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Obama’s Perry problem, and how Perry can capitalize on it

Ryan Streeter
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Coming off a weekend during which he lit up crowds in South Carolina and Iowa, and stomped on the Ames straw poll by finishing ahead of Mitt Romney without even appearing on the ballot, Rick Perry has given his fellow Republicans a lot to worry about.

He also presents a problem for Obama. He has entered the race as the one Republican candidate who can out-Obama Obama in giving speeches that are visionary and about the future (at a time when Politico is running stories titled "Obama's Vision Problem"). He also has a record on jobs that is a bigger threat to Obama than anything else the other candidates have to throw at the President.

His one challenge will be that, if he gets the nomination, Obama will try to paint him as an untrustworthy creature of the far right.

How can Perry capitalize on the opportunity his strengths afford him without falling into Obama's trap?

One way would be to break from the pack on what Ross Douthat recently called “the problem facing the eventual Republican nominee in 2012”: finding a deficit reduction plan that both conservatives and the broader electorate can embrace. More specifically, Douthat refers to the moment in last Thursday’s debate during which all candidates said they would reject a deficit deal that included 10 dollars in cuts for every dollar of increased revenue. He quotes Kevin Williamson to make the point: “Chalk one up to the crazies…$100 billion in new taxes plus $1 trillion in cuts balances the budget in 2012.”

You can easily get to $100 billion in revenue by closing loopholes that are unfair and skewed toward the affluent without ever raising tax rates. Rather than running away from this issue, a candidate like Perry should embrace it and lead on it.

Douthat is right that Republican candidates will face the deficit as a central, defining issue, so they had better be strong and articulte on it. With the super committee wrangling in the coming months to reach a debt ceiling extension that will only barely get us past next year’s election, the debt and deficit will be persistent themes during the election. They will hover above as the dark cloud threatening to rain on whatever candidates try to say about jobs and the economy. And, as Douthat points out, Americans don’t want extremism on this point. As a result, Obama will be desperate to paint his opponent as a right-wing nut when it comes to spending cuts and tax revenues. Republicans will have to have a clear view on the matter.

Rather than parroting the other candidates, Perry should seize the opportunity to be different on this issue for two reasons:

He is as conservative as they come and can afford the risk of leading on the issue. Perry’s reputation as a low-tax, freedom-loving, anti-Washington executive is well-established. The person candidates fear most on this issue is not any of them or some other elected official, but Grover Norquist, who would regard closing loopholes without offsetting tax cuts as a tax increase. On this point, Perry can be a credible educator, claiming that he would only touch loopholes that serve special interests – which is a very conservative thing to do.

It would help him with the group he needs the most help with: moderates. No one yet knows how well Perry’s Texas swagger will play in the "suburbs of Ohio, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania." By making clear that he is open to a solution that his Republican opponents all reject (they are on record, after all), he takes a move away from Obama that the President hopes to be able to make next year.

Were he to take such a view of deficit reduction, Perry would join the ranks of a Tom Coburn, his neighbor to the north, by igniting plenty of fire from the right while still maintaining his conservative credentials. My guess is that his advisors would think this a risk to great to take, but it may be the best thing he can do to guide the debate on the deficit rather than respond to it.

After Ames, all eyes are on Romney and Perry

Ryan Streeter
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Michele Bachmann pulled out an important, if not unsurprising, victory in Ames. Ron Paul's strong showing was also anticipated. And worries about Tim Pawlenty among his supporters were only confirmed by his distant third place finish. There are early reports this morning that he will announce today that he is ending his campaign.

Perhaps the most intriguing result was that Rick Perry bested Romney, even though the Texas governor was a write-in candidate who was nowhere near Iowa.

This result shows where we are right now in the campaign: at the point where the epic battle begins between Perry and Romney begins for the hearts and minds of voters. It's too early to make any firm predictions about whether that battle will define the primaries, but it's looking that way right now.

Romney has been the clear frontrunner despite misgivings among conservatives about his past flip-flops and unappealing health care law. His last debate performance helped him overall. His low Ames numbers were expected, since he didn't invest heavily in Iowa, but the fact that Perry got more votes put a chink in Romney's armor.

Perry is at least as evangelical and anti-Washington as Bachmann, with executive experience besides. Bachmann has thrown water all over Pawlenty's campaign. Perry will likely do the same to hers. She has probably hit the high point of her campaign, so long as Perry says and does the things everyone expects him to do.

