CAMPAIGN Cheney bus tour pays visit to Lisbon

The campaign recognizes the work by Columbiana County, its leader said.
STAFF/WIRE REPORTS
LISBON -- Vice-President Dick Cheney stepped into a vintage automobile on a main street in Lisbon and delivered what some describe as a good old-fashioned stump speech not seen here in 50 years.
Cheney, his wife Lynne, their daughter Mary and 10-year-old graddaughter Kate, made a last-minute stop here Saturday after a stop in Parma.
The vice president trimmed his 40-minute stump speech to the essentials, hopped up in a 1937 Lincoln Willoughby and declared to the crowd along Lincoln Way: "I think George Bush has done a whale of a job."
Mark Monroe, chairman of the Bush/Cheney campaign in Mahoning County, said he received word of the visit by telephone Friday evening and spent several hours making calls informing others about the visit. He said several local people spent hours making calls and spreading the word about the visit.
In the end, he said the efforts were successful with about 200 people lining both sides of the street in anticipation of the Cheneys' arrival.
Thanking the people
Monroe said the stop here was meant to be one of thanks and encouragement to the people in Columbiana County.
"My understanding is that it was an event to recognize and encourage those who have been working in the Bush/Cheney campaign and to give them a chance to meet the vice president, see him and hear him speak," he said.
Dave Johnson, chairman for the Bush/Cheney campaign in Columbiana County, said another reason the stop was not advertised was security factors. He said the event, however, was a success.
Johnson, who supplied the Willoughby from which Cheney spoke, said the Bush/Cheney campaign recognizes the work by those in Columbiana County.
"The Bush campaign recognizes that Columbiana County, though a small county, is very active, well-organized and working in this campaign," he said.
Johnson said Cheney addressed those gathered for about a half-hour, then worked his way through the crowd shaking hands and signing autographs. The vice president autographed a photo for one woman with three family members serving in Iraq, Johnson said.
Rebuttal
Firing back in the debate over American values, Cheney used his first campaign bus tour Saturday to label Democrat John Kerry "on the left, out of the mainstream and out of touch with the conservative values of the heartland."
Kerry in recent days has been invoking values with increasing frequency, promising a crowd in Minnesota on Friday, for example, that he would "honor the values that built our country."
Cheney, serving notice that the Bush campaign won't cede what has traditionally been a favorite Republican issue, told a cheering crowd at Wheeling Park High School: "Sometimes I think John Kerry develops amnesia out on the campaign trail. His latest thing is to tell audiences that he holds conservative values.
"Did he forget his voting record, a voting record that makes him the most liberal member of the United States Senate?" Cheney asked. He cited Kerry's votes against a ban on flag-burning, tax relief and banning what opponents call partial birth abortion.
"On these and a whole host of values, John Kerry's votes and statements over the decades that he's been in office put him on the left, out of the mainstream and out of touch with the conservative values of the heartland."