NEW YORK – Abortion-rights protesters and the first Republican delegates descended on President Bush’s heavily fortified convention city Saturday, as campaign officials said their boss would use the nomination spotlight to defend his foreign polices and offer a second-term agenda for health care, education and job training.
“He believes it’s important for a candidate to talk about what he’s done and, most important, where he wants to lead,” said adviser Karen Hughes, aboard Bush’s campaign bus in Ohio. “The speech is very forward-looking. It talks about what another four years of a Bush presidency would look like.”
Democratic rival Sen. John Kerry said most voters won’t look kindly on another term for the Republican. “For the last four years, we’ve had a dark cloud over Washington,” Kerry told supporters on an overcast day in Everett. “We’re going to get rid of it on Nov. 2.”
Pre-convention polls showed the race evenly split, though the challenger has lost ground since his convention in Boston a month ago. The four-day Republican convention opens Monday.
Bush campaigned deliberately through battleground states en route to an overwhelmingly Democratic convention city – fertile ground for protests against his foreign and domestic policies. Thousands of abortion-rights activists marched across the Brooklyn Bridge, 10 abreast in a protest a half-mile long. The night before, 264 people were arrested for disorderly conduct in a bicycle protest past Madison Square Garden.
The convention site is less than five miles from ground zero, where two hijacked planes destroyed the twin towers of the World Trade Center, killing 2,749 people and catapulting the nation into war. Bush’s approval ratings soared as he led the nation in mourning, then ordered troops into Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban regime and begin the search for Osama bin Laden.
Three years later, the terrorist leader is still at large and the U.S. military is fighting an unpopular war in Iraq. As the death toll of U.S. troops nears 1,000, Bush hopes to persuade voters that the invasion of Iraq has made the nation safer.
“The power of liberty cannot be stopped,” the president told supporters in Lima, Ohio, borrowing a line from his work-in-progress acceptance address. “Freedom is peace. Free societies are not going to harbor al-Qaida.”
But even free societies must be diligent. Security precautions here showed it.
Inside the hall, the transformation from sports and entertainment center to convention site was complete, with a custom-made podium filling one side of the hall and thousands of balloons above.
Associated Press
Carpenter Bobby Chambers of New York puts up signs Saturday at Madison Square Garden during preparations for the GOP convention.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