This raises three important questions:

1. Can Perry's appeal to conservatives broaden out to enough independents to beat Obama? His jobs record is his strength on this front, but his Texas swagger and gun-toting, states-rights-loving, evangelical persona are his biggest liability with this group.
2. Can Romney pull enough support from conservatives to beat Perry in the primary? If Perry has some potential weaknesses in a general election, Romney has them in the primary - and Perry's entrance into the race will reinforce that reality.
3. Will Perry's entrance into the race kick off a more intense fundraising battle? Money has been sitting on the sidelines to a significant degree. Will the big donors and bundlers start getting active now? How that question is answered will matter a lot.

Perry and Romney are flip sides of the other in terms of electoral advantage: one is especially strong among primary voters, the other among voters in a general. Some will probably start saying we should have a Perry-Romney or Romney-Perry ticket in 2012. While that doesn't quite seem like the dream ticket at this point, it could actually be what we get.

Full text of Rick Perry's 2012 announcement speech

Texas Governor Rick Perry
Saturday August 13, 2011
RedState Gathering 2011
Charleston, South Carolina

Howdy. Thank you, Erick (Erickson, editor of RedState). It is great  to be at RedState. And I’ll tell you what, it’s even better to be governor of the largest red state in America.

It’s sure good to be back in the Palmetto State, in South Carolina. I enjoy coming to places where people elect folks like Nikki Haley, true conservatives. And also where they love the greatest fighting force on the face of the earth…the United States Military.

And I want to take a moment and ask you to just take a silence, think about those young Navy SEALs and the other special operators who gave it all in the service of their country. Just take a moment to say Thank you, Lord, that we have those kind of selfless, sacrificial men and women. Their sacrifice was immeasurable, their dedication profound, and we will never, ever forget them. 

I stand before you today as the governor of Texas. But I also stand before you the son of two tenant farmers, Ray Perry, who came home after 35 bombing missions over Europe to work his little corner of land out there, and Amelia who made sure my sister Milla and I had everything that we needed, including hand-sewing my clothes until I went off to college.

I am also the product of a place called Paint Creek. Doesn’t have a zip code. It’s too small to be called a town along the rolling plains of Texas. We grew dryland cotton and wheat, and when I wasn’t farming or attending Paint Creek Rural School, I was generally over at Troop 48 working on my Eagle Scout award.

Around the age of 8, I was blessed – didn’t realize it, but I was blessed to meet my future wife, Anita Thigpen, at a piano recital. We had our first date eight years later. And she finally agreed to marry me 16 years after that. Nobody says I am not persistent.

There is no greater way to live life than with someone you love, and my first love is with us today, my lovely wife Anita. We’re also blessed to have two incredible children, Griffin and Sydney, and they are also with us today, and our wonderful daughter-in-law Meredith. I’d just like to introduce those two. Thank you.

What I learned growing up on the farm was a way of life that was centered on hard work, and on faith and on thrift. Those values have stuck with me my whole life. But it wasn’t until I graduated from Texas A&M University and joined the United States Air Force, flying C-130’s all around the globe, that I truly appreciated the blessings of freedom.

To paraphrase Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan, I realized that the United States of America really is the last great hope of mankind. What I saw was systems of government that elevated rulers at the expense of the people. Socialist systems cloaked maybe in good intentions but were delivering misery and stagnation. And I learned that not everyone values life like we do in America, or the rights that are endowed to every human being by a loving God. 

You see, as Americans we’re not defined by class, and we will never be told our place. What makes our nation exceptional is that anyone, from any background, can climb the highest of heights. As Americans, we don’t see the role of government  as guaranteeing outcomes, but allowing free men and women to flourish based on their own vision, their hard work and their personal responsibility. And as Americans, we realize there is no taxpayer money that wasn’t first earned by the sweat and toil of one of our citizens.

That’s why we reject this President’s unbridled fixation on taking more money out of the wallets and pocketbooks of American families and employers and giving it to a central government. “Spreading the wealth” punishes success while setting America on course to greater dependency on government. Washington’s insatiable desire to spend our children’s inheritance on failed “stimulus” plans and other misguided economic theories have given us record debt and left us with far too many unemployed. 

But of course, now we’re told we are in recovery. Yeah.

