# Rick Perry to jump into the race? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [May 28, 2011, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589 "2011-05-28T19:57:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/101 "2011-07-04T15:55:46Z")
> [@Recovering\_Republican](#): > > Sorry, I mistook you for a serious debater… I _have_ been overusing the LOL card with you, but it just seems there are so many fatuous posts to LOL at. But I don’t want to wander too far off topic and I don’t care enough to open a pit thread about it. In this case you obviously do see the relevance of quality vs. quantity jobs, and even concede that a job paying well above minimum wage isn’t enough to get by. I picked 40K as a somewhat tidy figure representing what a single person might be expected to live on, or what half of a two-income family might be able to get by on. That is also twice what one of Perry’s new jobs is likely to pay! If most of the new jobs in Texas pay in the 16K-20K range, as the article suggests (at or slightly above minimum wage) that’s not a great argument for Rick Perry bringing his plan to the rest of America. ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/102 "2011-07-04T15:59:51Z")
> [@Recovering\_Republican](#): > > You know what, I’m making just a little over 40K in IL, where they just increased our state income tax 66% so Gov. Quinn (whom I voted for because Brady was so reactionary) to pay off his union buddies. > > It’s substantially less than what I was making during most of the Bush years. In fact, I’d have to go back to 2002 to find where I did less well. So, yeah, I’m making less under Quinn/Obama and I’m paying more in taxes to boot. > > Those people have jobs, and probably most of them don’t have that much experience or background. Perry is creating jobs. That’s something. It’s more than a lot of other people are getting accomplished. Since you’re fond of historical lessons, you should google the term “wage slavery.” ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/103 "2011-07-04T16:36:23Z")
> [@tnetennba](#): > > I _have_ been overusing the LOL card with you, but it just seems there are so many fatuous posts to LOL at. But I don’t want to wander too far off topic and I don’t care enough to open a pit thread about it. > > In this case you obviously do see the relevance of quality vs. quantity jobs, and even concede that a job paying well above minimum wage isn’t enough to get by. I picked 40K as a somewhat tidy figure representing what a single person might be expected to live on, or what half of a two-income family might be able to get by on. That is also twice what one of Perry’s new jobs is likely to pay! If most of the new jobs in Texas pay in the 16K-20K range, as the article suggests (at or slightly above minimum wage) that’s not a great argument for Rick Perry bringing his plan to the rest of America. Or maybe you need to start somewhere, guy. Frankly, when I got laid off in 2008, if I had waited about for a job that paid exactly what I was making, I’d still be laid off. So I made a calculation that taking my current job (which initially only paid about 75% of what I was making) was better than not working at all, and having to explain to a future employer why no one picked me up for two years. Incidently, someone I worked with is doing exactly that, and she hasn’t worked in two years. Getting people back to work is what is important, the rest is going to follow. When you get unemployment back down to 5%, that’s when employers start making real offers and real raises. At 9.1% (eeek, it burns, it burns) they can pretty much feed you what they want. So I would rather have Perry creating not great jobs than Obama creating NO jobs. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/104 "2011-07-04T16:38:46Z")
> [@tnetennba](#): > > Since you’re fond of historical lessons, you should google the term “wage slavery.” Oh, I agree, wages have declined for working people. And both parties are responsible for that. So are unions that insist on closing the plant instead of making concessions. The real question is, American actually make far more than most of the world’s 7 billion people. Now that we are in a global economy, I’m not sure what he answer is. I’m reasonably sure “the One” doesn’t have it, though. ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/105 "2011-07-04T16:42:58Z")
> [@Recovering\_Republican](#): > > I’m reasonably sure “the One” doesn’t have it, though. Which one is that? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/106 "2011-07-04T17:08:09Z")
