Next to a possible future United States President, Evan Couture of Greenland was all smiles Sunday afternoon.
“It was a great experience,” he said after he and his parents, Len and Michelle, had lunch with Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who formally announced his candidacy for President in New Hampshire Saturday. “It was overwhelming.”
Perry briefly attended the New Hampshire Energy Freedom Festival at McIntyre ski area in Manchester, which attracted about 350 people to an event designed to provide a fun day out for members of the New Hampshire Energy Forum.
Perry said he entered the race out of “a duty to serve my country. And our country is in trouble.”
When asked in a swarm of reporters about fellow Republican primary contender and U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s victory in Saturday’s Iowa straw poll, Perry said he believed that people were not voting out of anger.
“I think there’s a lot of frustration,” Perry said. “People want their elected officials to listen to them. It seems like we have a federal government that’s not working for the people. It’s the other way around. I share their frustration. I want to make Washington as inconsequential in our lives as possible.
The last part is crucial. Perry and his advisers believe that the Republican field has lacked a candidate who can unite the GOP's factions - Christian conservatives, business interests and small-government enthusiasts - the way Ronald Reagan did. Perry aims to fill the void.
That means projecting confidence, strength and optimism that offers simple answers voters can grab hold of in a time of great anxiety and uncertainty.
"We know the greatest darkness comes just before the morning," Perry told 30,000 evangelical Christians a week ago, part of the run-up to his campaign announcement. Days later in San Antonio, he was even more explicit, telling a legislative conference that while "our fiscal house is built on shifting sands. . . . This West Texas optimist sees our brightest hour just around the corner."
The first step to securing the Republican nomination is to fend off rivals for the devotion of tea party activists and religious conservatives who control the process in the early nominating states.
Bob Vander Plaats, a religious-right activist in Iowa, said Christian conservatives are looking for a candidate "our base could quickly coalesce around." Perry's plan is to attract voters from Michele Bachmann and emerge by the South Carolina primary as the chief alternative to national front-runner Mitt Romney.
Perry's record is not without blemish. And his Republican opponents are prepared to argue that he's not the conservative he claims to be.
They will pick at his lifetime in public office, reports of cronyism, immigration policies that could alienate the right, a mandate to vaccinate preteen girls, a government initiative to take private property for a massive toll road project.
The Perry team aims to dismiss that with a relentless focus on jobs. Perry's campaign strategist, Dave Carney, said in an interview that the 2012 presidential race will be a "macro-election" dominated by the economy.
In large part, Carney plans to take the blueprint of Perry's re-election last year - denouncing a spendthrift Washington and touting his economic record in Texas - to the national stage.
When Perry's opponents attacked his policies, the governor kept talking about jobs, the economy, and freeing the state from Washington's constraints.
Last August, Carney explained how Perry's re-election message would go: "Nothing's getting better, it just gets worse. You can look at it anywhere in the country - Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio - where people have made up their mind. They're not listening to little micro-arguments. This is a macro-election. Whether its jobs or debt or spending, it's crystal clear."
His Christian prayer rally at Houston's Reliant Stadium was a discrete appeal to politically important religious conservatives who want a government that reflects their values, not only on abortion and gay rights but also on spending and debt.
Their moral universe includes not just social, but fiscal issues. Living in debt has become the new living in sin.
"There is a sense that there is a right and proper way in economics as well as personal behavior, and we've collectively as a nation strayed away from that," Green said. "And we need somebody who will have an absolute confidence that he or she can get us back."
Running a general election campaign would require Perry to pivot from an appeal to social conservatives whose extreme views could turn off moderate voters.
Part of the problem with Perry's economic message is that much of the state's job creation has been a shifting of jobs-from California, for example. Business-friendly policies and geographical advantages largely predate Perry, so he's less the cause than the beneficiary.
Carney's blueprint for winning a general election would cast Perry in sharp contrast to Obama on economic issues. He believes voters interpret the president's cerebral and nuanced style as indecisiveness.
If the economy is still struggling next year, Carney believes, the only thing that counts is whether voters believe there's somebody who will fix it. So Carney plans to project Perry in bold colors - direct, assertive and optimistic.
