“I stood up for the rule of law in the state of Texas, and if I had to do it again, I would make exactly the same decision,” said Perry. “David Axelrod said that this was a very sketchy indictment. Professor Dershowitz, who’s not exactly my cheerleader, said that it was outrageous,” he pointed out. Governor Perry is now the first Texas governor since 1917 to be indicted, but almost no one seems to think the charges are legitimate.
Unless he was demonstrably trying to scrap the ethics unit for other than his stated reason, Perry indictment seems pretty sketchy.
— David Axelrod (@davidaxelrod) August 16, 2014
The governor remained unapologetic for following through on a threat he made to veto state funds to a Democrat District Attorney who was arrested and convicted of drunk driving. Perry asked her to resign, and when she refused to do so, he carried out exactly what he had promised, saying that he had lost confidence in the prosecutor.
During the Fox News interview, Governor Perry explained that his indictment is indicative of a much larger problem: government agencies, such as the I.R.S. and the NSA, not following the rule of law. “This is not the way that we settle political differences in this country,” he said. “You don’t do it with indictments. We settle our political differences at the ballot box.”Perry is absolutely right. Threatening to use his veto power — and then actually following through with it — was completely within his rights as the governor of a state. The person on the receiving end of such a coercive tactic may feel differently, of course, but that doesn’t make it illegal. Have you ever had a police officer let you off with a warning, but threaten you with a ticket if you’re caught speeding again? It’s pretty much the exact same concept. Threats are sometimes made for the public good, and those moves are not illegal in themselves. If Texas truly feels this outraged over a governor vetoing funds, why don’t they just strip that veto power away? Oh, that’s right. This is America. Governors have those rights, and they deserve to. Unfortunately, another thing that tends to happen here in America is that sour grapes often lead to frivolous lawsuits like this. Wake me up when you can successfully convince me that an intoxicated public official who clearly doesn’t represent the public interest shouldn’t be forced out her position.
Besides, look at Lois Lerner. There’s an example of a public official who actually DID violate the law and target political opponents in a way that actually IS illegal, and so far, she’s managed to escape any form of punishment. Yet here we have a potential GOP presidential contender who dared to embarrass President Obama by sending the National Guard to the Texas border to address security problems, and he suddenly finds himself in the cross-hairs of certain Democrats attempting to make hay out of the use of a veto pen. Sounds just a tad fishy, does it not? That’s because it’s complete crap. The Texas grand jury can spend all the time in the world trying to make Rick Perry look like Rod Blagojevich, but there’s no way this one is going to stick.
On the plus side, we’re finding out through this unfortunate incident that Governor Perry may indeed be presidential material after all: you know, since he’s managed to get David Axelrod, Alan Dershowitz, and certain MSNBC commentators on the same page as Ted Cruz, Bobby Jindal, and Jeb Bush. Uniting them is quite an achievement!
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