Grover Norquist Perry
The Texas Tribune had a story yesterday by Ross Ramsey about Perry’s fight to stay relevant (my characterization, not Ramsey’s). From the Trib:
On Monday, he will unveil a financial pledge and challenge candidates in Texas to sign on, agreeing to oppose new taxes and tax increases, to cut “duplicative” programs and agencies in state government, and to push budget ideas that he has been touting for years, like requiring lawmakers to spend state revenue collected for specific programs on those programs, instead of diverting the money to other uses.
I don’t think anybody is going to be surprised by Perry’s attempt to emulate Grover Norquist. Perry has tried in the past to impose spending limits, and it hasn’t worked. Ending diversions sounds good, but it is really a phony issue. The main diversion, more than $1 billion, is using gasoline tax revenue to fund the Department of Public Safety. Since DPS’s job is to keep the highways safe, it makes perfect sense to us gasoline tax revenue for that purpose. If budget writers end the diversion for DPS, the money for the state’s chief law enforcement agency is going to have to come from somewhere else — and we don’t have it. So the campaign against diversions is really a campaign against spending, period. It reduces the amount of money that is available to spend.
The Perry pledge is laying the groundwork for another battle over state spending, and perhaps for another race for governor, or for his ultimate ambition: to run for president in 2016. He will surely find some adherents on the right side of the political spectrum, particularly among first and second term members, but I suspect he will be a lot less successful among veteran members who are uncomfortable with the spending cuts that were made in the last budget.
That Perry views this as a legacy is clear from his words: “We are approaching a 2013 legislative session that offers a very clear choice in the direction we’ll be going as a state in the years, and even decades to come.” What a grandiose notion. But what he offers is an empty vision for Texas’s future. Perry is a negative leader. He loves to tell people what they can’t do, but what they should do or what they need to do is missing altogether.
What stands out about the Perry pledge is that there is nothing in it that he hasn’t said before. Nothing. Oppose new taxes. Check. Preserve the Rainy Day Fund. Check. End accounting tricks. Check. He doesn’t have even the glimmer of a new idea.
There is something about this that is sad, on a human level. He has nothing to do except reflect on his rejection in the presidential race and struggle to stay relevant. Several members of his inner circle recognized that the end of the Perry era is near and found jobs in the private sector. The fear that he once generated is gone. The pledge gimmick will not find sufficient traction to make a difference. This is what happens when you stay too long at the dance.
Tagged: grover norquist, rick perry
John Johnson says:
I hate getting into the “I told you so” mode, but I have to point out, Paul, that not too long ago you predicted King Perry would be the Repub nominee and then be moving this throne to D.C.
He might have been if he had not personally imploded. Outside forces did nothing to bring him down; it was all self induced.
The Texas media could have helped us Texans spot these inherent flaws much earlier had they been doing their jobs properly. There was very little indepth research and follow up done on questionable deals and relationships, and he never answered hard questions with suitable answers and you guys let him get by with it.
That’s my take on what has transpired. I hope we all learn from it.
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Pat Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 2:29 pm
Burka’s proposition that Perry would be the nominee was based on an assumption that (a) the national Republican primary electorate was similar to that of Texas and (b) Rick Perry hadn’t made a mistake in 20 years and wasn’t about to start making them. And the verdict is…Rick Santorum proved that (a) holds true, but Perry had to make up for a two decade dearth of errors.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 9:33 am
Perry had NO damn business running for President-none at all.
His ego was too big for him and plus, he couldn’t even crack 60 percent in 2010 against Bill White (he only got 55 percent).
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Anonymous Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 3:45 pm
Johnson, everything important on Perry was already out there — sans ni**erhead. Texans are too ignorant to care. Even anny below doesn’t care since he’s not black. Duh.
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Willie James says:
To steal from another poster on another subject: “Time wounds all heels”…..Perry is SO past tense.
