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If Perry does mount presidential run, we'll see if his walk matches his talk
Lubbock Avalanche-Journal ^ | July 10, 2010 | Editorial

Posted on 07/10/2011 3:47:00 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife

If Rick Perry does mount a successful bid for the U.S. presidency, it will be interesting to see whether he can translate his past and present criticisms of the federal government into concrete changes to the sprawling bureaucracy.

Perry has yet to say he will or won’t toss his hat into the Republican race for the right to square off against President Barack Obama in 2012. He is, however, making all the moves of a potential candidate testing the waters. Insiders are mixed on the odds. Some say he’s definitely in; others put the odds at 50-50.

But the mere possibility the longest-serving Texas governor will join a party battle featuring hopefuls who conservatives and the tea party are not particularly excited about has pundits of all stripes from coast to coast offering their views of how a Perry candidacy would play out.

Perry, who’s never lost an election, has a good chance of rising quickly to the frontrunner position against Mitt Romney, Michelle Bachman, Herman Cain, Tim Pawlenty, Newt Gingrich and Jon Huntsman. His unabashed conservative message puts him at or beyond Bachman’s position on the far right end of the political spectrum. His executive experience compares well to Romney, Pawlenty and Huntsman.

And, like him or not, there’s little denying Perry knows how to campaign, raise money and deliver rousing speeches.

While polls show Obama in danger of losing to a generic Republican candidate — and the prevailing wisdom in the punditry sphere is the 2012 race is the GOP’s to lose, there is a real question whether a candidate who energizes the conservative base can do so without having his or her far-right stances turn off center-right independents, pushing them into Obama’s column.

But should Perry manage to keep his perfect election record intact and find himself in the White House, we’ll find out whether his Washington walk matches his Texas talk.

Assuming the GOP holds its House majority and gains control of the Senate, we can imagine Perry’s to-do list starting with the repeal of Obamacare and ending with a full makeover of the Environmental Protection Agency. In between, he’d likely put a host of agencies to work shredding scores of regulations he’s railed against. He’d also likely push Congress to end or redesign a variety of federal programs he views as overreaches in violation of state rights laid out in the Tenth Amendment.

Perry’s real test would be border security. He’s decried the federal government’s failure to secure the border, but the problem has stymied presidents from both parties for decades. Perry might be able the change that, but the odds are he’d merely find himself transformed from the critic to the criticized.

While some pundits question whether voters will back another Texas governor so soon after George W. Bush’s divisive two terms at the helm, others see Perry as a different sort of conservative. Unlike “compassionate conservative” Bush, some see Perry as more like Ronald Reagan.

But unlike the easy-going, grandfatherly Gipper, Perry is more like the Texas A&M yell leader he once was.

“Our loudest opponents on the left are never going to like us, so let’s stop trying to curry favor with them,” he said in a recent speech.

We’ve agreed with Perry, and we’ve disagreed with him. He’s certainly not perfect, but no candidate is. But if sending Perry to Washington would balance the budget, address the debt and rein in over-regulation, it would be a welcome change from the current state of affairs.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Editorial; Government
KEYWORDS: 2012; amnesty; conservative; democrat; economy; energymandate; gardasil; gorescampaignmanager; openborders; perry; perry4gardasil; perry4openborders; perrybotshere; rickperry; rinoalert; rinoperry; ttc
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To: bgill
DREAM Act, illegals, Al Gore, and using tax dollars for his own personal use.

DREAM ACT -- I guess you'll have to take on the entire Texas Senate on that one:

Gov. Perry and The Texas Dream Act

[snip]

It’s important to point out that there is a huge difference in the Texas Dream Act and the The Dream Act that was pushed in Congress and failed. The Dream Act in Congress was full of all kinds of goodies other than allowing children of illegals to receive in state tuition. The Texas Dream Act was focused only on that. I happen to agree with The Texas Dream Act, and so did everyone in the Senate in Texas. It passed with ZERO “no” votes. Add to that, it has been proven to be successful.

These are a few things you need to know about the [2001] Texas Dream Act. The child has to have lived in Texas the three years leading up to high school graduation. These students are given no special treatment in getting into Texas colleges and universities. They must get in on their own merit. They are paying the tuition (with or without financial aid). It’s estimated that these students make up about 1% of those entering college.

