Michele Bachmann made it official on Monday night -- she’s running -- and although Rick Perry has yet to do so, he seems headed in that direction, saying in an interview yesterday that he’s “giving it serious thought.”
What the Minnesota GOP congresswoman and the Republican governor of Texas have in common is that their candidacies -- real and potential -- have been sending shockwaves through the party and the rest of the 2012 field.
In many ways a Perry candidacy is a no-brainer. He fills the Tea Party niche well. He'd be the most prominent southerner in the contest. He doesn't have to give up his current job to run. He's got a good story to tell about the Texas economy. And his potential weaknesses aren't disqualifying. Top questions for Perry include whether he'd be able to raise the money and whether he can build organizations in the early states from scratch.
As a nominee for the party, however, he's got more serious liabilities. His Tea Party rhetoric and Texas swagger can turn off independent swing voters. And, if you close your eyes and listen to him speak, you'd swear it was George W. Bush. His accent, cadence and pronunciations are almost identical.
Yesterday, Perry gave his first national interview since he began hinting at a presidential run, assuring Fox News anchor Neil Cavuto that six weeks ago the presidential race was “not on his radar screen.” Now Perry said, he is “giving it serious thought.” But there’s no hurry, he added, saying that a decision could come within the next month. “We have some time,” he said.
Perry was in New York City on Tuesday speaking at a GOP Lincoln Day dinner and he planned to meet this morning with former mayor and once and possibly future presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani.
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