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paulburka says:
Had Perry elected to have back surgery in the spring rather than July, he would have been in a much better position. His operation sapped a lot of his energy, and we will never know how much the medication affected him. Instead, Perry entered the race in sub-par condition. I don’t think he would have succeeded in any case, because the persona he has taken on — that of the title of his book, “Fed Up,” did not come across well. He called Social Security a ponzi scheme, he attacked Bernanke as a traitor, he called Obama a socialist. He behaved as if he were a petulant kid. There was nothing presidential about his demeanor. If he runs in 2016, he will face the same problem. Nobody wants to elevate someone to the presidency who isn’t uplifting. Perry is an attack-dog politician. It works in Texas, where there is no coverage to speak of, even in a gubernatorial race, but it won’t work nationally. He’s dead in 2016, but he doesn’t know it.
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Anonymous Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 3:22 pm
Why doesn’t anyone bring up Niggerhead? He leased a hunting camp known by locals as Niggerhead. I am amazed our Governor could get away with this…and yet we just kind of brush it aside as if its no big deal. If I were black, I would be wanting answers. Im not, so its no big deal to me. But you know, it wasn’t as if there werent other hunting camps to lease in our state. When you are the Governor you have to be a little more understanding that your black constituents won’t understand why it is so important for you to hunt a place called Niggerhead – when there are so many other options…you can’t be their Governor when you do that. He still is, and that to me is so damn hilarious.
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Bodhisattva Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 5:25 pm
I honestly do not believe that Rick Perry thinks of African Americans generally as his “constituents.” A candidate represents a specific point of view and a specific constituency for that point of view, but an elected official must represent — and truly serve, as best he or she can — all the people. I don’t Rick Perry thinks that way (“Elections have consequences, mofo”) and there is certainly little evidence he has governed that way.
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Bodhisattva Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 5:27 pm
By the way, my comment is not limited to Perry’s feeling about African Americans. I just think he has his base, his governing coalition (“us”) and everyone else is a “them.”
Blue Dogs Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 9:34 am
Burka, I have always said that Perry is NOT running again in 2014 and his political career is dead anyways.
In response to Bodhisattva, Perry has appointed several Latinos and African Americans to boards, commissions, and some to the Texas SC: including the first African American Chief Justice, and 3 Latinos to the TX SC.
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texun Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 4:43 pm
It’s kind of Paul to attribute Perry’s failure to his meds and his “assumed persona”, but the truth of it is that he was a Texas Leaguer trying to complete in the Major Leagues.
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paulburka Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 10:05 pm
The fundamental problem is that Perry has spent his entire life as a big fish in a little pond, and he didn’t know what to do when he got in a big pond. He was lost.
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Anonymous says:
I don’t think he’ll be running for President in 2016 as it’s nearly impossible to upset an incumbent President in his own Primary.
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Willie James Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 4:18 pm
Unlikely, this.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 10:16 am
If Romney wins this fall, Perry will be neutralized politically by the Romney folks (who will likely back Abbott) if Slick Rick dares to run again.
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WUSRPH says:
Same old stuff from the same old guy…It will, of course, get the same reaction from the Leg. it has in the past–be ignored.
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Independent Mind says:
How’s that tax reform plan that Perry championed through the legislature a few years back working out for everyone? As I recall, we at the urging of the Rickster instituted a franchise tax on gross receipts – that’s right, gross receipts, not net income – of limited liability businesses in return for purportedly significant reductions of our massive state property tax. I don’t know about you, but my property tax bills now significantly exceed what they were before Rick foisted this silly scheme upon us. Funny, how he’s not calling for property tax reform today isn’t it?
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Anonymous Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 3:31 pm
You realize that is the fix, don’t you? The grossly unpopular franchise tax will fade away, but no new tax will be proposed to replace it, creating an even bigger drop in revenue.
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John Johnson Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 3:54 pm
yeah, taxing gross receipts instead of net income cost me a chunk. Raw goods costs skyrocketed but I could not raise the sell prices. Really an unfair way to structure it.
