Free Republic

With speculation mounting as to whether Rick Perry will make a White House run, two national polls released Friday morning show the Texas governor within close reach of front-runner Mitt Romney. The Massachusetts governor edges Perry by 16 percent to 14 percent, in a CNN/ORC International survey and by 17 percent to 14 percent in a Fox News poll. The CNN survey shows an increased enthusiasm for a Perry presidential bid. In May, only 40 percent of Republican respondents wanted him to jump into the candidate pool, a number that's now risen to 50 percent. Fifty-five percent want former Alaska...

Senior Aides to Texas Governor Rick Perry say they remain at least two, and as many as four weeks away from any final decision on whether to run for the GOP presidential nomination. Governor Perry is described as enthusiastic about the possibility and a reference to his wife Anita's encouragement yesterday, is actually a reflection of what aides say is many months of her agitation in favor of running. His time frame for getting into the race is about creating the financial network to fund a national campaign that goes big in every state, not state-by-state like others are now...

Clay County GOP chairwoman Kirstine Thiessen confirmed that Perry won the straw poll vote the other night, which was held among those on hand for a planned meeting. The county, I'm told, is in Rep. Steve King's district, and abuts Minnesota. Of the 59 votes cast, Perry won with 15, followed by Michele Bachmann with 9, Thiessen said. Rick Santorum got eight, Ron Paul got 6, Hermain Cain got 5, Thaddeus McCotter got four, and tied with Tim Pawlenty and Mitt Romney for that number. Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin each got two votes. It's not quite a representative sample...

John King CNN interview: 5:19 minute video: Could Rick Perry shake up GOP W.H. race?GUESTS: Erick Erickson [Red State] and Mimi Swartz [Texas Monthly] discuss the potential presidential candidacy of Texas Gov. Rick Perry.Swartz: “Formidable campaigner. People on the East Coast underestimate him at their peril. He’s relentless. Perry will fight to the death if he wants this.” King: If he gets in, who gets hurt? Erickson: Pawleny has most to lose. Bachman loses. Hurts Romney -- explains in detail. Palin and Giuliani won’t get in if Perry gets in. Swartz: quoting another pundit re: Bush/Perry -- Bush aristocratic –...

Speaking this morning to the Texas Municipal Police Association in Austin, Gov. Rick Perry returned to one of his favorite subjects over the last few years, saying the Obama administration has inappropriately handled security issues on the Texas-Mexico border. Perry, who told the Des Moines Register in recent days that God may be calling him to run for president, has long said Washington has not deployed enough manpower to the Texas-Mexico border. He repeated that criticism this morning, saying he wants 3,000 Border Patrol agents along the border in Texas and 1,000 troops from the National Guard. He said...

Gov. Rick Perry's political stock has soared in recent months as he has traveled the country touting a decade of fiscal restraint in Texas under his leadership. Last month, Perry made Texas history by signing a two-year state budget that cuts overall spending for the first time in over 40 years. Perry has long promoted the state's fiscal record as a model for the country and a key to why Texas has weathered the recession better than most other states. He has opposed new taxes and been vehemently anti-Washington, and his message is drawing interest among Republican primary voters nationwide....

......Perry also leads a state whose population is growing as its economy grows, a stark contrast to the debt-ridden, job-killing stimulus the Obama administration imposed on the country. It picked up four new congressional seats in the 2010 census as businesses and job-seekers flocked to the state. The issue of the economy would be Perry's trump card in a potential race against Obama. Texas leads the nation in job creation: From 2008 to 2010, as California lost 1.2 million jobs, Texas added 165,000. Michael Cox and Richard Alm of the Center for Global Markets at SMU's Cox School of Business...

EXETER, N.H. - Texas Governor Rick Perry has telephoned influential Republicans in early-voting New Hampshire and Iowa in recent days as he weighs whether to enter the race for the GOP presidential nomination. “He was looking for my thoughts in terms of what the presidential field looked like and what might happen if someone came in and shook things up a little bit,’’ New Hampshire Senate President Peter Bragdon said yesterday.... The conservative Texan also called several GOP leaders in Iowa, which will hold the first contest in next year’s GOP presidential race. Among those contacted, Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds.......

...With Perry's history of straddling the establishment and tea party wings of the party, [Andrew] Hemingway [chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Liberty Caucus, told RCP] offered a bold prediction for the unique assets that the Texas governor could bring to the table in New Hampshire. "I think ultimately Rick Perry is a candidate who secures Haley Barbour's money with Sarah Palin's endorsement," he said.

Should we be more amused or appalled at the prospect of Rick Perry as a presidential candidate? Certainly, over the centuries, the republic has endured worse, most recently Ronald Reagan and Bush II. But Gov. Perry brings to the subject a unique political cynicism that would be fascinating to watch, if only one didn't have to consider the public consequences. As a young pol on the make and feeling the prevailing Texas winds, Perry moved effortlessly from conservative Democrat to reactionary Republican with nary a backward glance. Stuck behind and below the always anointed Dubya, he patiently bided his time...

Two major names remain on the 2012 bench. Each has a giant persona, comes from a giant state, and has a giant following. Yes, it’s Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. Their political friendship, while somewhat recent, seems real — so real that it would be easy to imagine one endorsing the other if only one of them would jump into the race. That would give an instant charge of credibility and buzz to the endorsee, and likely set either Palin or Perry as the Tea Party favorite. Their friendship goes back to their days as...

The New York Slimes today published an editorial witht the premise that Bush hates Perry and vica versa...ok, I don't necessarily care about what the MSM thinks or is agitating to undermine us. But I am intrigued and curious as to the truth of such "rivalry". What is the real story on this? Bush did spend too much money. Do Bush and therefore Rove both hate Perry? Is there really a rivalry? Will Bush endorse Perry with any VP namely (IMHO) Palin? or Bachman? I believe if Bush doesn't endorse him/them (and I am predicting Perry runs, obviously - and...

When Sarah Palin’s “Going Rogue” was released in late 2009, people around the country stood in line for hours to meet her at book signings, and to shake her hand and ask her to run for president in 2012. And this was after the MSM had spent nearly a year and half dragging her and her family through the mud, accusing Palin of every misdeed imaginable, and going out of their way to remind us how unprepared Palin was for the vice presidency (according to MSM standards of course). From the release of “Going Rogue” through the November 2010 elections,...