The base srecharges

Republicans last week got their chance to make their case to the American public on prime-time television. They seem to have hit their mark.

The nomination of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin energized the conservative base. Sen. John McCain during his nomination acceptance speech Thursday night railed against runaway government. Perhaps the Republicans lacked some of the oratorical magic of their Democratic counterparts, but the message seemed to strike the right cord for this conservative corner of Ohio. Ours being the state either party needs to win the White House - and Ohio being split among Republicans and Democrats - both sides heard what they wanted, though independents still might be wanting. For their part, Republicans are counting on winning West Central Ohio, and the party offered its members here reason for optimism.

Activists attend conventions, and Republicans haven't been this excited in several years. They are back in form: blasting the liberal media, defending conservative values against the tax-and-spend plans of the other party and championing a candidate who also is a war hero.

Tuesday night was a coup. Democratic Sen. Joe Lieberman, who had been on Al Gore's ticket in 2000, made an impassioned plea for a McCain presidency. He depicted McCain as someone who would defend the country and reach across party lines to get things done to benefit Americans. Lieberman criticized Democratic Sen. Barack Obama as someone captive to his party's interests and - strange as this sounds - praised former President Bill Clinton for working with Republicans to achieve welfare reform and free-trade agreements. Lieberman even praised McCain's efforts to battle global warming - what many on the right consider pseudoscience - or to impose new federal campaign-finance laws on the political process - an assault on the First Amendment that conservatives bitterly opposed. Yet the convention-goers cheered Lieberman's bipartisan message.

Former Sen. Fred Thompson, a one-time presidential candidate and actor, played the partisan, but in his characteristically good-natured and folksy manner. Here he defended Palin as the vice presidential nominee: "Some Washington pundits and media big shots are in a frenzy over the selection of a woman who has actually governed rather than just talked a good game on the Sunday talk shows and hit the Washington cocktail circuit. Well, give me a tough Alaskan governor who has taken on the political establishment in the largest state in the union - and won - over the beltway business-as-usual crowd any day of the week. Let's be clear ... the selection of Gov. Palin has the other side and their friends in the media in a state of panic. She is a courageous, successful reformer, who is not afraid to take on the establishment."

Palin and others echoed the charge of media bias. And McCain was impressive, whether in remaining calm through an interruption by protestors, in promising a return to limited government or in promising a change in Washington (never mind that Republicans have held the White House since Jan. 20, 2001).

Republicans should be relieved that their base is energized, that the gloves have come off against a Democratic opponent who should rather easily be tarnished as the tax-and-spend liberal his record proves him to be. Nevertheless, the Republican convention leaves us with significant concerns. The themes have been "country first" and "service." While we all support the idea of honoring one's country and serving our fellow man, we find this to be a troubling message coming from the potential leaders of the federal government. We would much prefer "freedom first," given that the founders' vision of government was that it was instituted to protect the natural rights of the citizenry, not to prod its subjects into serving one cause or another. "Country first" can easily lead to blind support for the policies of this country's government, which is not a good thing.

The GOP focused heavily on national security issues, and its platform called for more of the same: empowering federal authorities to wage a continuous War on Terror. The platform took a belligerent tone toward Iran. The Iraq War was celebrated as a success. Laura Bush - to hearty applause - praised her husband for bringing freedom to 50 million Iraqi and Afghan citizens. That falls under the heading of blind support for bad policies.

That leaves two themes we're likely to see through Nov. 4: the party of big government and taxes versus the party of war. Throw in the economy and both candidates' "solutions," and we have a presidential campaign.