I’m reminded of a quote from Brian Schweitzer, my current governor. During his campaign, a reporter asked him what he’d do about the lack of jobs in Montana. His response? “There is no lack of jobs in Montana. Why, I know one lady who has three of them. What we lack is _good_ jobs.” It’s one thing to trumpet about creating a bunch of minimum-wage jobs, but if those minimum-wage jobs aren’t enough to support a family, they’re not really doing anything to address the problem. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/107 "2011-07-04T17:17:43Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > This explains a lot about the Bush/Cheney administration. No, actually it explains absolutely nothing about the Bush/Cheney administration. Following Reconstruction, the people of Texas were so bummed by the carpetbaggers that they rewrote the state constitution to spread the political power out between the governor and the lt. governor. Over the years, it has settled into the governor being the front man, the persuader, and the lt. governor being the back room arm-twister. Occasionally, you will have a governor that takes a stronger stance, as have both Bush and Perry, but the lt. governor will always be a major player. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/108 "2011-07-04T18:32:46Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I’m reminded of a quote from Brian Schweitzer, my current governor. During his campaign, a reporter asked him what he’d do about the lack of jobs in Montana. His response? “There is no lack of jobs in Montana. Why, I know one lady who has three of them. What we lack is _good_ jobs.” > > It’s one thing to trumpet about creating a bunch of minimum-wage jobs, but if those minimum-wage jobs aren’t enough to support a family, they’re not really doing anything to address the problem. Well, they do more than letting people sit around collecting welfare and food stamps, watching Jerry Springer… I think that once we get up to full employment, that when the wages will start getting better. THere’s more to it than that, we need to rebuild our manufacturing, get trade policies that aren’t completely retarded, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2011, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/109 "2011-07-04T18:35:09Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > No, actually it explains absolutely nothing about the Bush/Cheney administration. > > Following Reconstruction, the people of Texas were so bummed by the carpetbaggers that they rewrote the state constitution to spread the political power out between the governor and the lt. governor. Over the years, it has settled into the governor being the front man, the persuader, and the lt. governor being the back room arm-twister. Occasionally, you will have a governor that takes a stronger stance, as have both Bush and Perry, but the lt. governor will always be a major player. Good point, and in many ways, it’s not far off from what we have federally. Whose Obama’s point man on the whole budget mess? Biden Cheney did Bush’s dirty work and Gore did some of Clintons. The president gets to be the good cop and the veep the bad cop. Also explains why veeps are rarely elected in their own right. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/110 "2011-07-06T11:07:04Z")
Here’s an interesting Perry vs. Obama story. > **[Obama tries to stop execution in Texas of Mexican killer](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/05/obama-stop-texas-mexican-execution)** > > US president warns Texan authorities that execution would put America in breach of international legal obligations President Barack Obama is attempting to block the execution in Texas on Thursday of a Mexican man because it would breach an international convention and do “irreparable harm” to US interests. The White House has asked the US supreme court to put the execution of Humberto Leal Garcia on hold while Congress passes a law that would prevent the convicted rapist and murderer from being put to death along with dozens of other foreign nationals who were denied proper access to diplomatic representation before trials for capital crimes. The administration moved after the governor of Texas, Rick Perry, brushed aside appeals from diplomats, top judges, senior military officers, the United Nations and former president George W Bush to stay Leal’s execution because it could jeopardise American citizens arrested abroad as well as US diplomatic interests. Leal, 38, was convicted in 1994 of the rape and murder of a 16-year-old girl in San Antonio. Few question that he was responsible for the killing but the Texas authorities failed to tell Leal, who was born in Mexico and has lived in the US since the age of two, that under the Vienna convention he was entitled to contact the Mexican consulate when he was arrested. ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/111 "2011-07-06T11:15:26Z")
It’s not a Perry vs. Obama story. It’s a Texas vs. International Law story. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/112 "2011-07-06T11:34:29Z")
> [@tnetennba](#): > > It’s not a Perry vs. Obama story. It’s a Texas vs. International Law story. Now you see, guy, my attitude is, Screw international law, this creep murdered a 16 year old girl. Screw the lethal injection, let’s bring old sparky out of mothballs. I was just commenting on the political aspects of it, tho. I don’t think this is a fight Obama should really pick. ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/113 "2011-07-06T11:38:53Z")
Obama’s “fights” are determined by the law, not by gut instincts. Bush had the same position. You don’t seem to understand that it’s American tourists they are protecting. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/114 "2011-07-06T11:50:49Z")
