Rick Perry's Pretty Awesome Tenure as Governor
DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz: "Rick Perry's failed tenure as governor of Texas tells us everything we need to know about why he should never and won't ever be president of the United States." "Failed tenure as governor of Texas"? I'm about to tell you something I don't think I've ever said before, and I don't know if I ever will again. "Matt Yglesias wrote a good piece on this at Vox." No, really. Maybe he was hacked, or maybe he was hit on the head or something. But the whole piece is spectacularly fair -- giving Perry a lot of credit for what went right in Texas during his tenure, but also pointing out where broader economic, political, or cultural trends helped the state: I was working for ThinkProgress at the time Perry kicked off his campaign, so I got to see the kind of "Texas Miracle" debunkings that liberals were working on before Perry's campaign imploded. It mostly consisted of very bright people coming up with not-so-persuasive arguments. It was all about oil: Factually, this just doesn't hold up very well. Oil extraction is a big business in Texas, but the state is far too large for a single industry to power its entire economy. Yeah, but the jobs are low-paid: There are a lot of low-wage workers in Texas. But the people who have those jobs evidently think they're better than no job at all. And Rick Perry's Texas generated a lot of jobs. It's really just population growth: This is true. Texas's unemployment rate did get pretty high during the recession. Job growth was so robust because the state's labor force was growing so rapidly. But this is really a point in Perry's favor. People were voting with their feet — in droves — to move to Texas. It's just warm weather: Again, it is true that there is a marked tendency for warmer states to grow faster than colder ones. Scott Walker can't change the fact that Wisconsin is just a little cold and remote. But California has better weather than Texas, and its population and workforce aren't growing nearly as fast. Obviously, you can't lay the credit (or blame) for a state's economic success or failure at the shoes of a single person. But Perry is a leading member of a larger Texas conservative movement that has been politically dominant in the state for a long time and has clearly shaped the situation in important ways. Due to Perry's long tenure in office, Texas public policy very much reflects his values — a light regulatory touch, low taxes, and spending that's focused on infrastructure rather than social assistance. And it's more or less achieved what it's supposed to achieve: rapid job growth. Oh, by the way: Texas continues to outpace the national average in high school graduation rates according to annually released federal data, state education officials announced Friday. Almost nine out of 10 — 88 percent — of students in the Class of 2013 earned their diplomas on time, compared with a national average of 81 percent. Iowa was the only other state that posted a higher rate. Obama's Already Leaving Big Problems for the Next President On terrorism, President Obama is taking a knee and lining up in the victory formation, running out the clock . . . while trailing: In a detailed interview with The Atlantic, Obama made his view clear. "If they are not willing to fight for the security of their country, we cannot do that for them," he said, but added that he's committed to training Iraqis over a "multi-year" period. How many, exactly, is "multi?" State Department official and ISIS expert Brett McGurk laid that out on NPR: "It's a three-year campaign to degrade the organization." Three years marked from mid-2014, of course, falls after Jan. 20, 2017, the date Obama leaves office. Translation: The strategy is to avoid sending ground troops for the remainder of his term. So stop asking. This is a legacy issue for Obama, an actual red line. Iraq is already in the win column and only becomes a loss if he listens to Republican advice and orders combat troops to return, the White House thinking goes. Meanwhile . . . Al-Qaeda affiliates are significantly expanding their footholds in Syria and Yemen, using the chaos of civil wars to acquire territory and increase their influence, according to analysts, residents, and intelligence officials. The gains have helped the terror group's affiliates become major players in the countries and have complicated efforts to resolve the conflicts. Al-Qaeda offshoots could also be gaining sanctuaries to eventually plan attacks against the United States and Europe, analysts say. President Obama is content with a situation that doesn't feel like a defeat . . . even if it is a strategic defeat for the United States, Conservatives Are Standing Up