But the Republicans have emerged as the party with the ideas, even if they have yet to become the party of idealism. But it was clear from the rest of his speech that its new leader is working on that, too. It's more like your grandfather's, or what used to be called Moderate Republicanism in the Eisenhower Era. But this year's Republican program isn't just a moderate version of the Democrats', a Clintonism lite. It emphasis isn't having government do a little less, but on letting people do a lot more for themselves.
Freedom always is.
And no new birth of it can be assured by rhetoric alone. For now, George W. Bush's rhetoric is only that. At the end of the evening, as the buses full of elated Republicans pulled out of the First Union Center on to the expressway and home, one of the first offramps they'd pass would be marked Valley Forge.