Kay says Perry is hurting the Republican party

Senator Hutchison was on Hardball last night. If you missed her on MSNBC last night, no worries, Todd Gillman at the Dallas Morning News provided a summary in this morning's Trail Blazers Blog:

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison was on Hardball last night on MSNBC, talking mainly about Iran and President Obama's latest posture there. But Chris Matthews asked her about the Texas governor's race, too - specifically, whether she thinks she can beat Gov. Rick Perry, given her "centrist conservative views" and the fact that he's a "character... who's talked about secession from the union, who now enjoys... the endorsement of Sarah Palin, who, for whatever crazy reason, has gotten herself involved in Texas politics?

Short answer from Hutchison: "Yes."

She invoked Ronald Reagan - the big tent part, not the 11th Commandment part.

"I'm a conservative. I want the party to be growing and building and bringing people into our ideas by welcoming them into the party, by holding to our principles, while we say, here are what we believe, and we know you can't agree on 100 percent of everything, but we can form a party around basic principles of freedom, of lower taxes, of entrepreneurship and -- and the American spirit. We can build a party around that. And we can argue about differences that we might have, but we should not repel people from the party. And that's what I think has happened with Governor Perry, in some instances."