Perry Looks Warily at Upcoming Debates

Rick Perry saw his poll numbers swoon after a series of shaky debate performances in September. Now his campaign says the Texas governor may get a lot more selective, potentially skipping some of the jousting contests between now and when voting for the Republican presidential nomination starts in early January.


Republican presidential candidates, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, left, and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, talk during a Republican presidential debate in Las Vegas on Oct. 18, 2011. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson, File) “We are going to evaluate each debate as it comes and take each one on its own merits,” said Perry spokesman Mark Miner, adding that for now, Mr. Perry is confirmed only for the next GOP debate, set for Michigan Nov. 9th. At least five more debates are now scheduled between the Michigan contest and the Iowa caucuses Jan. 3rd.

The campaign argues that with less than 10 weeks to go before the first votes fly, the debates devour too much time for travel and preparation. “The primaries are right aroud the corner and there is simply more to do than there is time to do it,” Mr. Miner said.

“Is it death by debate?” asked Katon Dawson, South Carolina chairman for the Perry campaign. “Are there too many? Yes. Are they trying to focus on single issues and pick people apart? Absolutely.”

“You have to prioritize exactly what you’re campaign is going to do and what it’s going to look like and what you’re best at,” he said in an interview. “I don’t think Rick Perry has ever hidden from anything.”

Mr. Perry has made no secret of his distate for the debates. “These debates are set up for nothing more than to tear down the candidates,” he told Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly Tuesday night. “It pretty hard to be able to sit and lay out your ideas and your concepts with a one minute response.”

He went on to say that if he had to single out any one mistake, “it was probably ever doing one of the [debates], when all they’re interested in is stirring up between the candidates instead of really talking about the issues that are important to the American people.”

Other campaigns plan to stick to the scheduled debates. “The debates are an important part of the presidential process and the public appreciates the opportunity to see where the candidates stand on the issues,” said Alice Stewart, communications director for the campaign of Michele Bachmann. “We look forward to participating in the debates as well as campaigning in the crucial early caucus and primary states.”

A flat reception
Oct 25th 2011, 19:59 by W.W. | IOWA CITY

RICK PERRY has unveiled a new tax plan no doubt with hopes of putting some pep in the step of his limping campaign. Mr Perry's proposal offers Americans a choice between the income-tax rates they face under the current dispensation or a 20% rate he calls "flat" but isn't, because the plan "preserves mortgage interest, charitable and state and local tax exemptions for families earning less than $500,000 annually, and it increases the standard deduction to $12,500 for individuals and dependents."

Quick! What's your income-tax liability under Mr Perry's new flat tax? Is that more or less than your liability under the status-quo tax code? Mr Perry says "This simple 20% flat tax will allow Americans to file their taxes on a postcard", saving loads of money in compliance cost. But it looks to me that Mr Perry has come up with an ingenious scheme to force millions of prudent Americans to do their taxes twice in order to determine which of the two tax codes is the lesser evil. That is not simplification. Anyway, given all the deductions the "flat" option retains, the part you can do on a postcard is going to require a postcard the size of one of those Publisher's Clearing House checks Ed McMahon used to disburse to fainting widows.

Some wonkish conservatives are beside themselves with bemusement over Mr Perry's plan. "It is an embarrassment" which "defies credulity", says Reihan Salam at National Review. He goes on to observe that "Rick Perry’s proposal is not a flat tax. Rather, it is an alternative maximum tax or MAXTAX". Mr Salam contends that "what Perry has done is reverse the Buffett Rule. He has guaranteed that no American will ever pay more than 20 percent of her income in federal taxes". Mr Perry's plan would also abolish the estate tax and the tax on long-term capital gains, further comforting the comfortable in order to "spur growth".

Michael Brendan Dougherty, a conservative commentator at the Business Insider, is also incredulous:

Perry's tax plan would preserve all the confusion, waste, and market distortions in the current code, and add another layer. The politicians who manage that would get a new tax code to fiddle with as a bonus — one that has little substance beyond massively cutting taxes for the wealthy. Perry is selling simplicity to the GOP's base voters — that's the most appealing thing about a flat-tax — but most of these voters would actually pay less under the current more confusing code.

