Polls indicate both Perry and Sen. Hutchison are tied

A Rasmussen poll released today indicates that Governor Perry and Senator Hutchison are "essentially tied in an early look at their 2010 Primary battle."

The latest Rasmussen Reports statewide telephone survey shows Perry attracting 42% of the vote while Hutchison earns 38%. Seven percent (7%) say they’d like to vote for somebody else and 13% are undecided.

Perry leads by 15 percentage points among conservative voters but Hutchison leads by 35 points among the moderates.

Garner Shelby at the Austin American-Statesman reported yesterday that "A poll taken Sunday and Monday on behalf of Gov. Rick Perry’s re-election campaign suggests that among Republicans likely to vote in the 2010 GOP gubernatorial primary, Perry is in striking distance of Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison."

The summary doesn’t precisely say how pollster Mike Baselice chose who to poll.

Hutchison’s camp later questioned the methodology.

Her campaign manager, Rick Wiley, and a senior strategist, long-time GOP pollster Lance Tarrance Jr., took issue with Perry’s campaign testing the candidates in two ways—both with their officeholder titles (Gov. Perry, Sen. Hutchison) and simply by their names. Tarrance said the sample size in each case means the margin of error for each sample of 250 GOP voters is plus or minus 10 percent.

“Maybe they’re baiting everybody” with the poll, Tarrance said.

Baselice said later the plus or minus margin of error for a sample of 250 voters would actually be 6.1 percent.

In the summary, Baselice advises: “The overall ballot score shows the race much closer than some of recent polls floating around the Internet.” The percentages as relayed to Perry supporters by Perry consultant Dave Carney: Hutchison 44 percent, Perry 39 percent.

Yet those percentage combine the two samples. When the two were paired against each other by names alone, Hutchison led by 11 percentage points, that is: Hutchison, 47 percent, Perry 36 percent.

Put another way, nearly one in two Republican voters favors Hutchison for governor at this time.

Baselice, reached later, defended his approach.

Chris Bell's lawsuit over 2006 contribution for Perry still on

Jason Embry at the Austin American-Statesman reports "District Judge John Dietz late today denied efforts by Texans for Rick Perry and the Republican Governors Association to throw out a lawsuit brought against them by Democrat Chris Bell, who ran against Perry in 2006, said Bell lawyer Buck Wood."

Bell has alleged that reporting errors made by the Perry campaign on campaign-finance reports kept the public from fully seeing the source of money that the governor received for his re-election in the final week of the 2006 race. He has argued that the governors’ group did not follow proper state procedures in making the donation.

Wood said the Dietz ruling did not address Bell’s own effort to have a summary judgment in the case. If that effort is also denied, the case will move closer to a trial.

At issue is $1 million that came to the Perry campaign from the governor’s group in the final month of the campaign.

Job Security: Perry's Appointees reportedly contribute Millions

Wanna show the boss that you like him and hope to keep your job? Better pay up. Matt Stiles at the Houston Chronicle reports today that, "The appointees have given about $4.9 million since Perry became governor in late 2000, with the average donation topping $7,000."

Gov. Rick Perry has accepted nearly $5 million in political campaign donations from people he appointed to state boards and commissions, including some in plum jobs that set policy for state universities, parks and roads, records show.

Nearly half the appointee donations came from people serving as higher education regents, including more than $840,000 from those at the University of Texas System, according to a Houston Chronicle review of campaign-finance records.

Stiles' article includes the following link to see a list of top contributors with State Jobs:

http://images.chron.com/content/news/pdfs/09/05/04/donations.pdf

Perry to speak at Family Research Council summit in September

Governor Perry made a lot of news with his support of a pro-life license plate in Texas last week. For many that are following the 2010 road to the Governors Mansion, his support of the license plates shows a strategy that includes courting 'right wing conservatives'.

Earlier this morning, Wayne Slater of the Dallas Morning News, reported in his blog that Governor Perry is scheduled to speak at the Values Voter summit.