But this sure doesn’t feel like a recovery to more than nine percent of Americans out there who are unemployed, or the sixteen percent of African Americans and 11 percent of Hispanics in the same position, or the millions more who can only find part-time work, or those who have stopped even looking for a job. 

One in six work-eligible Americans cannot find a full-time job. That is not a recovery. That is an economic disaster.

If you think about it, for those Americans who do have full-time jobs, they aren’t experiencing economic recovery with the rising fuel costs and the food prices that are going up. Recovery is a meaningless word if the bank has foreclosed on your home, if you are under water on your mortgage, or if you are up to the max on your credit card debt. Those Americans know that this President and his big-spending, big-government policies have prolonged our national misery, not alleviated it.  

And what do we say to our children? Y’all figure it out? Don’t worry, Washington’s created 17 debt and entitlement commissions in 30 years, but the fact of the matter is they just didn’t have the courage to make the decisions to allow you to have the future that you actually deserve? That Washington wouldn’t even make modest entitlement program reforms in this last debate? And the President even refused to lay out a plan, for fear of the next election? How can the wealthiest nation in the history of civilization fail so miserably to pay its bills? How does that happen?

Well, Mr. President, let us tell you something: you can't win the future by selling America off to foreign creditors.

We cannot afford four more years of this rudderless leadership. Last week, that leadership failed, and the tax and spend and borrow agenda of this President led to the first ever downgrade of the credit rating of the United States of America.

In reality though, this is just the most recent downgrade. The fact is for nearly three years President Obama has been downgrading American jobs. He’s been downgrading our standing in the world. He’s been downgrading our financial stability. He’s been downgrading our confidence, and downgrading the hope for a better future for our children. That’s a fact.

His policies are not only a threat to this economy, so are his appointees – a threat. You see he stacked the National Labor Relations Board with anti-business cronies who want to dictate to a private company, Boeing, where they can build a plant. No president, no president  should kill jobs in South Carolina, or any other state for that matter, simply because they choose to go to a right-to-work state.

You see, when the Obama Administration is not stifling economic growth with over-regulation, they are achieving the same through their reckless spending. Debt is not only a threat to our economy, but also to our security.  

America’s standing in the world is in peril, not only because of disastrous economic policies, but from the incoherent muddle that they call foreign policy. Our president has insulted our friends and he’s encouraged our enemies, thumbing his nose at traditional allies like Israel. He seeks to dictate new borders for the Middle East and the oldest democracy there, Israel, while he is an abject failure in his constitutional duty to protect our borders in the United States.

His foreign policy seems to be based on alienating our traditional allies, while basing our domestic agenda on importing those failed Western European social values. We don’t need a president who apologizes for America. We need a president who protects and projects those values. 

Look, it’s pretty simple: we’re going to stand with those who stand with us, and we will vigorously defend our interests. And those who threaten our interests, harm our citizens  – we will simply not be scolding you, we will defeat you. 

Our nation cannot and it must not endure four more years of aimless foreign policy. We cannot and must not endure four more years of rising unemployment, rising taxes, rising debt, rising energy dependence on nations that intend us harm.  

It is time to get America working again. To get citizens – to get our citizens working in good jobs and getting the government to working for the people again.  

Page one of any economic plan to get America working is to give a pink slip to the current resident in the White House.

 Listen, we just got to get back to the basic truths of economic success. As Governor, I’ve had to deal with the consequences of this national recession.  In 2003, and again this year, my state faced billions of dollars in budget shortfalls. But we worked hard, we made tough decisions, we balanced our budget. Not by raising taxes, but by setting priorities and cutting government spending.  It can and it must be done in Washington, DC. 

Dr. Schwertner (State Representative, R-Williamson County, TX), we have led Texas based on some just really pretty simple guiding principles. One is don’t spend all of the money. Two is keeping the taxes low and under control. Three is  you have your regulatory climate fair and predictable. Four is reform the legal system so frivolous lawsuits don’t paralyze employers that are trying to create jobs.

Over the years, we have followed this recipe to produce the strongest economy in the nation. Since June of 2009, Texas is responsible for more than 40 percent of all of the new jobs created in America.

Now think about that. We’re home to less than 10 percent of the population in America, but forty percent of all the new jobs were created in that state. 

I’ve cut taxes. I have delivered historic property tax reductions. I was the first governor since World War II to cut general revenue spending in our state budget. We passed lawsuit reform, including just this last session a “loser pays” law to stop the frivolous lawsuits that were happening.

