Presidential Elections 2012 - #3167 - VIDEO: Rick Perry: 1st Campaign Video: 'Time to Get America Working Again' - The Blaze (2) Wrap-Up from Waterloo, Iowa, Perry Embraced, Bachmann Falls a Little Flat - Hot Air (3) Video: Rick Perry in Waterloo, Iowa (4) Rick Perry: The Paint Creek Boy Who Would be King - The Telegraph

Rick Perry: Time to Get America Working Again - As reported Saturday on The Blaze, Texas Gov. Rick Perry is now officially in the 2012 presidential race. The governor also released his first campaign ad with this highly produced piece called “Rick Perry: Time To Get America Working Again.”

Wrap-Up From Waterloo: Perry Embraced, Bachmann Falls a Little Flat - Hot Air - Governor Rick Perry, Rep. Michele Bachmann, and former Senator Rick Santorum met in Waterloo, Iowa this evening to woo Blackhawk County Republicans and fight for national attention. The media wondered whether Iowans would forgive Perry for snubbing the Ames straw poll and whether Bachmann could build on her win yesterday in the event. And while some questions were answered, others will start arising from the performances.  Perry made a good start with a friendly crowd. He used a mobile, dynamic style and emphasized the commonalities between the agricultural states of Texas and Iowa. Perry spoke of the difficult farming life and his formative years in small-town Texas, as well as spending a surprising amount of time talking about his military experience. At one point, he got a rousing cheer from the crowd when he pledged to make the presidency regain the respect of men and women in uniform. Perry also talked about jobs, and how his record shows that he can fix what’s ailing the nation. The crowd reacted with enthusiasm, interrupting Perry a number of times with applause and cheers.  If Iowans were angry about his decision to skip Ames, it didn’t manifest itself here. Perry got plenty of enthusiasm from the crowd.  In contrast, Bachmann’s reception seemed less enthusiastic. The lighting had to be changed before Bachmann spoke, apparently at the campaign’s insistence, which delayed her entrance and interfered with the timing of her entrance announcement.  Read more.......


Rick Perry's Speech in Iowa

Rick Perry: The Paint Creek Boy Who Would be King - The Telegraph - It is a pocket of rural America that has changed little in a century and is about as far removed from the bustle and marble monuments of Washington DC as one could imagine. But Paint Creek, where ranches and wooden homes, some now abandoned, are dotted beside cotton and wheat fields, is the place that defines the man who some Republicans believe could unseat President Barack Obama next November.  Governor Rick Perry was part of the fifth generation to work the land at Paint Creek, some 200 miles west of Dallas on the flat expanse of plains known as “the Big Empty”.  It was here that he was imbued with the country values of church, family, neighbourliness, thrift and hard work that now seem part of a bygone America beyond places like West Texas.  “There were three things to do in Paint Creek: school, church, and Boy Scouts,” Mr Perry said last year, looking back on the late 1950s. “That’s it. And it was plenty.” Paint Creek was “one of the most beautiful places or it could be one of the most desolate” depending on the weather. As a child, he ventured, it was the home of “some of the most principled, disciplined people in the world, and faithful”.  Read more........  Article contributed by Steve Peters.