People in Washington have always lived and breathed politics. In the run-up to this year's election, they can drink it too.

The Degrees bar at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Georgetown is offering the choice of two cocktails - the Kerry Berry Kosmo and the W-tini.

Both were invented by master mixer Michael Brown, who says roughly equal sales of the two drinks mirrors splits in the electorate.

"It's a close race between both candidates. It's a huge discerner of what's going to happen," he said.

"The reason why is because the people who like Kerry don't want to order a W-tini, no matter if they think the ingredients work for them or not. Same thing goes for the Kerry Berry.

"So people are very much divided across political lines on this election. This election's going to be huge."

And as well as mixing the drinks, Mr Brown also switched the traditional party colours - making the Democrat drink red and the Republican blue, to show how candidates had to reach across party lines.

Patrons at the bar had differing views on the Kerry Berry - made with raspberry and strawberry vodka, cranberry juice and a dash of grenadine - and the W-tini, which consists of mandarin vodka, blue Curacao, a dash of lemonade and a cherry at the bottom.

One man said: "Kerry tastes more like honesty and Bush's tastes more like freedom." When asked if it would affect his vote, he replied: "Well, honesty is the best policy."

A woman with a W-tini in her hand admitted she felt a bit of a traitor as the drink did not reflect her political opinion.

"I'm not behind W as a candidate but it was the ingredients that attracted me."

A sipper who tried both cocktails could not keep politics out of her judgement of the drinks.

"It's a little sweeter but I think I could drink the whole Kerry Berry. I would only have a few sips of the W-tini. And there may be a political motivation in my decision because I'm definitely a Kerry supporter."

(Agencies)