Facing a terrible and deteriorating economy and falling approval ratings, President Obama has only one strategic choice: Use his massive financial advantage to go negative -- to make centrist voters fear or hate the Republican nominee.
This would be harder to do against Romney than Perry, so in the end, I think Romney would have a somewhat better chance of winning states like Michigan, PA, WI, MN, NJ, or anywhere in the Northeast...
Perry, OTOH, for several reasons (including those not as popular on FR) would perform strongly enough among Hispanics compared to Romney, that most of the western states that went Blue would go GOP again in '12, Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico, and performs better the South overall, putting VA and NC back in the GOP column (although Romney probably performs better in N VA, Perry would motivate the "real" Virginia to the polls better, and make it a wash or net benefit).
Perry will take Florida too.
Good points.
As I said above, I think Perry would win a larger % of the popular vote, but Romney may pick up an extra state or two in the Midwest.
Either will beat Obama.