And I know I’ve talked a lot about Texas here in the last little bit. I’m a Texan and proud of it. But first, and foremost, I’m an incredibly proud American.

And I know something: America is not broken. Washington, D.C., is broken!

We need balanced budgets. We need lower taxes. We need less regulation. And we need civil justice reform – those same four principles. Our country’s most urgent need is to revitalize our economy, stop the generational theft that is going on with this record debt.

I come to South Carolina because I will not sit back and accept the path that America is on. Because a great country requires a better direction. Because a renewed nation needs a new president.

It is time to get America working again. And that’s why, with the support of my family, and an unwavering belief in the goodness of America, I declare to you today as a candidate for President of the United States.

It’s time for America to believe again. It’s time to believe that the promise of our future is far greater than even our best days behind us. It’s time to believe again in the potential of private enterprise, set free from the shackles of overbearing federal government. And it’s time to truly restore our standing in  the world, and renew our faith in freedom as the best hope for peace in this world that’s beset with strife.

The change we seek will never emanate out of Washington, D.C. It will come from the windswept prairies of Middle America, the farms and factories across this great land, from the hearts and minds of the goodhearted Americans who will accept not a future that is less than our past, patriots – patriots who will not be consigned to a fate of less freedom in exchange for more government.

We do not have to accept our current circumstances. We will change them. We are Americans. That’s what we do. We roll up our sleeves. We go to work. We fix things.

We stand up and proudly proclaim that Washington is not our caretaker and we reject the state that, in Margaret Thatcher’s words, she said a state that takes too much from us in order to do too much for us.  

We will not stand for that any longer.We’re dismayed at the injustice that nearly half of all Americans don’t even pay any income tax. And you know the liberals out there are saying that we need to pay more. We are indignant about leaders who do not listen and spend money faster than they can print it.

In America, the people are not subjects of government. The government is subject to the people. And it is up to us, to this present generation of Americans, to take a stand for freedom, to send a message to Washington that we’re taking our future back from the grips of central planners who would control our healthcare, who would spend our treasure, who downgrade our future and micro-manage our lives. 

It is time to limit and simplify the taxes in this country. We have to quit spending money we don’t have. We need to get our fiscal house in order and restore our good credit. And we will repeal this President’s misguided, one-size-fits-all government healthcare plan immediately.

We’ll create jobs. We’ll get America working again. We’ll create jobs and we’ll build wealth, we’ll truly educate and innovate in science, and in technology, engineering and math. We’ll create the jobs and the progress needed to get America working again.  

And I’ll promise you this: I’ll work every day to make Washington, D.C. as inconsequential in your life as I can. And at the same time, we’ll be freeing our families and small businesses and states from the burdensome and costly federal government so those groups can create, innovate and succeed.

I believe in America. I believe in Her purpose and Her promise. I believe Her best days have not yet been lived. I believe Her greatest deeds are reserved for the generations to come. With the help and the courage of the American people, we will get our country working again. God bless you and God bless the United States of America.

It's official: Rick Perry is running for president!

Natalie Gonnella
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After a swarm of speculation Rick Perry finally put the rumors to rest today, confirming to a crowd of more than 300 conservatives that he is in officially seeking the GOP nomination in 2012.

In a much awaited speech at the RedState gathering in South Carolina, surrounded by American flags and with portraits of Reagan and T. Roosevelt nearby, Perry announced to America that he is indeed running for president.

Stealing attention away from the Ames straw poll in Iowa, here's what the Texas Governor had to say:

Perry enters the race at the top of the pack, but the latest 2012 poll shows only one Republican ahead of Obama - unfortunately he's not running

Natalie Gonnella
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It's the biggest week yet this year for GOP hopefuls, and as Republicans gear up for this weekend's events, a new election poll offers some interesting insights into the latest views from likely American voters.

With many anxiously awaiting Rick Perry's announcement on Saturday, according to the latest CNN/ORC International 2012 poll, the Texas Governor is about to give Mitt Romney a serious run for his money:

15 percent of Republicans and independents who lean towards the GOP pick [the Texas Governor[ as their first choice for their party's nomination, just two points behind former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who's making his second bid for the White House. Romney's two point margin over Perry is within the survey's sampling error.