Mr Dougherty suggests that Mr Perry's proposed choice between the current system and his "flat" rate amounts to "an admission that for many Americans the status quo is actually better than anything Rick Perry's team can devise".

Left-leaning commentators just sound exasperated. Kevin Drum of Mother Jones writes:

What can you even say about this? It sounds less like a tax plan than a big ol' stew pot of right-wing applause lines, all the way up to the inane insistence that eliminating the estate tax has nothing to do with rich people and is only designed to provide "needed certainty to American family farms and small businesses." Should we laugh or cry? Perry has actually managed to combine two separate conservative memes (the estate tax is all about family farms, uncertainty is hobbling the economy) into one single sentence that makes even less sense than either of them separately. It's hard not to be impressed.

What about the spending side of the fiscal equation? As Matthew Yglesias observes, Mr Perry offers no details whatsoever about spending other than a bald commitment to limit spending to 18% of GDP. What gets cut? Mr Perry does not say. But would Mr Perry's dual system raise sufficient revenue even to spend at an extraordinarily low 18% of GDP without increasing the deficit? Len Burman, an eminent tax-policy expert and the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Professor of Public Affairs at Syracuse University, doubts it:

The idea of an optional alternative tax system is not new. John McCain proposed one in 2008 and it would have added $7 trillion to the debt over a decade. It’s virtually always true that if you offer taxpayers a choice, it will cost the Treasury money.
I have no idea how big a tax cut Perry’s plan is, but there’s no way this plan will come close to raising 18% of GDP (Perry’s spending target) unless there are hidden revenue raisers that I missed. The idea of adding to our enormous deficits to provide giant tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires just blows my mind.
And, by the way, an optional alternative tax system is not simple. Millions of middle-income taxpayers will have to figure their taxes two ways to figure out which plan is better for them. Will it be called the Alternative Maximum Tax?

The early bipartisan wonk consensus seems to be that Mr Perry's plan is as incoherent as his typical debate monologue. Of course, bad policy can be good politics. Will run-of-the-mill conservative like the plan? My guess is they won't as soon Mr Perry's opponents make it clear that the proposal actually promises a confusing complexification of the tax system, offers huge tax cuts to the rich, all while threatening to deepen America's already perilous level of indebtedness.

Piston Honda wrote:The only viable candidate the Republicans have right now, that has a shot at beating Obama is Mitt.

Easy E wrote:Hoenstly, If I were the Repubs I wouldn't want to be in the president's office. It is a heckuva lot easier to paralyze the country in the House of Representin' and most Americans won't even realize what is going on. They focus on the Pres.

Easy E wrote:Hoenstly, If I were the Repubs I wouldn't want to be in the president's office. It is a heckuva lot easier to paralyze the country in the House of Representin' and most Americans won't even realize what is going on. They focus on the Pres.

Frazzled wrote:I could fix it.

I like formats that allow a week or more to form a response. I think it's closer to actually being president. Also, we don't just elect a president; we elect an administration.

Manchu wrote:I like formats that allow a week or more to form a response. I think it's closer to actually being president. Also, we don't just elect a president; we elect an administration.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Frazzled wrote:I could fix it.

My dad used to say: "some folks will fix it or, if they can't, fix it so no one else can."

ShumaGorath wrote:All it does is allow the candidates to be as irresponsible as they now are.

Manchu wrote:

ShumaGorath wrote:All it does is allow the candidates to be as irresponsible as they now are.

I'm not saying the point you're making is a bad one; at the same time, being quick or witty is not the same thing as having a masterful command of the issues. Some folks needs weeks to dissimultae while others need bare seconds. Debates have strengths and weakness but being bad at them does not disqualify Rick Perry as presidential material.

Manchu wrote:Wow -- we disagree on it all, man! I liked George W. That was my kind of Republican.

ShumaGorath wrote:

Manchu wrote:

ShumaGorath wrote:All it does is allow the candidates to be as irresponsible as they now are.

I'm not saying the point you're making is a bad one; at the same time, being quick or witty is not the same thing as having a masterful command of the issues. Some folks needs weeks to dissimultae while others need bare seconds. Debates have strengths and weakness but being bad at them does not disqualify Rick Perry as presidential material.

