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DALLAS - Gov. Rick Perry, R-Texas, wasted little time pouncing on President Obama's "we don't have a strategy yet" comments about removing the threat of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in the Middle East, accusing the White House of "dithering and debating" the threat posed by the violent militant faction. "Yesterday, the president admitted he had no strategy to deal with ISIS," Perry said in remarks Friday at a summit put on by Americans for Prosperity, an influential conservative organization backed by the billionaire industrialist Koch brothers. "The deepening chaos in Iraq, Syria, Gaza, and Ukraine is...

Of all the names that it would be embarrassing for an MSNBC network host to blank on, Rick Perry's would have to be at the top of the list. How countless many times has the Lean Forward network had fun at Perry's expense over his "whoops" moment during a 2012 presidential debate? But that unfortunate fate befell Jose Diaz-Balart today, hosting his own new MSNBC show. The topic was the way in which Ted Cruz and Perry would potentially fight over Texas donor dollars if they were to both run for president. Diaz-Balart got Cruz's name without problem, but when...

Republican strategist and former John McCain consultant Steve Schmidt has joined the team helping Texas Gov. Rick Perry with the strategy around his indictment, POLITICO has learned. Schmidt is the latest addition to a team that Perry has been expanding with legal hands. The Republican governor, a potential 2016 presidential candidate, has been indicted for allegedly abusing his power by vetoing funding to the office of a Democratic prosecutor who wouldn’t resign after a drunken driving arrest. “We’re bringing in the best of the best to help us handle this … this is serious, we’ve got to handle it with...

Lax border control on the southern border opens the door to almost anyone who wants to enter the U.S. illegally, and according to Governor Rick Perry, that includes terrorists. “Remember the ISIS version of ‘mission creep,’” said the governor last week at the Heritage Foundation’s Border Crisis and New Politics of Immigration event. rick perry According to Derrick Morgan and David Inserra at the Heritage Foundation, 11.4 million people have lived in the United States without authorization since January 2012. After Obama issued the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) memorandum in 2012, the number of illegal immigrants crossing the...

Well, what fun is that? Many were hoping to munch popcorn and see Rick Perry’s attorneys spend the next few months ripping Travis County DA Rosemary Lehmberg to shreds over her blatantly political effort to get the Texas governor indicted for cutting off her funding. Accusing Perry of being drunk with power is rather amusing, under the circumstances, but apparently Perry has better things to do with his time: The writ claims the charges of abuse of power and coercion filed against Perry are unconstitutional and that Perry was simply exercising his constitutional veto powers when he vetoed funding...

The country is reeling - especially within the political realm - over the gross abuse of power demonstrated in the indictment of popular Texas Governor Rick Perry. The whole scenario is so bizarre it is almost laughable. There is plenty of corruption in government, but usually it is the garden variety kind, like theft, lying, nepotism, etc., which is corrected with prosecution. This rises to a more disturbing level, because it is the prosecutor who is corrupt. How do you fix that? Rooting out corrupt Democrat lawyers is more difficult than prosecuting regular Americans, due to the incestuous relationship between...

ericynot1 wrote:As is so often the case, Ransom, in an effort to tarnish Democrats, has twisted things and left out much of the interesting stuff about this story. The special prosecutor, Michael McCrum, who investigated this case against Perry, and took it to a grand jury, is anything but a political hack. He's an ex-cop (four years in Dallas and Arlington, TX) turned lawyer/ federal prosecutor who's known to be non-partisan (donates money to candidates from both parties, though more to Republicans), and was appointed by Bert Richardson, a Republican judge appointed by GW Bush. Brian Wice, Tom DeLay's attorney...

Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Jose Antonio Meade says Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s recent statements about the possibility that Islamic fundamentalists could be entering the U.S. from Mexico are “absurd.” …

<p>Gov. Rick Perry (R) seems to be enjoying the spotlight that has come with pushing back to his recent indictment.</p> <p>The latest move: His new political action committee unveiled a T-shirt featuring Perry's mug shot. The back of the shirt features the mug shot of District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg, whose character Perry has repeatedly tried to attack while making her the poster child of his pushback.</p>

‘Just keeps winning’! Rick Perry’s PAC strikes gold with mugshot t-shirts [photos]Posted at 5:40 pm on August 22, 2014 by Twitchy Staff

The Defense Department on Friday pushed back against Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s (R) claim that fighters from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) might have entered the United States across its southern border. Perry, who is weighing another run for the president in 2016, made the assertion Thursday during a speech at the conservative Heritage Foundation. "There's the obvious great concern that, because of the condition of the border from the standpoint of it not being secure, and us not knowing who is penetrating across, that individuals from ISIS or other terrorist states could be [crossing]," he said....

