Glad to hear Texas is walking the walk. Hopefully other states will begin to model after a working government instead of insisting on perpetuating the fail.
If you look at the articles, they usually pull their "debt" figure from a data collection site, which lumps state and local debt together into one huge number. They don't even bother to separate State-held debt from the bonds held by local municipalities. Houston, Dallas, Austin, Arlington, Denton, and other large cities farm out massive bonds on the local level to build hospitals, schools, fire houses, etc. We've added 5 million people in the last decade; lots of infrastructure requirements. City of Arlington spent millions in bonds to help build JerryWorld.
Those bonds are on the backs of the local residents, not the State.
They also never talk about the fact that Texas does not have a State income tax, so residents get to keep more of their own money. Your dollars go a lot further here. Finally, they never talk about how affordable housing is here, or how the property taxes are next to nothing compared to liberal Meccas like NY.
Lazy, lazy reporters or flat-out partisan hacks looking to smear Texas in general, and Governor Perry in particular.