David Brooks Laugher of the Week

From today’s NY Times column (TimesSelect required):

Republicans in the 1980s could win by promising to expand freedom and reduce overbearing government. But today, post-9/11, most Americans aren’t anxious because their freedoms are being impinged.

If you were a Republican presidential candidate would you take such advice? And even if you believed this could you win a general election on this sentiment after eight years of Bush doing almost nothing but impinging our freedoms?