Interestingly however, as Perry and Romney appear to lead the pack among Republicans, when it comes to registered voters in general, President Obama's biggest competition actually comes from someone who isn't even running.

According to the latest 2012 poll results:

Giuliani has a 51-45 percent advantage over Obama among registered voters, while Romney matches up evenly against the President - 49 percent for Obama and 48 percent for Romney. But the survey indicates Obama appears to have a slight edge over Bachmann (51-45 percent) and Perry (51-46 percent) and Obama has a lead over Palin (55-41 percent).

With a number of GOP candidates taking the stage tonight for the Iowa debate ahead of this Saturday's straw poll, it will be interesting to see if (and how) voters' preferences may change as the race for the GOP nomination continues to gain steam.

The full analysis from the latest CNN/ORC International survey is available to view here.

Starting Saturday, it will be Rick Perry's economy vs. Obama's economy

Ryan Streeter
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Rick Perry is getting his mileage out of Saturdays right now. Last week was his prayer rally, which by most accounts came off well. This Saturday in South Carolina he intends to “signal” his intentions to run for President in 2012 (and then confirm those intentions by traveling to New Hampshire followed by Iowa).

When he gets into the race, Perry’s biggest challenge will be two-fold:

1. Maintain the positive momentum he had enjoyed merely by flirting with a run;
2. And convince enough Americans that he is the best candidate for tough economic times.

On the first point, Perry’s challenge is pretty clear. His consistently favorable position in the polls for weeks has been driven by his fundamental appeal on key issues and the overall lack of enthusiasm Republican voters have for the field as a whole. Once he enters and the nation gets to know him better, will he keep up the strong showing?

Just yesterday, Gallup announced that his “positive intensity” score is the highest of the entire field. That means Republicans who recognize him have a stronger favorable impression of him than anyone else in the field enjoys. Romney still leads the field overall in terms of voter intent, but Perry is in a strong second place according to the latest USA Today/Gallup poll. Perry’s challenge will be not to slip, but rather to gain on Romney. Expectations are high. Maybe a little too high.

On the second point, Perry’s economic record in Texas makes him stand out from all the other candidates during a time when it is increasingly clear that 2012 will mainly be a referendum on the Obama economy – if Republicans can keep thing that way (as Ramesh Ponnuru argues in his Bloomberg column this week, that’s not a guarantee: if Obama can convince enough of the electorate not that he’s wonderful but that he’s simply less risky than the Republican alternative, he will win).

Perry is the best candidate for keeping the subject of the economy front and center because of his record presiding over Texas’ sustained, high-adrenaline job-creating economy. Of the 722,000 jobs added in America since the end of the recession, Texas contributed 265,300 of them (37%). In 2010, Texas’s GDP surpassed $1.2 trillion, more than New York’s, and a 27% increase since 2000.

The question becomes: can he convince enough of America that what he achieved in Texas can work for the nation?

Perry’s street cred with religious conservatives is already strong (exhibit A: his prayer rally). His Tea Party bona fides are strong (exhibit B: His book, Fed Up!). And as we’ve seen, he elicits a very strong positive reaction from Republicans in general.

So his main challenge is and will remain his ability to convince America that he offers the solution to the Obama economy. If he and his team can do that consistently over time, he’ll roll past the other GOP contenders.

The media and the Democrats will (already are) try to create a mental association among voters between Perry and George W. Bush (just close your eyes when you listen to Perry and you’ll hear the connection the Democrats are dying for you to get lodged in your head). They will dredge up data and questions about the Texas budget and whether the state is really as strong as people say, and so on.

So it all boils down to his ability to beat back those attacks and keep the focus on two economies: the Obama economy, and the Texas economy.

In defense of Rick Perry’s “The Response” event

Ryan Streeter
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What one report called “Rick Perry’s clamorous and controversial day of prayer Saturday” was actually pretty straightforward: a group of about 30,000 Christians came together to pray and fast and ask God to renew the nation. Perry began planning the day more than a year ago, before his presidential prospects were front and center, and by all accounts, he was motivated by an abiding and sincere faith.

There is no way the event could be seen as nonpolitical, of course, since Perry is the Governor of the nation’s second largest state and an almost-certain presidential candidate.

But while the media predictably saw the event in terms of Perry positioning himself among religious conservatives, the political angle was more interesting and significant than that. On Saturday Perry did something the other 2012 GOP candidates have avoided doing: he put America’s biggest problems beyond the reach of politicians alone and focused on the condition of the nation itself.

