Posted on 05/27/2011 9:01:05 PM PDT by smoothsailing
Published May 27, 2011 | FoxNews.com
Maybe Texas Gov. Rick Perry said he’s decided to test the waters on a presidential run just because he’s feels left out.
For all the attention paid to the presidential possibilities of two members of the House (Paul Ryan and Michele Bachmann) and a reality show host (you know who), you’d never know that the Republicans had on their bench the three-term governor of the state with the nation’s best economy and the largest Republican population.
But for some reason, when Perry told people he wasn’t running, reporters believed him. If Chris Christie even flies over Iowa, the blogosphere goes into meltdown mode, but the political press for some reason mostly took Perry at his word.
It seems strange that they would have.
Perry, who has been governor for more than a decade, is a favorite of the Tea Party movement for his tough stands on state sovereignty, border security, taxes and gun rights. Anybody who packs heat when he jogs so he can blow away coyotes that mess with his Labrador retriever and hangs out with Ted Nugent at a Tax Day rally is going to have serious street cred with the Republican base.
As the Perry talk heats up, these primary election positives will be reinforced by liberals who find his Texas-fried politics to be repellant. Every time Democratic cable news talkers remind viewers that Perry once warned that Texas might secede from the union if Washington kept piling on new federal powers, somewhere in Iowa or South Carolina a Republican primary voter thinks, “Not bad.” When Perry gets chided for declining photo-ops with President Obama on visits to the state, somewhere in New Hampshire a guy...
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Haters gonna hate I guess. Why do we even elect a governor I wonder after reading your posts.
Most of the opposition to Perry comes from one issue mushheads or folks who don’t understand how our state government works. He has been a Great Governor and that’s why he keeps getting re-elected by the good folks of this great state. BTW..he is a Veteran (C-130 pilot)so he wouldn’t have to be taught to salute....
I really don’t think he’ll fly nationally as a candidate either. Not sure why he’s the flavor of the week.
Well I suppose Perry is an improvement because I could at least TOLERATE him as nominee (I'd pull my hair out if Trump or Gingrich was "our" candidate), but he's VERY far down my list of preferred Republicans. I'd vote for him if the ONLY alternative was a uber-RINO like Giuliani but that's about it. The funny thing is Governor Goodhair is being touted because he'e supposedly "more electable". Ha! As others have noted, the ONLY reason he keeps winning re-election in his own state is because he's from a very heavily Republican state and he keeps having pathetic weak-ass opponents (in both the primary and general) who are even worse than him. Put him up against a real opponent in a swing state and I think he's toast. The guy is too much of a GWB clone and people don't want another compassion conservative type from Texas.
I'd said for a while I see Perry as a hybred of Romney and Pawlenty, minus the ability to win non-safe Republican states. Better than Romney, but worse than Pawlenty (and Pawlenty isn't particularly good to begin with!) I wonder how long the Perry fad will last? If he takes the bait and announces, it will just muddy up the field with more mediocre choices.
born March 4, 1950 in Paint Creek, TX (Meets the Jus Soli Requirement)
Parents were
Joseph Ray Perry born 1925 in TX
Amelia June Holt born 1928/9 in TX
Both parents were US Citizens at the time of his birth (Meets the Jus Sanguinis Requirement)
Rick Perry is a NATURAL BORN CITIZEN unlike Barry Soetoro aka Barack Hussein Obama.
You have to push Perry to the wall.
Texas has the best economy of any state and you have to give credit where credit is due.
I'll say it again, in the end it will be Palin & Perry teaming up.
I have not thought about the merits of Perry much except that I know he is a good old boy and a statist who sometimes says/does conservative things. But his state, Texas, is a testament to the fact that a tax-friendly/free-market environment is conducive to the generation of wealth and jobs. So a statist Texan is preferable to a statist community organizer from Chicago by way of Hawaii, Indonesia, and maybe Kenya.
Governor by default cause only democrat scumbags and even lamer Republicans have ever run against him.
Kinda surprising this guy of all people is subject to a draft movement.
Must be the Bush people upset that Daniels bowed out.
http://www.ontheissues.org/Rick_Perry.htm
Far better that Mutt Romney or Newt. I would rather have George Allen or Fred Thompson, but I could pull the lever for Perry if it comes to that. He could beat Obumbles.
I don't think that's correct. Texas became the first state in 50 years to actually cut budget spending. We didn't just swap numbers between columns. (In my school district alone, we're firing 97 teachers.)
This is a redistricting year - Texas will be adding some DIM seats because of the RINOs in the house, especially the speaker. He made sure the conservatives who did not support him as speaker would have to run against another conservative or would no longer live in 'their' district.
Texas school districts are letting TEACHERS go, but few administrators. There is a budget shortfall, big time.
He was re-elected last time because KBH and someone with no name recognition ran against him in the primary. Then the choice was between him and a dim - no contest. He is called gov good hair for a reason.
Okie01’s summary is spot on. We have to watch Rick Perry like a hawk. There are pros and cons to him.
We Texans tend to focus on the cons because, as okie10 said, Texas should be a conservative utopia by now. However, to non-Texans, Texas IS a utopia. That’s why our population is exploding, our housing market hasn’t taken as much of a hit as the rest of the country, and over half of all the jobs created in the country were in Texas because businesses are moving here left and right.
Conservatives in Texas are somewhat spoiled compared to the rest of the country. We’re used to mostly getting our way. We have a right-to-work state, no income tax, a legislature that meets every other year for 140 days, and a decent economy in a significant national recession.
Perry has done a few things to tick us off. But the flip side of that is that we were able to stop or reverse those things. He does what his constituents tell him. And that’s a good thing, IMO.
I’ll point out one small leadership quality that no one has mentioned, Rick Perry has excellent emergency management skills.
LLS
Okie01’s summary is spot on. We have to watch Rick Perry like a hawk. There are pros and cons to him.
We Texans tend to focus on the cons because, as okie10 said, Texas should be a conservative utopia by now. However, to non-Texans, Texas IS a utopia. That’s why our population is exploding, our housing market hasn’t taken as much of a hit as the rest of the country, and over half of all the jobs created in the country were in Texas because businesses are moving here left and right.
Conservatives in Texas are somewhat spoiled compared to the rest of the country. We’re used to mostly getting our way. We have a right-to-work state, no income tax, a legislature that meets every other year for 140 days, and a decent economy in a significant national recession.
Perry has done a few things to tick us off. But the flip side of that is that we were able to stop or reverse those things. He does what his constituents tell him. And that’s a good thing, IMO.
I’ll point out one small leadership quality that no one has mentioned, Rick Perry has excellent emergency management skills.
Mark Levin has had fill-in hosts this week, but the one last night had been impressed with Perry until his started getting Texas callers. Not one was a positive for Perry.
I live in Texas and have had my share of differences with our governor in the past but given the current crop of candidates in the republican primary field I can think of only one I would vote for over Rick Perry and that is Herman Cain.
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