Perry’s Entitlement Problem

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For months, Republicans have complained about their choices in the 2012 presidential race. Mitt Romney seems unprincipled, they’ve said. Michele Bachmann is too flimsy. Tim Pawlenty looks fine on paper, but in person, not so much. And Newt Gingrich is just plain erratic.

But now disaffected conservatives think they’ve found their man. His name? Rick Perry. This weekend, while most of the field focuses on the Ames, Iowa straw poll, the three-plus-term Texas governor will launch his bid for the GOP nomination at the Red State conference in Charleston, S.C.—and significant swaths of the Republican base will heave a collective sigh of relief. As The New Republic’s Ed Kilgore puts it, “Rick Perry seems to perfectly embody the Republican zeitgeist of the moment, appealing equally to the GOP’s Tea Party, Christian Right, and establishment factions while exemplifying the militant anti-Obama attitude that holds it all together.”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/08/12/rick-perry-exclusive-newsweek-interview-calls-for-dismantling-social-security-and-medicare.html