Posted on 08/10/2011 3:21:28 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
DES MOINES, Iowa — Texas Gov. Rick Perry will make his Iowa debut Sunday in Waterloo, one day after the Ames Straw Poll.
Perry will appear at the Black Hawk County Republicans’ Lincoln Day Dinner at the Electric Park Ballroom, the same location where Minnesota U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann held one of her campaign kickoff events in late June.
“It was a great boost,” Gregory Tagtow of Waterloo, outreach chairman for the Black Hawk County Republicans, told IowaPolitics.com. “We were hoping because of the closeness to the straw poll to get a presidential candidate or two.”
The event comes a day after Perry is expected to confirm that he’s running for president during visits Saturday to South Carolina and New Hampshire, according to numerous national media reports.
Perry’s planned attendance at the Waterloo fundraiser at 4:30 p.m. Sunday came as a surprise to Tagtow, who said the Perry campaign contacted Black Hawk County Republicans Chairman Mac McDonald on Tuesday morning about wanting to attend. Until then, the county party had difficulty getting any presidential candidate to attend.
“We sent invitations to all the campaigns. We had some responses back; some were busy. Most were concentrating all of their efforts on the straw poll,” Tagtow said.
In a sign of things to come, the Republican presidential candidate who isn’t officially in the race received as much attention as the one who showed up in person for Tuesday’s kickoff of a statewide bus tour by social conservatives.
Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty swooped in at the Iowa Capitol for a brief appearance at the startup of the “Values Voter Bus Tour,” a 1,305-mile, 22-city, four-day bus tour sponsored by three national groups that oppose abortion and gay marriage.
“There are some on the other side of this debate who snicker or ridicule or make fun of those positions, but know that the people of this country reward and understand those positions,” Pawlenty said. “Every time, for example, the issue of traditional marriage has been put before the voters and the people of this country, they’ve supported traditional marriage.”
Pawlenty emphasized the need to “win over the hearts and minds” of Iowans and Americans. He touted his record, saying he co-authored the Defense of Marriage Act in Minnesota defining marriage as between a man and a woman, abortions are at “historic lows” in his state and he appointed strict constructionists to the Minnesota Supreme Court.
But nine people from Americans for Rick Perry wearing burnt-orange T-shirts had a larger presence at the event, and attracted just as much or more media attention.
The tax-exempt 527 independent organization — organized under a section of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code which allows the group to accept limitless donations and influence the election but forbids it to coordinate with the candidate’s campaign — is based in California and Texas. It is encouraging the Texas governor to run for president and is asking people to choose Perry as their write-in choice at Saturday’s Ames Straw Poll.
“So if you’re in Iowa and you decide to go on Saturday and you haven’t made up your mind, think strong about voting for Perry, because it will make a huge difference,” said Nate Crain, of Dallas, Texas, the group’s national finance chairman, who said he’s known Perry for 19 years but hasn’t spoken to him in nine months because federal laws prohibit a 527 group from interacting with a candidate.
Crain said his group wants to gather at least 150 to 250 write-in votes for Perry, and is targeting undecided voters as well as those supporting candidates who aren’t doing well. The Ames Straw Poll at Iowa State University is expected to be attended by thousands; about 14,000 attended four years ago.
“Governor Perry is not trying to rain on the Iowa Straw Poll,” Crain said of Perry’s anticipated announcement Saturday. “He’s simply just trying to get the message out, because everybody keeps asking about it. He finally needs to send a signal that he’s going to have the intention to run.”
Crain said while he’s not speaking on behalf of Perry, he bases his statements on the fact that he’s known Perry for 19 years and has been a close friend, longtime donor, supporter, fundraiser and campaign operative for the Texas governor, and has served on his “kitchen cabinet” and two inaugural committees.
“That’s just not the kind of thing that he would do … because he has so much respect for Iowa,” Crain said of Perry negatively affecting the Ames Straw Poll. “He needed to come out and he needed to end the speculation. He needed to send the signal of what he was going to do. Finally, the speculation game is over with.”
The Republican Party of Iowa’s State Central Committee in late July decided against including Perry on the straw poll ballot because he was not an official candidate. Tuesday was also the final day for presidential candidates to qualify for Thursday’s Republican presidential debate in Ames, which will be broadcast live on FOX News..............
