Spokesman says Texas Gov. Rick Perry is running for president, announcement planned Saturday

AUSTIN, Texas — Texas Gov. Rick Perry is running for president, a spokesman confirmed Thursday, a move certain to shake up the race for the GOP nomination much to the delight of conservatives looking for a candidate to embrace.

Perry spokesman Mark Miner said the governor would make his intentions known on Saturday while visiting South Carolina and New Hampshire just as most of his presidential rivals compete in a test vote in Iowa.

Official word of Perry’s entrance into the race came just hours before eight candidates, including GOP front-runner Mitt Romney, were to appear on stage during a nationally televised debate.

It wasn’t much of a surprise. The longest-serving governor in Texas history has flirted with a presidential run since spring and has spent the past few months courting Republicans in early voting states and laying the groundwork for a campaign. He met privately with potential donors from California to New York and gave rabblerousing speeches to party faithful, casting himself as a fiscally responsible social conservative.

His intentions became even clearer over the past few days when officials disclosed that he would visit an important trio of states, a campaign-like schedule timed to overshadow the debate and the Iowa straw poll and, perhaps, wreak havoc on a field led by Romney.

You still did not provide the name of who you prefer. It's Ron Paul aint it?

You really do fail with the insults. You just can't stand it when people bring up Perry's support of the illegal aliens or the pro-abortionist Rudy Giuliani, can you? Oh, wait, I offended you, I mean "guest workers". I am very sorry, I know that "illegal aliens" is such an ugly phrase, so I'll call them "guest workers" from now on.

I said last month I was interested in Cain and Bachmann out of the declared candidates, but I'm also willing to consider candidates who haven't declared yet, since we are still several months out from the primaries..

At this point, I'll take Cain because I know for sure he isn't bought and sold by the "guest worker" crowd of RINOs like Perry is, and I'm sure he was never a supporter of scum like ol' Rudy.

“It’s why there were wars fought over Texas.”

Remember the crude!

or something like that?

Uhh, I believe your education has let you down, my friend. Oil was many years later, and didn't even have an impact until really 1901, but the value of Texas was understood early on, even if it, its weather, it's critters, and its native inhabitants were Hell on early European explorers from Spain and France. Cabeza de Vaca understood that it was a good location and had good resources in the 1520s or 1530s. Jump ahead 150 years to the 1680s and Robert de LaSalle claiming part of it for the French, knowing that it was good land. Jump ahead another 150 years, Stephen F. Austin understood the value in the early 1800s. Over the centuries, they all faced the problems of the weather, the critters, and the existing inhabitants wanting to hold on, but there was only so many outsiders they could kill before the Europeans and others were finally able to establish a true presence, eventually selling parts of it and fighting over other parts of it.

Oil didn't really come along and have an influence until Spindletop in 1901 helped turn the US into a world-class producer of oil, but people knew that Texas was good farming and ranching country which drew many people in, not to mention coal when it started to be mined, even before Austin showed up in with his colonists. Sure, in the first part of the 1800s, the gold rushes out west were much more glamorous, but things worked out well for Texas in the end. Over time, you had the farming and ranching build up, then around the 1880s, coal mining began in earnest, then 20 years later, oil, then the support companies for the oil industry, then the universities, then military in WWII, the aerospace, medical, and computer companies all took off within a few decades of one another. Over time, all of that built up an incredibly solid and diverse economic foundation for Texas.

That's not to say that we have left our agricultural roots behind - as a recent example, the Texas Department of Agriculture has helped Texas become the second largest exporter of goods to Cuba from the United States, right behind Louisiana. Texas is probably within range of shipping 20% of all American goods to Cuba in 2010 thanks to our farmers, although with this drought, we might have fallen a few notches.

We are also a very diverse state as far as people - many people don't realize that whites make up less than half the state, and with the large international population (over 15% were born outside of the United States), with so many ties overseas, it certainly helps Texas out as far as business opportunities.

My point is that all the things you mention as the origin of fights over Texas had nothing to do with the reason that modern Texas is valuable and that’s oil.

My original point is that too much credit is given to Perry for Texas' economic success. It took two solid centuries of economic and population growth to get to where we are at, and yet we have idiots running around trying to claim that Texas success = Perry.

Who gets rich with cattle ranching these days?

Actually the agricultural industry, from the single-family farm, to the large corporate farming/ranching companies is huge. Because of all of these varied interests, Texas is able to weather a lot of the economic problems.

All fair points. But if Perry were the wrong kind of Dem (or Rep for that matter) he could have certainly fouled things up. Perry gets credit for that. A lot of good governing is just getting the heck out of the way and letting people go about their business which Obama doesn’t want to do. I feel Congress influences domestic issues far more than the President who really has more to say about conducting foreign policy. Personally, I’ll take almost any Rep as President just as long as we get a good Rep Congress who can bend him/her to their will. For example, for a Rep President to veto a Rep Congress bill is pretty much unthinkable but a Dem President would do it out of reflex.

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