Rick Perry Gets No Respect

When Texas Governor Rick perry announced that he would not seek another term as governor, most people (including myself) assumed that he did that because he want ed the time to lay the groundwork for another presidential campaign. He failed miserably in 2012, but still thinks he can turn that around and become the Republican nominee.

But he's having a hard time getting anyone else to think he might make a good GOP nominee -- including among Republicans in his home state. A Texas Tribune / Univ. of Texas Poll taken this year shows he would only have the support of 10% of Texas Republicans if he chose to run (trailing Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Marco Rubio). And that extends to the media. While much is reported about the possible candidacies of other possible candidates, it is rare to even hear Perry's name mentioned.

And it looks like the national polls have as little regard for a possible Perry candidacy as the media and his home state Republicans. Most of them don't even include his name when they poll respondents about who they would prefer in 2016. The folks over at Smart Politics (the blog of the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota) looked at the 17 polls that have been conducted this year on a 2016 GOP presidential preference -- and Perry's name only appeared in 5 of those polls. The other 12 polls didn't even bother to list his name. In fact, he was listed less than such long-shots as Susana Martinez, Scott Walker, Rick Santorum, and Bobby Jindal.

This is a good thing. During Perry's term as governor, the state of Texas sank to the bottom in far too many important categories. He would be a disaster as president -- maybe even worse than the last Texan to occupy the White House.