[snip]

Most of us agree that border control MUST be dealt with first. The problem with all other efforts on this issue in the past is that the borders were not sealed. If there is anyone who we can trust to do that it is Gov. Perry (if he decides to run for President). He knows what goes on down at the border. He has gone there many times. He knows what needs to be done. There is no doubt in my mind that if he were President, he would seal our borders. But Perry also understands Hispanic outreach.

[snip]

AL GORE -- (Tipper stuck around longer than most -- but then she left too) -- Rick Perry, like Ronald Reagan, Phil Gramm, along with many others, switched to the GOP. Perry was Al Gore's TX campaign manager in the 1988 Democratic Party presidential primary that was won by Michael Dukakis. Perry was a conservative democrat and moved to the GOP in 1989 and ran against Jim Hightower for the Agriculture Commission and won.

Rick Perry: Al Gore's gone to Hell

Perry does not believe there is valid scientific proof of anthropogenic global warming. He has said several times that there is no scientific consensus on the issue.

On September 7, 2007 Perry gave a speech to California Republicans. He said, "Virtually every day another scientist leaves the global warming bandwagon. ... But you won't read about that in the press because they have already invested in one side of the story."

ILLEGALS and spending tax dollars for personal use....

You'll have to be more specific bgill. Just throwing stuff out there but not elaborating because you're just so tired isn't going to cut it.

I'm all ears.

41 posted on 07/10/2011 7:44:08 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: fluffdaddy

“If all you’ve got against Perry is Gardasil and the Trans Texas Corridor, it’s way past time to give it a rest. Both were mistakes. Neither mistake went anywhere. No harm no foul. Besides, the Gardasil “mandate” was tempered with an opt out.”

I thought I could get through this one by lurking, but no such luck. So I figure I’ll join in. The problem with the Gardasil and the TTC is we are TOTALLY AT A LOSS to understand why he pushed this stuff SO HARD and practically had to be put on a rack to back off (and for the record, for most people to have to opt-out for Gardasil required that they purger themselves). The only thing that is common between the two is the revolving door where his people seem to migrate to the company that will make the big bucks (off the backs of the Texas taxpayers) and then migrate back to work for him. For Gardasil that was pointed out with links, for TTC, it was his now-dead (thankfully) transportation secretary that had the Cintra-connection.

But to answer your question, there are other things that bother us, they just don’t perplex us as much, since they’re not HAIR-BRIANED, but only RINO-esque. This includes, other than whining to the feds, not doing a damn thing about illegal immigration, especially during this last session when he could have gotten anything through our 2/3’s Republican legislature if he REALLY wanted to. Instead he had his cronies lock up stuff, so he didn’t have to sign or veto. Same for education and pension reforms. There are a number of REPUBLICAN governors that have been in office for only a short time that are making Perry look like a joke.

Even so, I still prefer him over Romney and about half of the field and will vote for him in November, if I have to.


42 posted on 07/10/2011 7:56:10 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Walk = Talk: Senator Bourke Hickenlooper, R-IA, and Jesse Helms, R-NC, who else?


43 posted on 07/10/2011 7:58:31 AM PDT by Theodore R. (98)
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To: Eye of Unk

“I’m just thinking that too many people are visualizing voter support for a candidate from Texas, only Texas.”

A good point. Unless Perry had come in to Texas with an Obama-like drive to wreck the state, it would have been almost impossible to damage us. We are making out like bandits due to high oil prices and never having a real estate bubble (thanks to our State Constitution that long predates Perry). We also have a heck of a lot of Republicans in positions of power, and even many of the Dems actually CARE about the state (unlike DC). Governor Bush did fine here; Ann Richards, a Democrat, did great here. This is a tough state to mess up these days.

Bottom line, if you vote Perry, you get PERRY - you will NOT get Texas - so you should be looking at the PERSON, not the state.


44 posted on 07/10/2011 8:02:33 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

Just out of curiosity, did Merck try this Gardasil stunt in any other state - or was Perry the only one to take the bait?

I can’t seem to find any other states that mandate or attempted to mandate it, not even California or other left-wing states.