for the Fundamental Freedom to Not Care Yesterday's edition of the Cam and Company program lived up to the hype. In addition to featuring Cam's always-excellent hosting and my friend the acerbic, quick-witted Kurt Schlichter in-studio, our special guests included my TJAMS co-host Mickey White, Townhall's Guy Benson, Justified star Nick Searcy, my NR colleague Charlie Cooke, and WIBC morning host Tony Katz. Here's a sample of what you missed (and you can still watch in the archives), as I attempted to make a point about the importance of being free to not care about the progressives' cause du jour. [Cam made the point that the counter-culture has now become the dominant culture, and traditional culture is the counter-culture, and Kurt summarized it as, "the war on the normals."] Jim: The realm of apolitical spaces -- you know how on college campuses they want you to have "safe spaces"? Where you're not going to hear any idea you might disagree with, or encounter trigger words, or anything like that? A lot of America used to be relatively apolitical spaces. If you were into politics like we are, you were considered a geek or a nerd and you moved to D.C. They left you alone. The tax code, government contracting -- this was considered obscure stuff that you didn't really need to worry about too much. What was government going to do to you, right? They're not going to suddenly go and ban light bulbs tomorrow. They're not going to make you buy health insurance from some crappy web site that doesn't work, right? Government was off doing its stuff. We in political world sometimes sneer at low-information voters. This used to be a country where you could be a low-information voter, and there was no consequence to it, and it was kind of nice! You should be able to live a life free from politics. Right? Free from ideology. I'm quoting my colleague Jonah Goldberg a little bit here. What we on the Right are fighting for -- inadvertently, we didn't really want to -- it's not "you have to believe like us' -- you have to be free to believe whatever the heck you want to believe. If you don't agree us, fine! But the other side is basically saying, "No, you HAVE to comply!" Erick Erickson is using the slogan lately, "You will be made to care." Think about Caitlin Jenner and all that kind of stuff. I wrote something about him earlier this week, and bunch of people said, "Jim, I don't want to hear about it. I don't care. I haven't thought about him since the Wheaties box, all right?" Or in my case, since he was on CHiPs. (humming CHiPs theme) You should be free to do that. But now, honest to goodness, a Washington Post reporter and some National Journal reporter set up some automatic Twitter thing where if you use the pronoun, 'he' -- Cam: Oh, yeah, the "Bot" -- Jim: Which oh, by the way, Jenner said it's perfectly fine! He understands. Up until recently, he was Bruce Jenner, former Olympian, dad of the Kardashians, all that kind of stuff. People were used to thinking of him a certain way. Now he's different. Now whatever you think of it, he understands that's a rather abrupt change. So if you think of him as "he," he's not going to be bothered by it. He understands. He's cool with it. He understands he's put his family through a very big change and they're all working through it all together. Just them, the family, the parents, the kids, and the E! Network television cameras. It's a very close-kit circle. A little weird, but whatever, they're doing it their way. But these two reporters in D.C. just decided, "NO! You are not allowed to do what Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner wants you to do! You MUST use the feminine pronoun! Even though he just said it was okay!" And oh, by the way, no less than GLAAD says, do what the person wants. Now these two reporters are now correcting GLAAD! I just want to put them all in a jar, and shake it, and make them fight like we used to do with bugs. Kurt: I know who wins: us. Jim: The fact that they're dragging you into this maelstrom, is that if you want to say, "I don't care about Bruce Jenner. I didn't watch the CHiPs reruns. I don't watch the E! Network. I haven't cared about the Olympics since the Soviets went away!" What we on the right are standing for, inadvertently, is the right to not care. And the problem is, it's really hard to stir the apathetic, because that's what makes them apathetic! Cam: You don't have to be apathetic about apathy, Jim. You can be-- [laughter] Kurt: I'm enthusiastic about apathy! Cam: What is the sound of one hand not clapping? ADDENDA: If you're anywhere near Silicon Valley, I want to see you Tuesday, June 9, at 7 p.m. -- be there and bring your copy of The Weed Agency! | 
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