Gov. Rick Perry, whose efforts to woo the religious right to beat Kay Bailey Hutchison in next year's GOP primary, will be a featured speaker at the big Values Voter summit in Washington DC in September. The event -- an annual gathering of the who's who among social conservative political types -- is sponsored by Family Research Council. The group lists the Texas governor on its web site as a confirmed speaker, along with others invited and confirmed -- Sarah Palin, former Ohio secretary of state Ken Blackwell, radio talkers Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, Congresswoman Michele Bachman, Phyllis Schafly and gay marriage opponent Miss. California Carrie Prejean.

Perry is stepping up his appeal to social conservatives with repeated tweets on his Twitter account boosting Tuesday's prayer breakfast in Austin, part of the National Day of Prayer observance.

Governor Perry's efforts to distance himself between Senator Hutchison as a 'Washington Outsider' seems to be faltering. KVR reported earlier that Perry has more money from Washington contributors and guess where the Values Voter summit is going to be held? The Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, DC.

Texas House debates flag for Governor

Things must be really busy at the Capitol these days what with the latest debate centered on what type of flag should be designated for the governor.

Robert T. Garrett of the Dallas Morning News writes in today's Trail Blazers blog about the flag.

The House just had its daily leg stretch and heehaw. This one over designating an official flag for the governor.

House Democratic Leader Jim Dunnam of Waco, offered a bill proposing a red, white and blue flag dating to 1839 and the Republic of Texas (right). Dunnam said, "I think he should have a flag." Gov. Rick Perry has failed to issue an order specifying one.

Rep. Phil King, R-Weatherford, said Dunnam's proposed flag looks too much like the current flag of Russia. Though Dunnam pleaded that Russia imitated the Republic of Texas, King swayed House members to substitute a blue flag with stars and a seal for Dunnam's 1839 pilot flag of the Republic of Texas.

"Members, vote for America, not Russia," King said.

The Handbook of Texas Online states that the pilot flag was probably used from January 25, 1839, to December 29, 1845.

We thought the Governor already has a flag... our current Lone Star state flag. Sure its our sixth one, but we're proud of it and we hope the Governor is too.

Perry's raises more from Washington donors than Kay?!?

The Associated Press is reporting today that, "Perry has collected $2.7 million from Washington since becoming governor — four times more than Hutchison's $670,000 from Washington during the same period, a Morning News analysis found".

Perry has been able to raise far more than Hutchison overall because federal campaigns have limits on individual donations, while Texas state campaigns do not. A slightly higher percentage of Hutchison's campaign money has come from Washington.

The money has come from political communities, lobbyists, individuals and interest groups.

We reported last month that Perry's political strategy is to paint Senator Hutchison as a 'Washington outsider'. The AP article continues with comments from Kay's campaign manager and the Texans for Public Justice:

The governor's financial support from the Beltway undercuts efforts to distance himself from the nation's capital by painting himself as the candidate of Texas-style government and Hutchison as the candidate of Washington, which recently landed Perry in the national spotlight amid talk of Texas secession.

"Governor Perry has built a fundraising mechanism well beyond the boundaries of Texas," said Craig McDonald of Texans for Public Justice, a nonprofit group that tracks campaign money. "He has been very successful with special interest groups inside the Beltway."

Hutchison campaign manager Rick Wiley said it's more evidence that Perry likes to bash Washington but has no problem taking its money — except for $555 million in federal unemployment stimulus money, which the governor says has strings attached and he has rejected.

"One has to wonder what kind of strings he's attached to the fundraising haul he had from Washington, D.C.," Wiley said.

AP reports that Perry is comfy on the right

KVR picked up on a Associated Press report by Kelley Shannon in the Dallas Morning News. Kelley's report indicates that Perry's strategic goal of staying to the right is working so far; and he's comfortable there.