45 posted on 07/10/2011 8:04:45 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: BobL

Very eloquently said, and quite true.

The web of bad judgments are suspect, especially
so when they have not be directly addressed.

Given that they also arose in a ROVE-created puppet,
created from a Democrat taken from the DNC,
further suggests they should be addressed to remove
the burqa-of-RINOship over Perry.


46 posted on 07/10/2011 8:05:35 AM PDT by Diogenesis (Nothing surpasses the complexity of the human mind. - Leto II: Dar-es-Balat)
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To: deport

“I can’t disagree but in the long run it’s damn hard to get a candidate much right of center elected nationally. “

It’s even harder if you don’t try...and when was the last time we tried since 1984?


47 posted on 07/10/2011 8:06:21 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

The problem with a Dream Act, in any form, is that it becomes an incentive for people south of the border to come here. Maybe not a huge incentive, but an incentive, added on to many incentives.

We need to delete these incentives if we don’t want people coming here illegally - that simple.


48 posted on 07/10/2011 8:11:03 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: lentulusgracchus

I know that Perry disappoints you sweetheart, but Ross Perot is not running. Ross may be on the wrong side of the lawn for all I know.


49 posted on 07/10/2011 8:13:19 AM PDT by Ditter
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To: BobL
deport (pushing for RINO):
"I can’t disagree but in the long run it’s damn hard
to get a candidate much right of center elected nationally.“



50 posted on 07/10/2011 8:13:26 AM PDT by Diogenesis (Nothing surpasses the complexity of the human mind. - Leto II: Dar-es-Balat)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

“Rick Perry, like Ronald Reagan, Phil Gramm, along with many others, switched to the GOP.”

Let’s keep Reagan out of this, please. He switched parties LONG BEFORE Jimmy Carter showed up. I had the national Democrats figured out during Carter’s term, it should not have required Perry another decade to figure it out.

Yes, Dems down here in Texas are (or certainly were) another breed - they CARED about the state and social justice was among the last things on their minds. However, Perry was helping to run a Democrat PRESIDENTIAL campaign - which, combined with a Democrat Congress would have been a NIGHTMARE for this country. Perry could have simply said “No Thanks” when Gore came calling...but he didn’t...and that confuses many of us.

Gramm...who knows, but he switched in 1983, so he did at least figure out the Dems a lot earlier than Perry.


51 posted on 07/10/2011 8:17:02 AM PDT by BobL (PLEASE READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2657811/posts)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife
While polls show Obama in danger of losing to a generic Republican candidate — and the prevailing wisdom in the punditry sphere is the 2012 race is the GOP’s to lose
There is no such person as "generic Republican candidate" - there are only individual people who are candidates for the Republican nomination. Each will have his/her own strengths and shortcomings. What that actually means is that people are looking for an alternative to the status quo, a.k.a. "the mess we're in."
there is a real question whether a candidate who energizes the conservative base can do so without having his or her far-right stances turn off center-right independents, pushing them into Obama’s column.
November 5, 2004 | Rod D. Martin
only about half of Americans vote, even in high turnout years. Those who vote do so for a reason, and that reason is always that they care about something, or someone. You must motivate people to turn them out. Annoy them and they stay home. There's always room to expand either group. And the guy who turns out more of his supporters always wins.

Almost no Republicans have understood this. They have listened to a left-wing media trying to destroy them, constantly telling them to “run to the middle” (as if people who want to elect liberals won't just vote for a real one). They have listened to their paid consultants, who make ungodly sums on television ads but not a penny organizing volunteer GOTV (get out the vote) efforts. And they have listened to their own officeholders, who, having picked the low-hanging fruit, managed to get elected by doing these things, but whose counsel is virtually worthless in the harder battles being fought today.

I have preached this for years. Run to your base: give them a reason to vote by giving them an agenda worth voting for and meaning it. And then organize the activists necessary to find them and get them to the polls. Here lies the Holy Grail, I've said, and for years been laughed at by all.


