomb in Youssifiyah, 12 miles south of Baghdad in an area known as the "triangle of death."

Two other soldiers from the 29th Brigade Combat Team were also killed in a bombing Monday near Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad. The U.S. military also said a Marine was killed Sunday near Amiriyah, 25 miles west of Baghdad.

Those deaths raised the death toll for October to more than 90, the highest monthly total since January when 107 American service members died. The latest deaths brought to 2,025 the number of U.S. service members who have died since the Iraq war began in March 2003.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said there is no readily apparent explanation for why the number of U.S. casualties was higher in October than in previous months. But he said the insurgents' roadside bombs — which the military calls improvised explosive devices, or IEDs — are getting more sophisticated. [emphasis added]

Increasing numbers of Americans (not to mention innocent Iraqis) are losing their lives in this conflict, and the Pentagon cannot figure out a "readily apparent explanation" for the increase in American deaths. No wonder President Bush doesn't want the public to be paying attention to Iraq.