The two-term governor is lately offering fiery remarks that appeal to highly conservative voters as he gears up for a rough, expensive re-election race against U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison for the GOP nomination.

"There certainly is a strategy there, and one that he's run before," said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University. Perry, who has never lost an election, is working to nail down the support of social and economic conservatives who tend to dominate Texas' GOP primary voting before he even thinks about moving toward the middle to appeal to a larger group of Texans, Jillson said.

Recent history shows pleasing those conservative voters is the key to winning GOP primaries in Texas. No more than about 650,000 of Texas' 13 million registered voters typically vote in a Republican gubernatorial primary, but there usually aren't two heavyweight contenders on the ballot.

Whoever survives that contest for governor in March 2010 is the favorite to win the November general election in the still-reliably Republican state.

The challenge for Hutchison, who's more moderate than Perry on social issues like abortion and embryonic stem cell research, is to attract middle-of-the-road voters and suburban women to the GOP primary, Jillson said. By doing that, he said, she could form a foundation for Texas Republicans' future as the state's demographics change and voters become less conservative.

"I think that argument is there to be made because Perry does amaze and offend regularly," Jillson said.

Secede! Or, drink some more tea.

A lot of media attention has been focused on Governor Perry's comments that bordered on calling for secession. Hilary Hylton of Time Magazine reported, "It was the shout-out heard around the world: Texas' Republican governor Rick Perry's praise for his state's tea-party protesters, accompanied by not-so-veiled references to a potential Lone Star State secession."

Dressed in jeans, boots and a baseball cap with a camouflage peak and a hunting outfitter's logo, the Texas governor was one of the few major politicians to appear at the tea parties across the country. While crowds yelled "Secede! Secede!," Perry — 60 but telegenic and youthful — thought out loud that secession might be the outcome if Washington does not mend its "oppressive" high-spending, dictatorial ways. (Most experts say the notion that Texas can legally secede is mistaken, but the state does have the right to split into five states, offering the prospect of 10 U.S. Senators, math that would send cold shivers down any Democratic back.)

After the rallies, Perry downplayed his secession comments, amending them in an interview with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram to say, "I'm trying to make the Obama Administration pay attention to the 10th Amendment." The so-called 10th Amendment movement, asserting the rights of the states to claim all powers not granted specifically to the Federal Government, has been grist for conservatives for more than a decade. The movement got a boost following the Democratic return to dominance in Congress and more traction when federal dictates about how to spend stimulus money raised hackles in places like Texas and South Carolina. Some two dozen state legislatures are considering or have passed resolutions supporting the 10th Amendment.

Governor Perry seems to be pandering to the radical right wing supporters who seemingly hate President Obama. Hilary's article in Time Magazine is humorous and shows just how much Perry's national media strategy seems to be working.

Hilary's article in Time continues with comments from Royal Masset:

Nevertheless, one longtime Republican analyst and numbers cruncher, Royal Masset, believes Hutchison will defeat Perry and be the next governor of Texas. Polls suggest she has an early lead, and Masset points to her overwhelming victories in the past as evidence of her wide support not only among Republicans but also among independents, who can vote in Texas primaries. He has urged Perry to forgo another gubernatorial bid. Masset believes that Perry should be content with one major accomplishment: helping to create more jobs in Texas than the rest of the U.S. during his tenure. "Your place in history is secure," Masset wrote in a recent analysis piece for the Quorum Report, an insider political newsletter that circulates out of Austin, the state capital. "You would be freed up to do great things on the national scene where real power is now held by media stars such as you."

It is not likely to be advice Perry will heed. He is already the longest serving governor in Texas history — as lieutenant governor, he took over for President-elect George W. Bush in December 2000. That has given him unparalleled influence over state government, where much of the governor's power resides in appointments to boards and commissions. Masset believes that more of that kind of centralization of power "will lead to Washington-style corruption. We need new people with new ideas. We need new appointees and new blood."