Everyone else – Romney, Bachmann, Pawlenty and the others – has talked about America’s chief challenges as political: Obama and the Democrats are spending us to Hades, and we need to throw them out. Perry’s event was a call to prayer for the troubled America that all of us have had a hand in imperiling. If we fall over the cliff into Hades, it’s not only the fault of the political class. Calling Americans - and especially the faithful among them - to shoulder the burden of our troubled times is an old tradition in our country that, to date, the other candidates have not effectively embraced.

Viewing the event this way will never fly among elite commentators, though. Consider one New York Times’ op-ed contributor's pre-coverage of Saturday's rally. After acknowledging the right of political leaders to express their faith in the public square, the writer…

…said that Mr. Perry is free to call a meeting where only people who agree that Jesus Christ is the one true savior are welcome,” but that “few of them commence potential presidential campaigns that way.”  (In case the writer didn’t notice, Perry didn’t “commence” his campaign with the event).

…said “We should question the prayer service’s tone, too.” (Apparently, Perry’s theological precision violates the standard set by Abraham Lincoln’s nonsectarianism and “encourages the very divisions that Lincoln believed lay at the root of America’s ills.” There was nothing divisive about the event other than the divisiveness liberal elites cannot help but to attribute to it.)

… said “we’re entitled to judge Mr. Perry’s association with the prayer service’s organizers.” (The writer cites the American Family Association, which the Southern Poverty Law Center calls “a hate group,” and none others. Shall we start naming people and groups with whom Obama has associated?...)

All of this is predictable and consistent with criticism Perry received from others.

But it misses the more important political significance. Setting aside how sincere Perry’s intentions for the event were – and I believe they were – we can assume that someone who’s been widely praised for his political instincts, as Perry has been, was not unaware of the political dimensions of the event. Here are three of those dimensions that have not been discussed in the coverage:

The backdrop and context of Perry’s remarks were that America is in trouble – and not because of politics. Perry prayed that “our heart breaks for America,” and he noted discord at home and fear in the marketplace. He cited the “anger in the halls of government,” too, but the main point of his remarks was to highlight not the trouble politicians have created, but that we as a people have forgotten the source of our strength. Perry stands alone among declared and undeclared candidates as someone who has asked Americans to look beyond the mistakes of Obama and others to the deeper failings of our nation as a whole. There is a long tradition in America of politicians speaking this way, and Americans generally respond positively.

Perry has positioned himself as a candidate with spiritual depth. What the media sees as a controversial act many Americans will regard as a firm commitment to deeply held beliefs. Perry didn’t use his faith to call for action against political opponents or to engage in divisive or confrontational behavior of any kind. Rather, he stood on his faith as a way to point to America’s need for renewal, hope, and direction. A candidate for office who believes that politics isn’t all there is, is a candidate who appeals to many.

Perry’s remarks were noticeably apolitical. Holding the event was a political act given his position, but his 12 minute speech and prayer were essentially him reading from the Bible and commenting on what he read. His faith was on display as sincere and authentic. The media sees this as bold and controversial, but by being so direct about his faith, Perry essentially made it a normal part of his bio and removed any doubt about his sincerity as a believer. It makes him more – not less – trustworthy than candidates who cite their faith in the routine manner in political speeches and occasions. He looked like a guy who draws deep inspiration from his beliefs, not a politician who uses his faith to advance his political career or objectives.

The Rick Perry that Matt Dowd knows

Ryan Streeter
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Matt Dowd has a good article today on Rick Perry, whom he's known a long time.

It's worth the read for those interested in the potential, er, eventual, entry of Perry into the race.