Waterloo, Iowa— Texas Gov. Rick Perry, in his first visit to Iowa since announcing his presidential bid, said on Sunday that he felt compelled to run because no one in the Republican field had caught fire with the public.
“This wasn’t something I felt compelled to do six months ago or even three months ago,” Perry said. He was hopeful that “one of the people in our group would explode out and take off and everybody in American could get behind them. That hasn’t happened. My wife basically said, ‘Listen, our country is in trouble and you need to do your duty.’ And that was a pretty clarion call for me.”
Perry and Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) will be speaking tonight at a fundraiser for the Black Hawk County GOP. Perry was mobbed as soon as he entered the historic Electric Ballroom. He high-fived a boy wearing an “Americans for Rick Perry” T-shirt, kissed a 100-year-old woman’s cheek and discussed rain totals with farmers.
When one man called him “Mr. President,” Perry replied, “Hey listen, I got a whole lot of asking to do before anything happens out here in Iowa.
Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty brought clarity to the campaign for the Republican presidential nomination, leaving social conservatives Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry as the main challengers to front-runner Mitt Romney.
Mr. Perry, who is the governor of Texas, immediately presented himself as a threat to Mr. Romney in his stronghold of New Hampshire, where the former Massachusetts governor owns a home and leads in state polls. Mr. Perry campaigned there Saturday and Sunday.
Later on Sunday, Mr. Perry moved to make incursions into the home turf of Mrs. Bachmann, a three-term congresswoman from Minnesota. He stormed into Mrs. Bachmann's native town of Waterloo, Iowa, the state that will hold the nation's first nominating contest early next year, going table to table, shaking hands and hugging guests at a packed GOP dinner as loudspeakers boomed the tune, "Deep In The Heart of Texas."
Other candidates have entered with their own media boomlets, only to slip away without seriously challenging Mr. Romney's position as the leading candidate for the GOP nomination. Expectations are high for Mr. Perry, but he is untested outside of Texas.
"If Perry can execute a good launch in the first 30 days and survive the initial onslaught, he has a very good shot at the nomination," said Phil Musser, top political strategist for the now-defunct Pawlenty campaign. "These first 30 days will be make or break."
In Waterloo Sunday night, Mr. Perry told of his upbringing as a farm boy and his years as an Air Force pilot in a speech punctuated by loud applause. He promised, if elected, to slash spending, taxes and federal regulations. He said he would veto spending bills "till the ink runs dry if that's what it takes."
Local advertising executive Jim Mudd, who sat next to Mr. Perry over dinner, came away impressed. "I think Perry is a winner," he said. "Everything he says is in keeping with what we believe in the Republican Party."
Mrs. Bachmann's straw poll victory over runner-up Ron Paul established her as the front-runner in Iowa, but it was Mr. Pawlenty's third-place finish that had the most meaning.
Romney aides are hoping the contest develops into a slugging match between Mrs. Bachmann and Mr. Perry for the most conservative voters, just as the fight between Mrs. Bachmann and Mr. Pawlenty dispatched Mr. Pawlenty while leaving Mr. Romney unscathed. On Sunday evening here, Mr. Santorum excoriated Mr. Perry's position that he would respect New York State's right to approve gay marriage, saying "states cannot do whatever they want to do." Conservatives have also questioned Mr. Perry's executive order mandating the vaccination of 11-year-old girls against the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, a move that was overturned by the Texas legislature.
Mr. Romney, who ran a private-equity firm before winning office in Massachusetts, will paint the Texan as a career politician while casting himself as the only major candidate with extensive private-sector experience. And while Romney aides say their candidate will contest Iowa, other strategists here see more reason for him to pull back and let the Minnesotan and the Texan battle it out.
That dynamic could play elsewhere, as well. If Mrs. Bachmann and Mr. Perry split the evangelical Christian vote in South Carolina, Mr. Romney could have an easier chance to win there. If the same thing happens in the panhandle of Florida, Mr. Romney could focus on the swing areas of South Florida and the area between Tampa and Orlando.
Mr. Perry made it clear he will contest all the early states, not cede some ground and play harder for others. "I intend to compete for every vote in every state," he declared Saturday night in New Hampshire. "This isn't just to campaign in a few places."