I will agree with that, however I view Perry as the exact kind of fly debates are meant to zap. He's substance-less and panders to a fringe that lacks a large electoral backing because it gets him coverage. When he's required to defend his statements, which he so rarely is, he falls flat on his face because they're often insane. Without that net he might have slipped through into a place where he had a real chance to be president.

Phanatik wrote:What do you think of Reagan?

Manchu wrote:@shuma: How would you compare him to how George W. did in the 2000 debates? (non-rhetorical question)

memory lane: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50c2kgvojCs

AustonT wrote:3 things that could help Obama win in 2012
1. Not being Obama (this is key)
2. Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign instead of asking for 4 more years.
3. The Republicans continue to squabble looking like small children to the American people until no 1 doesn't matter.

Manchu wrote:I think Rick Perry has some good points about debates. I don't know that we learn anything about candidates in their one minute responses that couldn't be learned from tabloid covers or talking head soundbytes. The debate is a corner stone in the "elections are more important than governance" mentality that has done nothing good for American politics. So maybe he's just not good at debates but so what?

gorgon wrote:

AustonT wrote:3 things that could help Obama win in 2012
1. Not being Obama (this is key)
2. Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign instead of asking for 4 more years.
3. The Republicans continue to squabble looking like small children to the American people until no 1 doesn't matter.

Per Politifact, he's kept more than he's broken.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter

Barack Obama wrote:
“I keep a checklist in my desk, and I kind of see, all right, I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign and let me see, yes, I got that done and that one, yes.  No, that one’s not done yet. So we’ve got about 60 percent done in three years. So I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years.”

AustonT wrote:
2. Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign instead of asking for 4 more years

AustonT wrote:

Barack Obama wrote:
“I keep a checklist in my desk, and I kind of see, all right, I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign and let me see, yes, I got that done and that one, yes.  No, that one’s not done yet. So we’ve got about 60 percent done in three years. So I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years.”

2. Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign instead of asking for 4 more years.

Came from the man himself.

dogma wrote:

AustonT wrote:

Barack Obama wrote:
“I keep a checklist in my desk, and I kind of see, all right, I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign and let me see, yes, I got that done and that one, yes.  No, that one’s not done yet. So we’ve got about 60 percent done in three years. So I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years.”

2. Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign instead of asking for 4 more years.

Came from the man himself.

I don't see the relationship between that quote, and what you said.

Barack Obama wrote: I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign

AustonT wrote: Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign

Barack Obama wrote: I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years

AustonT wrote: instead of asking for 4 more years.

AustonT wrote:

dogma wrote:

AustonT wrote:

Barack Obama wrote:
“I keep a checklist in my desk, and I kind of see, all right, I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign and let me see, yes, I got that done and that one, yes.  No, that one’s not done yet. So we’ve got about 60 percent done in three years. So I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years.”

2. Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign instead of asking for 4 more years.

Came from the man himself.

I don't see the relationship between that quote, and what you said.

Must be a learning disability. Don't worry I'll help you.

Barack Obama wrote: I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign

AustonT wrote: Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign

Barack Obama wrote: I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years

AustonT wrote: instead of asking for 4 more years.

Words are tricky, it's ok I understand. Now please continue to troll and plead ignorance.

AustonT wrote:
Must be a learning disability. Don't worry I'll help you.

Barack Obama wrote: I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign

AustonT wrote: Actually delivering on the campaign promises from his last campaign

Barack Obama wrote: I’m pretty confident we can get the other 40 percent done in the next five years

AustonT wrote: instead of asking for 4 more years.

Words are tricky, it's ok I understand. Now please continue to troll and plead ignorance.

ShumaGorath wrote:Format your sentences better, your implications were difficult to parse. Did you appreciate that he got roughly 60% of them done? Are you criticizing that hes asking for more time to finish the rest?

ShumaGorath wrote:Words are tricky, iit's ok I understand. Now please rewrite that so that it actually conveys some sense of meaning instead of being a tacked together series of words that are less then the sum of their parts.

AustonT wrote:
I let the President speak for himself without challenging his actual record. I "appreciate" that he claimed to have fulfilled 60% of the campaign promises he made. If you want to walk down this road politifact opines that he's at about 39%. And yes I'm criticizing the fact that he has failed to meet the goals he set in his four year term. That's how holding people accountable works.