Is the political indictment of Gov. Rick Perry already backfiring on Democrat governor hopeful Wendy Davis? Gov. Perry’s official courthouse portrait immediately became the Mugshot Seen ‘Round the World. Instead of becoming a liability, it became a badge of honor. It will probably be on campaign T-shirts, mugs and shot glasses (the Rick Perry “MugShot” is irresistible) before long. Perry followed that visit up with a trip for ice cream, sealing the win on what the Democrats hoped would be a terrible day for him and the beginning of the end of the Perry era. The case itself is already...

How does a Democrat candidate for the highest office in the state become a nonperson at the "non-partisan" Texas Tribune? When that person's campaign goes into such a freefall that it becomes an embarrassment to even report on it. Such seems to be the case with the Wendy Davis campaign for  governor in Texas. The last time the Texas Tribune directly reported about her was a full week ago on August 15 which not so coincidentally is when the Rick Perry indictment happened. The backlash from that obviously political indictment  which is already falling apart as reported by Bryan Preston...

Via the Daily Signal. Easy prediction: This soundbite will inspire lots of scoffing and sneering without even a bare attempt at an argument on the merits for why he must be wrong. “There’s the obvious great concern that because of the condition of the border from the standpoint of it not being secure and us not knowing who is penetrating across, that individuals from ISIS or other terrorist states could be [crossing the border] — and I think there is a very real possibility that they may have already used that,” he said…“We have no clear evidence of that...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)There are 65 prominent people who might run for president in 2016. The Democratic and Republican fields contrast sharply. Hillary Clinton is the clear front-runner, while there is no front-runner on the Republican side. Twenty-three Democrats have been mentioned as a candidate or are eyeing a bid, according to an analysis by The Hill. The GOP side has 42. Most of the people on this list won’t run, and some have adamantly claimed that they’re not interested. But many politicians have changed their minds on seeking the White House. Before mounting his 2008 bid, then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) said he...

Leadership: Texas Gov. Rick Perry smiled confidently for his mug shot, as if to signal he would prevail over politicized big government. In fact, that may resonate as a campaign theme for voters weary of the same abuses. Until now, the prevailing "narrative" was that a governor under indictment on two counts of "abuses of power" would be political toast. Because even if the charges were baseless, as these are, the mug shot and the screeching headlines would bring certain opprobrium. It certainly happened that way for now-exonerated House leader Tom DeLay, whose career was ruined by the same tactics...

Update, August 19: On ABC “World News with Diane Sawyer” on Aug. 18, Senior National Correspondent Jim Avila included a soundbite from Texans for Public Justice Director Craig McDonald in his story. McDonald was merely introduced as a “critic,” with no ideological label, and Avila never verbally said the name of his group. The Soros connection and the group’s involvement in Perry’s indictment charges were not addressed. NBC and CBS still have not mentioned the group. Sometimes it seems like there isn’t a single political issue that a Soros-funded group isn’t involved in. Texans for Public Justice, one of the...

For those of you who’ve been sleeping since it happened Friday, Travis County grand jurors indicted Perry on charges of abuse of official capacity and coercion of a public servant. The first count carries a possible prison term of five to 99 years. The second, two to 10. I’m no expert on law or math, but I believe those potential sentences each exceed one year. And there’s more. As an indictee, Perry’s state-issued Concealed Handgun License, assuming he still has one — his office didn’t know as of Tuesday afternoon — will be suspended until the case against him is...

AUSTIN – Several members of the grand jury that indicted Gov. Rick Perry said Tuesday that his claim the indictment was based more on politics than substance is unfair and disrespectful to the months of work they put in. The jury, which met weekly for four months, "really tried to keep an open mind and come to a fair decision given all the testimony that we heard," said Janna Bessin, one of the 12 Travis County residents appointed to serve on the grand jury. "It's too bad," Bessin said, calling the criticism unfair. "But I guess that his side's job...

Tuesday night the Houston Chronicle published a story about the grand jury that indicted Texas Gov. Rick Perry. Those grand jurors who spoke with the Chronicle broke the law to do so, and they knew that they were breaking the law. They claimed that they were speaking to the newspaper to counter Gov. Perry’s “spin” on the case.That’s not the job of a grand jury, by the way.One of them is a woman named Rho Chalmers. Chalmers tried to get around her lawbreaking by attempting to build this wall of implausible deniability. Rho Chalmers, who name matches that of...