Bush prepares to accept Republican nomination

The speech comes one day after the convention anointed Bush as the party’s presidential nominee and Dick Cheney as his vice-presidential running-mate.

“This is a major step toward becoming President of the United States … I’m tough competitor. I’m going to give it my best shot,” Bush told reporters after he was nominated.

Cheney, in his own acceptance speech on Wednesday, launched a broadside against the Clinton-Gore Administration, breaking the party’s self-imposed ban on personal attacks during the convention.

“What are we to make of the past eight years? I look at the man and see opportunities squandered,” the normally mild-mannered Cheney said to a roaring and chanting crowd at his own coming-out party on the National political stage.

“We are all a little weary of the Clinton-Gore routine. But the wheel has turned and it is time. It is time for them to go,” Cheney said, igniting chants of Time to Go’ and No More Gore’.

The Gore campaign was quick to respond, with Gore campaign spokesman Doug Hattaway saying “To quote Dick Cheney, The wheel has turned.’ But apparently it has turned all the way back to the Republican personal attack politics of the past.”

Bush will attend a Republican tribute to his wife, Laura, in the afternoon on Thursday before delivering his approximately 45-minute acceptance speech to perhaps the biggest National audience he will have until the fall debates against Gore.

On Wednesday afternoon, he tested the acoustics of the basketball arena in South Philadelphia where the convention is being held to get a feel for the cavernous space.

“My fellow Americans, I accept your nomination,” he practiced saying from the podium. A group of people lingering in the upper tiers of auditorium cheered loudly.

The convention was slightly overshadowed by news that former president Gerald Ford had suffered two minor strokes and was in the hospital receiving treatment.

Shortly after receiving a tribute at Tuesday’s session, the 87-year-old Ford went to a hospital complaining of sinus problems. He was sent home but checked in again on Wednesday.

Dr Robert Schwartzman, head of the hospital’s neurology department, said Ford “probably had a little stroke a day or so ago … maybe two days ago and had another little one”.

Cheney, White House Chief of staff under Ford, wished the former president well during his speech, saying, “I wouldn’t be here tonight if it wasn’t for him.”

Cheney also served as secretary of defence under Bush’s father, former President George Bush, leading the military in the successful campaign to oust Iraqi forces from Kuwait.

A confident Bush arrived in Philadelphia on Wednesday declaring “If all goes well, you’re looking at the next president of the United States.”

Bush’s speech was expected to focus on the twin cores of his bid for the presidency — compassionate conservatism and the notion that he is “a different kind of Republican”.

The speech is new territory for Bush, not because of its subject matter but because of its length, and the governor acknowledged as much.

“This will be longer than some of you are used to,” he told reporters recently. “I don’t need to go on for hours because people will be falling asleep.”