Texas Governor Rick Perry tells a group that he didn’t even think that the state was in a recession:

The problem for Perry is that Texas is currently experiencing its worse unemployment since the oil-industry bust in the mid-t0-late 1980s. From the San Antonio News-Express: Texas unemployment hits 22-year high in August

The national recession thundered across Texas and San Antonio in August, sending the state’s unemployment rate to a near 22-year high and unexpectedly shaving hundreds of jobs from the local labor market.

Texas’ seasonally adjusted unemployment rate jumped to 8 percent last month, the highest it’s been since the same 8 percent rate was recorded in November 1987 as the state was reeling from the oil bust.

While these numbers are better than states like California (or, for that matter, Alabama) and are below the national average, Perry is playing with political fire to suggest that the Texas economy is untouched by the recession.

The above is the kind of sound bite that opponents dream of having and will make a great commercial.

h/t: The Political Wire.

5 Responses to “Can you Say “KBH Commercial Fodder”? I Bet you Can”

1. Chris Lawrence Says:
   September 19th, 2009 at 4:43 pm

   Indeed, while the economy is far better in Texas than most states (heck, I got a raise this year instead of a furlough), I wouldn’t go as far as to say there’s no downturn here.

2. Life on Mars (Signifying Nothing: hotter than reality by far) Says:
   September 19th, 2009 at 4:50 pm

   [...] on Mars Our esteemed governor apparently thinks there isn’t a recession in Texas. I’ll gladly concede that the economy here is doing significantly better than in many other [...]

3. Chris Lawrence Says:
   September 20th, 2009 at 12:21 am

   Update: no ad yet, but already featured on KBH’s YouTube feed.

4. ABC Says:
   September 20th, 2009 at 9:29 am

   The very sentence before he acknowledges Texas is part of the recession but is forecasted to be the first state out. That context is important, especially when you look at news this week that Austin, McAllen, and some other Texas cities are already officially not in recession.

5. Steven L. Taylor Says:
   September 20th, 2009 at 9:40 am

   ABC,

   That strikes me as spin and doesn’t obviate the potential damage of the key sound bite from the clip.

   And the way it sounded to me was the remark about Texas being the first out of the recession was what led him to comment that he didn’t realized that the state was in one.