Also, it explains how the 527 group "Americans for Perry," were told they could have a small spot in the parking lot and then told even that presence was being denied.
August 9, 2011 Strategist for Rick Perry says the Texan’s actions don’t diminish the Iowa straw poll
Since they will not be allowed a lot at Iowa State University, Perry supporters will set up shop in a Holiday Inn conference center, less than a mile away. They are offering free t-shirts and other inexpensive “swag” to people who drop by the hotel. According to sources, they will also offer free Straw Poll tickets to Rick Perry supporters.”………
[Texas Sen.] Kay Bailey Hutchison won’t endorse Rick Perry for president
If Rick Perry gets in, will Karl Rove be out? ................"Rove and other Bush allies began aligning themselves behind Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, a longtime Bush family ally, in challenging Perry in last year’s Texas gubernatorial primary. It was in the context of that bitter race that Carney in a 2009 interview with The New York Times Magazine disparaged the Bush crew — and Rove specifically — as “country-club Republicans” and “not conservatives.” ...........
Well one good thing about Perry being out of the state and trying to become king: It’ll be harder for him to keep signing contracts to give away (effective) control of our highways to private companies (usually foreign) for unlimited tolling, with monopoly-protections against competition - just to sweeten it up a bit more for them.
...one of a number of really weird things that has come out of our governor over the past decade.
(ok, fire away with your usual 10 pages of crap defending him)
more support for Governor Perry
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/274160/perry-ames-katrina-trinko#
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/09/another-group-helps-rick-perry-out/
Jobs for Iowa has an ad running in Iowa, that “What if?”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNSloevv56M
Astroturf.
Last session, it was the House trying to sell toll roads, not the Governor. I disagreed with the TxDOT’s deal with foreign interests, but that’s just about the only disagreement we’ve had.
http://wingright.org/2011/07/07/lets-see-life-or-toll-roadsour/
I’ve fussed with - and testified with, babysat for - the leader of TURF for years. Toll roads aren’t worth TURF’s fight against the Governor and the more successful one against Frank Corte, They certainly don’t justify the praise that TURF gave radical left Dems.
Otherwise good conservatives like Larry Simpson invited all sorts of City, County and State officials and employees up front to speak before finally getting around to the rest of us. Then, they treated the anti-toll road citizens to ridicule and rants.
I was one of the people who sat up half the night at the end of March waiting to testify with TURF - ended up telling them to remember that they would be asking for our help next Spring.
“They certainly don’t justify the praise that TURF gave radical left Dems.”
I certainly can’t argue that. But that’s what you get when people are having stuff crammed down their throats. Unfortunately since conservatives are either unable to, or too scared to try to organize against Perry, it leaves the radical left to do that job.
For the conservatives, they won’t fight him until forced to, such as when Perry’s boys attempted to convert Highway 249 into a toll road near Tomball, north of Houston. That’s when all hell broke out against him here...but that’s too late. He should have been STOPPED long before that.
Grape vine says that Iowans wanting to vote for Sarah Palin are required to first buy Bristol’s book.
Hard to side with people who aide and abet
Garnet Coleman, Joe Farias, Jessica Farrar, Trey Martinez Fischer, Senfronia Thompson, Mike Villarreal
http://wingright.org/2011/07/07/lets-see-life-or-toll-roadsour/
Perry could only win 51% of the vote in the 2010 primary. I expect he will underwhelm outside of Texas on even a grander scale.
Send them some cheese to go with that whine.
Against a sitting U.S. Senator with very high name recognition and the backing of the Bush’s and a Libertarian Ron Paul type candidate running also and Perry still took over 50% of the vote in the Republican primary? I find that to be a great showing.
“Hard to side with people who aide and abet”
Understand, but I’ll do that on single issues. Heck, lots of conservatives have let themselves be defended by the ACLU. Sometimes you just have to climb on board with the best organized people who support your (one) cause.
Since you asked --
TTC-Borders-Gardasil -- Comprehensive -- Posts 28, 32 and 39.
Thanks for the LINKS!
That SC speech should be “just as well covered” by the media.
Funny how the "rules" kept being changed.
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