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Cow Droppings Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 4:24 pm
you tax profits and the courts will call it an income tax. Bullock’s political posturing created this box.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 2:05 am
How about cutting government then you don’t have to worry about the semantics of an income tax or that ridiculous “margins” tax?
Also, please tell Gov. Perry that highly leverage toll roads are in and of themselves a massive tax. Borrowing is just a tax in the future and the debt service on these roads means the tolls are too high for many folks to drive on them.
Anonymous says:
This is a real test for the legislature. Will House and Senate R’s allow themselves to be bullied by the guy who just humiliated himself in the presidential race? Or will there be a movement of the non-lackey brigade to highlight the hypocrisy of rental mansion austerity? Separation of powers still exists, right?
If I were going to be brought before the high executioner for my moderate offenses, I’d at least like the man in the black robes to be competent. No matter how loud the duck might quack, it still can’t walk.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
every Texan pays lower taxes than almost every state in the union, Texas creates more jobs than all the other states combined, thanks to Guv Perry. Hows that Obama thingey working out dems?
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Col. Mike Kirby Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 3:48 pm
really? gub perry is responsible for high gas and oil prices that has lead to an increase in employment in that area? he’s also responsible for the jobs boom in liberal, pinko, commie Austin?? Tell us oh brilliant one, how did he do that?
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John Johnson Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 4:04 pm
Go away, light bird. You’re going to have a stroke. JBB deserves a little respect. After all, he has found a way to drive some relatively sane people crazy. That’s his goal and I give him high grades. He knows that oil and gas under us has boosted our economy and that refineries in TX are now exporting product which boosts it more. A monkey sitting in the governor’s chair would have garnered the same results. He also is aware that we don’t raise taxes in TX…we just add “fees”. We’re fee’d to death.
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Voldemort Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 4:21 pm
Gov. Perry has done little to lower taxes, improve schools, create jobs. Perry has done, well he hasn’t done much but talk. but like JBB, that is what noecons do.
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Tellnitlikeitis Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 4:32 pm
JBB…this is as good a place to answer you from several days ago when you shared Franklin’s observation that a penny saved is a penny earned.
What happens to goods and services and to your time while sitting in traffic congestion because our roads and highways are inadequate?
Saving a penny will actually cost you. We have run out of money to build roads and highways. The last bond money is being spent. No mas (except for the $32 billion it will cost to repay those bonds).
Almost all of our highways dollars go to maintain existing roads. There is no more new money for new roads. Your parents and grandparents invested in you and your future. It’s sad that you are unwilling to do the same for your kids and grandkids.
A penny saved here is a penny wasted.
Same thing a few years ago when your guys kicked 220,000 kids out of CHIP. Some of them got sick and ended up at the ER….that was very expensive treatment….you wanted to save 27 cents of your dollars and gave up 73 cents in federal matching money for every 27 cents you saved. Except you didn’t save anything.
You simply paid for higher medical care at the hospitals because those kids showed up sick without medical case files or histories – so they ran more expensive tests.
You are not saving money. You are wasting it.
And that is so sad.
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Bell of the ball Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 1:54 pm
I agree with you up to a point here. The difference is that care provided in ERs doesn’t necessarily cost the state. It shifts the cost from the state to local taxpayers, if there is a hospital district, or to those of us who pay for health insurance through higher premiums. Actually, higher premiums generates revenue $$ for the state due to the premium tax paid by insurance companies…who raise our premiums to cover them. Just more budgetary smoke and mirrors.
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Col. Mike Kirby says:
pretty funny advice coming from a 64 year old. Physician heal thyself.
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John Johnson Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 4:45 pm
you don’t have to worry about me. They still ID me when I buy my Jack.
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Huck Finn says:
If they are going to sign this pledge, they should just cancel the ’13 session and use the same budget for the next biennium too. Think of the savings.
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Just tired.... says:
“There is something about this that is sad, on a human level.”
