Rick Perry’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week
Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s campaign for the Republican presidential nomination took a few hits this week.
After jumping out to big leads in the polls following his entrance to the race, Rick Perry saw his poll numbers fall slightly this week and the gap between him and his main competitor, Mitt Romney, shrink. The shrinking poll numbers are not a huge surprise since the momentum Perry created by entering the race could never last.
That being said, a serious of unfortunate events for the Perry camp could cause even a larger drop in Perry’s popularity. First, on Thursday afternoon, the Justice Department said that the congressional redistricting map that Rick Perry signed into law appears to have been “adopted, at least in part, for the purpose of diminishing the ability of citizens of the United States, on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group, to elect their preferred candidates of choice to Congress.”
Basically, the Justice Department is contesting the redistricting map because they believe it is a deliberate attempt to disparage Hispanic voters. Then, on Thursday night, Perry bombed at the Fox News/Google Republican presidential debate, according to almost every notable conservative pundit. It is extremely uncommon for conservative pundits to attack one of their own but they came out in droves on Friday morning to comment on Perry’s poor performance.
Lastly and perhaps most shocking, Perry came in a distant second to Herman Cain in the Presidency5 straw poll in Florida. This particular straw poll had about 2,000 voters and one had to pay to vote, which is typical of straw polls. Straw polls are an interesting part of presidential campaigns in that they almost never forecast how an actual election will turn out but they have the ability to end campaigns (see Tim Pawlenty at the Ames Straw Poll).
This is by no means a sign that Perry’s campaign is over (or that Herman Cain has any shot in of winning), but it is still very embarrassing for Perry’s camp. The Perry campaign invested a lot of time and effort in this straw poll (unlike other top contenders Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann, who didn’t even officially enter it) and still lost by over 20 percentage points to the CEO of Godfather’s Pizza. Perry is still a contender but he is going to have to improve his debate skills, tighten up his campaign strategy and win over a few conservative pundits if he wants to win the nomination.
GOP Congresswoman to sponsor respect of Marriage Act
Good news if you're a fan of equal rights: Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) will be the first GOP cosponsor of the Respect of Marriage Act, which will repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, commonly known as DOMA. DOMA is a bill passed during William Clinton’s presidency that defines marriage as between one man and one woman. This bill prevents the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages as valid. The Obama administration has already challenged the bill, calling it unconstitutional—but for now, it is still in place.
Another week, another GOP debate, another embarrassing crowd moment
Last week I posted a video in the roundup that showed members of the crowd at a GOP debate cheering for the idea of an uninsured man dying. At this week's Fox News/Google debate, the crowd booed at a soldier, as seen in this video: GOP Debate.
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