Rick Perry: Texas' Village Idiot

Would be GOP presidential nominee has already demonstrated that when it comes to debating, a mediocre high school debate team member can easily outshine him. Lack of debate skills is bad enough, but Perry seems to be insistent on proving his down right stupid not to mention utterly uninformed. A case in point, Perry told people at a campaign event in Cedar Rapids, Iowa that he did not know the details of the Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas. Even though Perry was governor of Texas at the time of the ruling striking down Texas' sodomy statute (and Virginia's at the same time). An even though Perry has shown that there are few limits to his willingness to prostitute himself to the vilest anti-gay elements of the Christianist/Tea Party base of the GOP. ABC News has coverage of Perry's self-acknowledged ignorance. Here is that story:

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa – Texas Gov. Rick Perry admitted Thursday that he didn’t know about the Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas, a case decided while he was governor which struck down the state’s anti-sodomy law and similar laws in 13 others.

A voter at a meet and greet asked him to defend his criticism of limited government in the case. “I wish I could tell you I knew every Supreme Court case. I don’t, I’m not even going to try to go through every Supreme Court case, that would be — I’m not a lawyer,” Perry said at the Blue Strawberry Coffee Shop here. “We can sit here and you know play I gotcha questions on what about this Supreme Court case or whatever, but let me tell you, you know and I know that the problem in this country is spending in Washington, D.C., it’s not some Supreme Court case.”

In 2003, the Supreme Court deemed Texas’ anti-sodomy law to be unconstitutional in a 6-3 ruling in Lawrence v. Texas, and the case nullified anti-sodomy laws in 13 other states at the same time. Perry, a strong opponent of gay marriage and the ability of homosexuals to serve openly in the military, served as governor when this case was decided.

Asked by Ken Herman, a columnist with the Austin American Statesman, for clarification on whether he knew what the case concerned, Perry responded, “I’m not taking the bar exam…I don’t know what a lot of legal cases involve.”

When told that the Supreme Court case struck down the Texas sodomy law, Perry said, “My position on traditional marriage is clear and I don’t know need a law. I don’t need a federal law case to explain it to me.”

The Texas governor referenced Lawrence v. Texas in his 2010 book Fed Up!, calling it one of the court cases in which “Texans have a different view of the world than do the nine oligarchs in robes.”

Perry had a previous Supreme Court trip up earlier in the month when he misstated the number of justices on the Supreme Court and stumbled over the name of Justice Sotomayor during an editorial board meeting with the Des Moines Register.

Perry clearly isn't a lawyer, and he clearly isn't very intelligent. Indeed, his comments make you wonder who really wrote his 2010 book. Texas is a great state in many ways. Sadly, it seems to have a penchant for electing GOP morons to the governorship over the last two decades.