Mr. Romney isn't responding in kind. He is maintaining his focus on New Hampshire and on fund-raising. On Monday and Tuesday, he will be in New Hampshire, then fly to California, Wyoming, Idaho and Utah to raise campaign funds.
Mrs. Bachmann had said all tax revenues coming in could be directed to paying off U.S. creditors, funding the military and fully financing Social Security and Medicare. But what was left would have meant 68% cuts to virtually every other program, from the Veterans Administration to the Federal Bureau of Investigation to federal education assistance, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center, a fiscal think tank in Washington.
"We have to reject the new normal" of federal spending under Mr. Obama, she responded.
Fox News anchor Chris Wallace then asked her why she had written six letters asking for money from the president's stimulus plan and writing in those letters that the money for roads and bridges would create jobs in her district.
Pella, Iowa - The Republican presidential candidate who's been missing from political action recently in Iowa returned here on Wednesday with a fresh prediction: President Obama won't win Iowa in 2012.
And Mitt Romney upped the ante, proclaiming he would win the state's seven electoral votes if he becomes the Republican presidential nominee.
Romney spoke to reporters in Pella, Iowa, after speaking at a company that manufactures agricultural, environmental and industrial equipment. In the back-and-forth with business people, Romney repeated his slams against the Obama administration: decrying its "job-killing" economic policies, saying he believes officials intend to have a government-run health care system, and blasting Democrats as being beholden to special interests like public worker unions.
In his exchange with reporters, Romney mentioned the president's upcoming bus tour.
"I hope that on his bus tour he actually takes the time to get off the bus and sit down with business people...and ask them whether the policies he's put in place over the last two and a half years have helped or hurt enterprise and jobs in America," Romney said.
The candidate then donned the hat of political punditry.
"I think you'll find that on policy after policy, that if he [Obama] does that he'll learn from the American people and from business people just what I do...that the president's policies have made it more difficult for enterprises to grow and thrive at a time when the economy was in trouble. And that's why I think this president is going to have a tough re-election bid."
Romney added: "Let me make this prediction: he won't carry Iowa in November 2012."
In 2008, then-Senator Obama won Iowa, beating GOP presidential nominee Sen. John McCain by nine-points in the state. Obama, then a senator from Illinois, also won Iowa's critical caucuses in January of that year.
Meanwhile, there's a question of whether or not Romney can make good on his prediction: of winning Iowa should he become the nominee.
While eating a pastry from Jaarsma Bakery in Pella, Iowa, Romney called The Press to share his thoughts on President Barack Obama’s visit to the Johnson Controls-Saft advanced battery factory in Holland.
“He must be concerned about Michigan,” said Romney, who is hoping his father, former Gov. George Romney, still has coattails when Michigan Republicans choose their presidential nominee next year.
“My prediction is that he won’t carry Michigan in 2012.”
Former Democratic congressional candidate Patrick Miles Jr. said no plans were laid nor promises made Thursday when he re-connected with his old Harvard Law School classmate, President Barack Obama, during a reception at the Johnson Controls-Saft plant.
After commiserating over the plight of Democratic candidates like himself last year, Miles said, Obama assured him “things will look much better next year.”
Miles, who lost to Republican Justin Amash by a 2-1 margin, said he will decide this fall whether to run again.
Holland Republican Pete Hoekstra’s bid for the U.S. Senate seat held by Democrat Debbie Stabenow took a hit Thursday when state GOP party bigwigs Betsy DeVos, Spencer Abraham and Saul Anuzis endorsed Detroit charter school founder Clark Durant for the Republican nomination.
But by week’s end, Hoekstra could take heart in reports by Michigan Public Radio and Gongwer News Service that Gov. Rick Snyder is likely to back Hoekstra later this month.
Low turnout bemoaned
Moments after Grand Rapids Mayor George Heartwell congratulated 1st Ward Commissioner Walt Gutowski on his Aug. 2 re-election, commissioners lamented the lower-than-expected voter turnout of less than 9 percent.
Gutowski, who avoided a November runoff by capturing 52 percent of the vote, agreed it was disappointing. But, he quickly interjected, “the outcome was all right.