What’s sad is the damage done to the people of Texas by this regime. Feel not “sorry” for Perry, as he is forced into a cushy, six figure, wood-paneled office somewhere.
Feel for the children who cannot read…who lost their medical coverage at a critical moment…who will forever be a drain on the creaky infrastructure of the former Great State of Texas as it completes its transformation to a Third World backwater.
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wondering says:
Paul,
Does “no new taxes” mean not fixing the new and very costly tax loophole that Judge Dietz recently announced? So we will have a Compact Texas Budget by drip torture?
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longleaf says:
I have a feeling what’s coming next is some sort of intensified school choice/voucher/charter schools push. Certainly it is not going to be what one of the GOPer posters was contending on here over the weekend and that was that, not to worry, cuts in public school funding were going to be “restored” with the rising revenues from the oil and gas industry.
Bill Hobby called this in January, 2011, in his Dallas News interview. The population of the public schools is now overwhelmingly nonwhite. The parents of these children either don’t vote at all or vote the “wrong” way. The public schools will continue to be defunded. There is now a permanent disconnect between the power elite in Austin and the majority of Texans. This is one of the classic definitions of a Third World political and economic system.
Bill Hobby: “A huge majority of public school students in Texas are … black and brown. As an example, in the 10 years between 1998 and 2008, total enrollment in Texas schools grew by 795,000, and of that … 748,000 were Hispanic. And I think Republicans don’t like public education because they’re educating black children and brown children. That’s the inevitable conclusion.”
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/state/headlines/20110122-what-would-veteran-lawmakers-do-about-texas’-budget-deficit.ece
I predict the legislators will “stand their ground” against “race baiters” (as they will now label former Lt. Gov. Hobby). They may even initiate a new round of cuts just to spite him and his “educrat” friends.
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wondering says:
If the Compact leads to another cut in per-student spending for public education (last session they cut $400 per student), are the Compact Budget signers in the House and Senate OK with those cuts all coming from their own school districts (e.g., Plano ISD, Alamo Heights ISD)?
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Peggy Venable Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 8:39 pm
Let’s be honest. Education spending has grown five times faster than the increase in student enrollment. We didn’t have the federal stimulus dollars this session and knew we would not. Why should government spend more than revenue it brings in? (Answer: it should not)
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Self-Proclaimed Moderate Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 9:13 pm
Yes, let us be honest, Peggy. The Texas budget as passed by the legislature and signed by the governor was indeed structured to spend more than the revenue estimated by Comptroller Combs. Because there was not enough revenue coming in, nearly $5 billion in Medicaid expenditures simply were not accounted for in the budget. That made the overall budget “look” balanced and also made it “look” smaller. But everyone knew the bill would come due, including you, the TPPP, Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, et al. Is that honest, transparent budgeting?
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RINO Reply:
April 18th, 2012 at 8:19 am
Ms. Venable, I am curious what else you would have recommended cutting from last Session’s appropriations bill? If the Budget Compact were in place last Session the Legislature would have needed to cut an additional $15 billion from the budget (2.3 billion from not using the FSP deferal, 4.9 billion from fully funding Medicaid, 0.7 billion from sales/alcohol/motor fuels tax speedups, 4.3 billion from not using GR-D balances to certify GR expenses, and 3.2 billion from not using the ESF). Can you give us a list of $15 billion of appropriations you’re willing to cut? Also, please only include items that the Legislature actually has the ability to cut. “Block-granting Medicaid” was not a viable option last Session since that requires Federal legislation.
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Crabtree's Catch says:
With Governor Perry, you have someone who is much more interested in the trappings of his office than governing. The ever growing security detail, the free lodging in West Lake Hills and the governor’s mansion, a staff that grows in numbers each year, personal aides, free travel around the country on private jets, a capitol office, etc. This is what Perry is interested in.
He is insulated by a ferocious staff that is as vindictive as any Chicago politician ever was. He receives financial support from a lobby full of genuinely smart people who should know better (no really), and he generally gets a free pass from a lazy Texas press corps that display token reporting at best. Until elected leaders start standing up, none of this will change.