> [@tnetennba](#): > > Obama’s “fights” are determined by the law, not by gut instincts. Bush had the same position. You don’t seem to understand that it’s American tourists they are protecting. I thought Bush kow-towed to Mexico too much, too. Sorry, this clown raped and killled a 16 year old girl. There is no doubt of that. If an American tourist raped and killed a 16 year old girl, I wouldn’t have any problem with that country dealing with him harshly, either. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/115 "2011-07-06T16:35:31Z")
So, if you were in Mexico, and the local officials decided to arrest you for rape and murder, and you were brought to trial without being allowed to contact the American embassy, and you were convicted, you’d be OK with that? You say there’s “no doubt” of his guilt, but there’s doubt for _anyone_ convicted in a court system that has no problem with attorneys sleeping through a trial, or with executing someone where the only evidence was a single eyewitness. Hell, if I were in Texas and accused of something, I’d want to get non-Texas legal systems involved, too. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/116 "2011-07-06T22:22:46Z")
> [@Recovering\_Republican](#): > > I thought Bush kow-towed to Mexico too much, too. > > Sorry, this clown raped and killled a 16 year old girl. There is no doubt of that. If an American tourist raped and killed a 16 year old girl, I wouldn’t have any problem with that country dealing with him harshly, either. When they refused him access, he hadn’t been convicted yet. Does presumption of innocence mean anything to you at all? Or are you one of the verdict first, then the trial types? Plus, this being Texas, if a jury convicted someone for a murder I saw with my own eyes, I’d go under hypnosis to find out what really happened. ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2011, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/117 "2011-07-06T23:21:59Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Does presumption of innocence mean anything to you at all? Elsewhere he calls it a “fallacy.” ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2011, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/118 "2011-07-07T00:29:17Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > When they refused him access, he hadn’t been convicted yet. Does presumption of innocence mean anything to you at all? Or are you one of the verdict first, then the trial types? > > Plus, this being Texas, if a jury convicted someone for a murder I saw with my own eyes, I’d go under hypnosis to find out what really happened. Well, in this particular case, the guy confessed when he was caught, a trial found him guilty, and the only issue is that the authorities didn’t let him talk to the Mexican Conselate. Fry him. ---
**Author:** ![Recovering\_Republican](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@Recovering\_Republican](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recovering_Republican)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2011, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/119 "2011-07-07T00:31:22Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > So, if you were in Mexico, and the local officials decided to arrest you for rape and murder, and you were brought to trial without being allowed to contact the American embassy, and you were convicted, you’d be OK with that? > > You say there’s “no doubt” of his guilt, but there’s doubt for _anyone_ convicted in a court system that has no problem with attorneys sleeping through a trial, or with executing someone where the only evidence was a single eyewitness. Hell, if I were in Texas and accused of something, I’d want to get non-Texas legal systems involved, too. You know what, guy, I’ve heard you guys carping about the Texas system for years now, but you know what you’ve yet to produce? A single case where a guy had been executed and didn’t have it coming. So why do you guys hate Texas so much? ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2011, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589/120 "2011-07-07T01:02:05Z")
> [@Recovering\_Republican](#): > > You know what, guy, I’ve heard you guys carping about the Texas system for years now, but you know what you’ve yet to produce? A single case where a guy had been executed and didn’t have it coming > **[Innocent, but Executed](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/innocent-but-executed_b_272327)** > > Whether our criminal justice system has executed an innocent man should no longer be an open question. Cameron Todd Willingham's case proves that. > **[DNA Tests Undermine Evidence in Texas Execution](https://www.texasobserver.org/texas-observer-exclusive-dna-tests-undermine-evidence-in-texas-execution/)** > > New results show Claude Jones was put to death on flawed evidence. > **[10 Convicts Presumed Innocent After Execution - Listverse](https://listverse.com/2010/01/12/10-convicts-presumed-innocent-after-execution/)** > > English jurist William Blackstone once said, “Better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.” Even lawyers are indoctrinated with [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-perry-to-jump-into-the-race/583589.md?page=7)