The author is shocked that Texas Governor Rick Perry is scheduled to announce his candidacy for President tomorrow, on the day of the Iowa Ames Straw Poll.
It seemed clear all along that all Rick Perry was trying to do was get attention, and build up his massive ego further. He had said he had no interest in the Presidency, but apparently he has been tempted and enticed to run because of all the attention he is getting, which he clearly craves! So this is an ego trip, nothing else!
Is Governor Rick Perry qualified to be President? Well, he IS the Governor of Texas, the second largest state in population and land area, and has been for the past eleven years, longer than any governor in the country.
However, one must realize that the Governor of Texas is more of an honorary position, as it is literally the WEAKEST Governorship constitutionally in the whole nation of 50 states! The Governor of Texas is a media star because of the tremendous size and population of Texas, but he has very little authority and power, and has loads of free time to pursue other ambitions, a fact that helped George W. Bush decide to seek the White House!
It is also said that Rick Perry has presided over a tremendous increase of employment, about 40 percent of the whole nation’s growth in employment in this recession, and Perry loves to brag about it!
But the fact that the vast majority of these jobs are MINIMUM WAGE is ignored, as if one can live and support a family on a minimum wage job! And the fact that the military and oil companies have a major role in Texas also distorts the reality of employment!
The fact is that Texas ranks very low on education funding, as well as educational curriculum in history and science being distorted and inaccurate to the extreme!
It is a fact that poverty in Texas is widespread, one of the worst levels of poverty in America! But Perry has no concern for the poor, the sick, the disabled, the elderly or anyone else, and instead prefers to promote states rights, as if that is the basic meaning of the US Constitution, which it clearly is exactly the opposite, federal supremacy!
It is the fact that health care is very inadequate for millions of Texans under Rick Perry, but Perry has no concern about that reality! Instead, he is refusing to cooperate on the establishment of the Obama Health Care plan, preferring to sue in federal court to deny health care to millions of Texans!
It is the fact that Rick Perry is described by many as a great campaigner, but a very lazy, shiftless governor who avoids work when he can, so it is obvious he loves the battle but not the challenge of leadership!
It is a fact that Rick Perry has no clue to an understanding of economics, and would be a disaster for us, having no clue as to how to promote an economic recovery!
It is a fact that Rick Perry is quite stupid in reality, and is best noted for his cockiness and swagger, reminding many of George W. Bush, with the only improvement from the image of Bush being that Rick Perry would be described as a more handsome man than Bush is, but are we to vote based on looks, or brains and character and intelligence, which in the long run matter more?
It is a fact that Rick Perry would love to make America a Christian nation, rather than what it is–a nation primarily of many different Christian sects, along with other religions! Perry does not believe in our basic principle of separation of church and state, and has no understanding of our history, being extremely ignorant! But then, Perry was a C and D student, much like George W. Bush, so what can one expect?
It is a fact that Rick Perry is a great fan of and is supported by the Tea Party Movement, the reckless, radical group which has helped to cause the downgrading of our credit by Standard and Poor’s, and will stop at nothing to make certain that there is NEVER any increase in taxes on the greedy, selfish top two percent of the population and the corporations, no matter how much it impoverishes the nation and makes a more stratified society with a disappearing middle class!
It is a fact that Rick Perry advocated secession of Texas from the Union,which is illegal and unconstitutional, and over which the Civil War was fought 150 years ago! Former Texas Governor, President, and Senator Sam Houston, were he alive today, would be ashamed of Rick Perry being the Governor of his beloved state, which he felt had gone wrong when it seceded from the Union in 1861 and joined the Confederacy, and courageously supported Abraham Lincoln and the Union during that Civil War!
It is a fact that the Bush family themselves oppose Perry, which says that establishment Republicans who want to remain in the mainstream, as at least father George H. W. Bush wishes, are terrified of the possibility that this unaccomplished, inferior man might be the leader of the free world, with his maniacal belief in his own superiority!
It is a fact that if Rick Perry somehow won the Presidency, the nation would suffer far worse under him than even the worst critics of Barack Obama might imagine!
If Rick Perry is the best we can gain for President in 2012, this nation is in far greater danger and trouble than we can possibly imagine in 2011!
When it comes to displaying his credentials for being president, Rick Perry could more aptly point to his tenure as the Lt. Gov of Texas than his time as governor. Since the TX governor has limited powers, its hard to judge what Perry would do as the nation’s leader other than on what he says on the campaign trail. A former Democrat, Perry presents himself as the tax cutting, tough on crime, pro-business, and conservative Christian, which is bound to carry him a long way. If he has an advantage in the GOP field, he has never championed a widescale public healthcare bill like Romney. Plus, Romney’s massive personal wealth is at some point going to be on somebody’s radar in these hard economic times. Not that he isn’t sufficiently well off financially, Perry has the southern, straight shooter talk that will remind national observers of George W. Bush, rather than a GOP version of John Kerry. Perry will point to economic success in Texas as proof of his governing skills, but, like you mentioned, that data is subject to interpretation. Voters will have to decide if Perry’s economic ideals of cutting taxes during an economic downturn while reducing spending is the right recipe for growth. Perry has a stellar electoral record, even beating popular senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in a gubernatorial primary, which is why his opponents in the GOP field should take him seriously, and expect him to use his tea party connections to the fullest.