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anita Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
Well said.
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Robert Morrow Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 2:08 am
keep posting Crabtree… what a bloated security entourage for Perry, either it makes him look presidential OR having too many orderlies for the patient.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 9:35 am
Crabtree:
Perry plans on moving back into the Governor’s Mansion in June, so he can have his lifestyle back.
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Peggy Venable says:
Funny, I was at the event today and heard every word the Gov. Perry said. Didn’t mention a pledge. Not once, except to tell a reporter that there was not a Texas Budget Compact pledge.
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anita Reply:
April 16th, 2012 at 9:24 pm
Maybe you just hear what you want to hear.
The Tribune’s updated story quotes Perry speaking of a pledge. I assume the reporter just made it up.
I look forward to seeing a request from the Governor’s press office for a retraction and correction. Shoot that to us when you get it, Peggy.
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JohnBernardBooks Reply:
April 18th, 2012 at 11:18 am
the Tribune? are you serious? hahaha
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Self-Proclaimed Moderate says:
Pledge or no pledge, Peggy, Perry is doing nothing more than calling attention to himself because he can’t stand being out of the limelight. He has been at the helm of an overwhelmingly Republican House and Senate for quite some time now. Why has state debt skyrocketed under this Republican domination?
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I can read good says:
Peggy, perhaps you should read his prepared remarks located on the governor’s website:
“These principles represent a vow to the people of Texas, A pledge that each and every member of our legislature -or anyone aspiring to be a member of our legislature – should sign on to.”
Now, I am not advised as to whether he actually spoke these words as his staff has issued a disclaimer that he frequently strays from prepared remarks. What is evident, however, is his intent that this be a pledge, vow or any other synonym you would like to use.
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anita says:
Soundie like Peggy no knowie what she talkie aboutie.
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Distinguished Gentleman says:
Paul says: “This is what happens when you stay too long at the dance.”
Oh, Paul, how right you are about that.
We need term limits so that nobody else can inflict as much harm upon Texas as James R. “Rick” Perry has inflicted upon this state.
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Robert Morrow says:
Anyone who supports gargantuan, highly leveraged, soaking-in-debt toll road projects really has no credibility when it comes to small government, less tax issues.
I used to gag whenever someone called Perry a “libertarian.”
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Gary says:
Under the Governor’s leadership Texas has fallen to 49th out of 50 states in the funding of Education. This is his legacy. It appears there is a focus on the present without a vision for the future. I want a President candidate who has a vision greater than what is to lead my country in the future. I do not see 50th or 49th in education as an effective platform in a future Presidental election.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
April 17th, 2012 at 9:36 am
Gary, what was Texas ranked in Education under George W. Bush ?
If I recall, Bush left the governorship with an unemployment rate of either 3 or 4 percent before Perry succeeded him.
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poorfarmboy says:
Term limits ? I think Craddick said it best….”We already have term limits – they’re called elections!”
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Distinguished Gentleman says:
The problem, poorfarmboy, is that either nobody runs against the incumbent, or the person who actually does run against the incumbent self-destructs like Kay Bailey Hutchison did in 2010.
Term limits of 12 years is more than reasonable. Nobody should be allowed to cling to one specific public office for more than 12 years. It is extremely unhealthy.
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Blue Dogs Reply:
April 18th, 2012 at 9:42 am
Distinguished, you’re just mad because Perry and other GOPers have held statewide offices since the late 1990s.
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JohnBernardBooks says:
Texas budget’s have gone down 6% since 2000 under Guv Perry. Thats a good start. Cut Cut Cut
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Blue Digs Reply:
April 18th, 2012 at 1:35 pm
Distinguished Gentleman needs to SHUT UP and move to Florida or Louisiana.
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Distinguished Gentleman says:
If anybody should “SHUT UP” and perhaps relocate, it should be none other than Blue Balls him or herself.
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