The Romney campaign's first sortie against Rick Perry was to assure his supporters and financial backers -- and the major, schoolyard-brawl-starved media -- that he's suiting up. It's a bit like dropping warning leaflets on a civilian population before the bombing commences. Anyway, "You’ll see him take it up a notch," a Romney adviser informed Politico.
So how will Romney phrase his assaults? It's inconceivable that he'd need more bullet points -- quite literally -- than the NY Times has already provided. In last Sunday's edition the paper noted that Gov. Perry ...
*"proclaimed that gay marriage was an issue for individual states to decide, but backtracked in recent weeks and now says he supports a federal amendment banning gay marriage.
*"signaled support for various federal actions to restrict abortion rather than leaving the issue to states.
*"used $17 billion in federal stimulus money to balance the state’s last two budgets.
*"accepted a $1 million federal grant last October for planning to carry out one of ['Obamacare's'] key provisions.
*"[personally] received at least $83,000 in federal farm subsidies between 1987 and 1998.
*"[sought] additional federal aid that comes from a presidential disaster declaration.
*"rejected $556 million in federal stimulus dollars for the state’s unemployment insurance program ... [yet] requested that the federal government reimburse Texas $350 million — the estimated cost of incarcerating illegal immigrants in county jails and state prisons in 2009 and 2010.
*"accepted financing for [No Child Left Behind] as governor. This fiscal year, Texas received $2.03 billion.
and *"suggested that frustrated Texans might consider secession."
Finally, there's that mother of all political cretinism: Perry has "called Social Security a failure that was 'set up like an illegal Ponzi scheme.' "
Romney can hurl the points collectively or slice 'em and dice 'em. Either way, for a base whose most intense desideratum is to unseat Barack Obama, they add up to one overwhelming incontrovertibility: Rick Perry is unelectable.