Dowd writes:

Here

1. He is an extremely astute politician with a keen sense of where voters are, and he has great instincts on message. Perry has ruthless discipline and communication. They say in politics, “Don’t let your boot off an opponent’s neck till Election Day.” Perry doesn’t take his boot off till a year after the votes have been counted and the opponent has faded into oblivion. He is actually a better campaigner than George W. Bush (Perry’s predecessor as Texas governor) was when he first entered the national scene.
2. Perry has surrounded himself with a very loyal staff. His aides believe in him, and he in them. He is involved in campaign decisions, but he delegates well and doesn't stop being loyal because a mistake might be made. This is a huge advantage in the ebb and flow of presidential campaigns.
3. His statements related to possible Texas secession actually helped him in his recent race in 2010, and will help him in a national campaign in the Republican primaries and caucuses.  In an environment where Republican voters despise the federal government, anti-Washington rhetoric is music to their ears. Conversely, this talk will hurt him in a general-election race. Moderate voters in the Midwest will see it as off-putting.
4. Although he has run many times for both district and statewide office in Texas, Perry has never been fully vetted by the media. He underwent some scrutiny in his races for governor, but he has never endured the full-court press that happens in a presidential race. What the media discovers will not be as important as how he and the campaign handle the intense spotlight for the first time. Perry and some of his staffers are known to have thin skins. They will need to grow calluses if they are to succeed in the show.
5. Perry has never lost a race. While many immediately list this as a positive (and it is laudable and suggests huge talent), losing at some point in your career makes you better when the inevitable problems hit. I have learned more from my losses in life and politics than from my victories. It’s the losses that really cause self-reflection and growth. President Obama and former Presidents Bush (father and son), Clinton, Reagan, and Nixon learned enormous amounts from setbacks in their political careers, and those losses eventually helped them win the White House. We know Perry can win. The real question is: Can he suffer defeat and rise to the next battle?

Cain tops Perry to take Colorado straw poll

Natalie Gonnella
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As Americans await the outcome of ongoing debt negotiations, in other political news from across the country Herman Cain has claimed the top spot in the latest conservative conference straw poll.

Earning nearly half the ballots cast at the Western Conservative Summit in Denver, the Georgia businessman trumped his GOP competition, with undeclared candidate Rick Perry finishing a very distant second.  According to Politico's Haberman & Burns:

Herman Cain easily won the Western Conservative Summit presidential straw poll Sunday, drawing 246 ballots out of 508 cast and beating his nearest runner-up by a 179-vote margin.

Second-place contender Rick Perry took 67 votes, or 13 percent, to Cain's 48 percent. In third place was Rick Santorum with 50 ballots, or just under 10 percent,

In addition to Perry, the survey also included other unconfirmed candidates like former Ambassador John Bolton, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan.

As well as appearing in the straw poll, Perry also featured as the event's keynote speaker on Friday night.

The full results of the Western Conservative Summit Straw Poll are included below.

Michele Bachmann -- 9 percent, 44 votes
John Bolton -- 4 percent, 20 votes
Herman Cain -- 48 percent, 246 votes
Newt Gingrich -- 1 percent, 3 votes
Rudy Giuliani -- 0 percent, 0 votes
Jon Huntsman -- 0 percent, 1 vote
Gary Johnson -- 0 percent, 1 vote
Thaddeus McCotter -- 0 percent, 2 votes
Sarah Palin -- 1 percent, 5 votes
Ron Paul -- 2 percent, 12 votes
Tim Pawlenty -- 1 percent, 7 votes
Rick Perry -- 13 percent, 67 votes
Mitt Romney -- 10 percent, 49 votes
Rick Santorum -- 10 percent, 50 votes
Paul Ryan -– 1 vote

Is Rick Perry doing TOO well in the polls right now?

Ryan Streeter
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Today's Gallup poll on the 2012 Republican presidential field is supposed to be about Romney, but it's really about Rick Perry.

Without Perry in the results, Romney maintains his commanding lead at 27%, with Bachmann in second place at 18%.

But when you include Perry, Palin, and Giuliani, Romney's lead drops to 17% and Perry comes in second at 15%.This is comfortably within the margin of error, putting Romney and Perry in a statistical tie.

The other entrants hurt Bachmann the most. But the real question is: is Perry doing too well at this point?

He has surged from among the cellars of the polls to near the top over the past month and a half as speculation about him has risen.

But unlike Palin, who has enjoyed a long run of intense media coverage and is benefiting from the release of "Undefeated," and unlike Giuliani, "America's mayor" and past presidential candidate, Rick Perry has surged owing to the speculation about him in recent cable TV and radio coverage.

America hasn't seen him perform in real-time yet. He is relatively unknown as a "live" personality on the national stage.

If he runs - and it seems pretty clear he will - he will have to deliver publicly in a way that justifies his high numbers. If he fails to enthuse a broad enough base of voters, the story could quickly become how he's flaming out in Fred Thompson-ish fashion.