52 posted on 07/10/2011 8:17:24 AM PDT by conservatism_IS_compassion (DRAFT PALIN)
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To: BobL
.........This includes, other than whining to the feds, not doing a damn thing about illegal immigration, especially during this last session when he could have gotten anything through our 2/3’s Republican legislature if he REALLY wanted to. Instead he had his cronies lock up stuff, so he didn’t have to sign or veto. Same for education and pension reforms. There are a number of REPUBLICAN governors that have been in office for only a short time that are making Perry look like a joke.

Bob.

We (Texans) have a 1300 mile INTERNATIONAL border with Mexico. It is the FEDs job (money and muscle) to protect it. Texans are spending about $100 million a year from our budget on border security. Perry has asked for drones, he's gone to Israel to see how they protect the Gaza Strip. He has asked for 3000 troops on the border. He has set up an elite Texas Ranger force. What do you suggest he do?

During the last legislative session Gov. Perry called them back into special session to address "sanctuary cities" and the secure cities bill where police could check immigration status. The TX Senate passed a take it or leave it bill and adjourned. The House took it up pissed at the Senate for doing that, and once all the political "eye-balling" began on how their votes would look in the upcoming election and the specter of political musical chairs started to dawn on them, the leadership in the house dropped it.

Perry has made his displeasure clear.

Lawmakers Call it Quits, Leave Unfinished Business

*******

But all was not lost.

******

July 4, 2011 [Texas] Rule requiring drivers to prove citizenship now law As the House early last month debated a must-pass finance bill, one member slipped in language that puts into law a controversial Texas Department of Public Safety policy requiring driver's license applicants to show they're in the country legally.

The amendment, added by Rep. Jim Pitts, R-Waxahachie, to the education funding bill legislators needed to balance the state budget had originally been included in Senate Bill 9, the so-called "sanctuary cities" bill that failed in the special session. It also had appeared in an omnibus homeland security bill by Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, that died in the regular session.

The new law approved last Tuesday makes some tweaks to a 2008 DPS policy that prevents illegal immigrants from getting a driver's license and created a special license for temporary visitors. The rules require Texans applying for or renewing their license to show they are citizens or are in the country legally.

By putting it into law the state potentially undermines an ongoing lawsuit that argues DPS doesn't have authority to check legal status."....

53 posted on 07/10/2011 8:22:57 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Diogenesis

Your issues with Perry are well known and worn out. Get some new ones. PUHLEEEZE!


54 posted on 07/10/2011 8:28:30 AM PDT by lonestar (It takes a village of idiots to elect a village idiot.)
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To: Cincinatus' Wife

this is a good piece of analysis:

http://conhomeusa.typepad.com/therepublican/2011/07/rick-perry-anti-obama.html


55 posted on 07/10/2011 8:29:51 AM PDT by ConservativeDude
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To: Diogenesis

Lying again...and on Sunday morning...


56 posted on 07/10/2011 8:35:43 AM PDT by wtc911 ("How you gonna get down that hill?")
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To: Cincinatus' Wife
And btw. I am not a professional anything.

Then your obsession with Perry, and 500 threads about him in the past few weeks can be explained how?

57 posted on 07/10/2011 8:42:04 AM PDT by catfish1957 (Hey algore...You'll have to pry the steering wheel of my 317 HP V8 truck from my cold dead hands)
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To: catfish1957
Then your obsession with Perry, and 500 threads about him in the past few weeks can be explained how?

500 threads! Really?!

I'm good!

LOL.

Why is that a problem for you?

People could have said the same thing about me posting Sarah Pain threads. No one said, "boo."

Who is your candidate?

58 posted on 07/10/2011 8:47:32 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
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To: Diogenesis
WOW!!!! Alaska's BIG!!!!

Now let's discuss another statistic about Alaska...

Ak population - @700k.

US population...@ 307 million (Alaska's population = 0.028% of US population).

Texas population - @ 25 million.

Heck, the county wherein I live has a population twice that of Alaska.

So, what exactly is your point about the area of Alaska on a Perry thread?

59 posted on 07/10/2011 8:48:08 AM PDT by wtc911 ("How you gonna get down that hill?")
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To: ConservativeDude
Obama is the anti-jobs President. Rick Perry, if he gets into the race, is the pro-jobs candidate. And that makes him the anti-Obama candidate in a way that the others cannot be.

Thank you for the link!

60 posted on 07/10/2011 8:48:25 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
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