Pawlenty drops out of race

Easy. We're talking Texas, a state which elected W governor, only after the Familia greased the skids so he
could get the nom for one of the least-stressful governorships in the nation, so that the family could cease being embarrassed by the career failure (other than W's purchase of the Rangers, another family T-ball venture).

 

It's pretty telling that the best defense you can muster of the guy is that he's won elections. Not exactly a unique characteristic among politicians.

 

If America has a Hindenburg moment and Perry somehow wins the presidency, Texas could have an interesting succession scenario.

The current lieutenant governor, David Dewhurst, is running for Kay Bailey Hutchison's Senate seat and is favored to win. Therefore, both top executive offices could be vacant.

 

Spectacularly-played . . .

 

But it's the ultimate metric for politicians, unfortunately.

And if he's won re-election twice, what he's doing is evidently popular enough among his electorate.

 

Though to extrapolate that mandate to a national audience, as his backers will try to do, is patently false. You could make a case that Mitt Romney's previous electoral success is a burden, rather than a blessing.

Though it's no doubt significant, I'm pretty sure every candidate in the Republican field with the exception of Herman Cain has won elections. It doesn't make Perry special in the way that his backers seem to want to make it.

 

. . . before demonstrably among the least-responsive/responsible state electorates, going . . . what was the turnout, for PArry's re-elec . . . 33%? That's frackin' pitiful.

 

Well, it's a pretty stupid argument to say, "Even their own state hates them." about someone who has recently been elected or keeps getting re-elected. I've read that about Chris Christie, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and countless others on this board.

 

I know your goal is to paint every Republican as a racist. It's always been silly, but it's real absurd in this case.

Perry didn't switch parties after passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

He's not even a "Reagan Democrat".

We're talking about the guy who was the Chairman of Al Gore's 1988 Presidential campaign in Texas.

The fact is, the Democrat(ic) party has changed. Rick Perry has not. It used to be that you could be a Democrat and be for a strong military. You could be a pro-life Democrat.

But, the current Democrat(ic) Party is a coalition of special interests. In order for each special interest to get what it wants, they all stand together. So, if you're not down with every part of the coalition, you're drummed out of the party.

Especially on Life, there's no compromise. While the left likes to paint Republicans as ideologues, the truth is the left demands ideological purity.

Al Gore used to be pro-Life. Lot's of Democrats were. Now you can't be. (And don't give me Harry Reid or Bob Casey, Jr. They've both been neutered as far as their pro-Life positions go.)

Rick Perry had no future in the modern Democrat(ic) party. And, it had nothing to do with race.

 

I did think Perry's comments about him being the most conservative candidate in the race was strange. I don't think he's anywhere close to as conservative as Bachmann.

 

Good column in The Economist this week on the intransigence of both parties on, well, just about anything. Interesting take from overseas, even if it isn't groundbreaking.

As far as the whole, "Perry knows how to win elections" thing ... It is somewhat disingenuous now for a lot of Democrats to discount that as a qualification. It was used over and over again as an Obama executive qualification in 2008.

"He's run a campaign in umpteen primary states!"

"He won the Illinois Senate with 97 percent of the vote!"

One real problem with Perry's candidacy, just from what I'm reading, is that his Texas Miracle has a lot to do with oil prices going up. And when that gets a little more exposure, it has a chance of really neutralizing his greatest strength. Rick Perry's state gained from our suffering. That's how it will be framed.

I do agree with him about the importance of a steady, predictable regulatory scheme, although I'm sure we'd disagree on the particulars. But it's a huge problem in the U.S. right now.

Admittedly, I'm still learning about him. And, admittedly, a lot of my information comes from the New York Times.

 

She's quoted in the NYT today, from one of the talk shows this weekend, as in favor of reinstating "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" if she's elected.

I understand that's no great surprise. But I can't believe that a candidate in 2012 is still beating the anti-gay drum as hard as she does. That horse isn't going to ride much longer, surely.