GOP race starting to heat up

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

The Republican race for the White House is about to accelerate dramatically, with a series of debates and events testing whether Rick Perry has staying power and Mitt Romney can keep focusing on the president instead of his GOP rivals.

September also may settle the field for good, with Sarah Palin perhaps deciding at last whether to run.

Perry, the Texas governor, jolted the party last month by leaping to the top of several national polls within days of joining the race. Now, three scheduled debates in 16 days, the first on Wednesday in California, will show how well he can stand alongside his competitors and field a range of questions.

That opening debate “will be most critical” for Perry because “it will be his first time out,” said Terry Nelson, a campaign strategist who had worked for former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, now out of the 2012 race.

Perry’s entrance has riveted political insiders and led to talk of how Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, should respond. It also siphoned off some of the buzz surrounding Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, a tea-party favorite previously considered by many observers to be Romney’s chief rival.

But GOP strategists warn that it’s very early, and polls at this stage are often poor predictors of what’s to come in next year’s voting to pick a nominee.

“There’s movement all over the place,” said Kevin Madden, an unpaid adviser to Romney and a veteran of several campaigns.

At this stage in the 2008 presidential cycle, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani topped national Republican polls, followed by ex-Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson. Both men faded fast.

Party insiders say Perry can be a potent and resilient contender if he avoids major missteps. They say that polls and anecdotal evidence suggest he can appeal to a crucial swath of Republican activists: deeply conservative voters who place a somewhat greater emphasis on the economy, especially jobs, than on social matters, such as gay marriage.

Unlike Bachmann, a three-term House member, Perry can point to a record of robust job creation as governor. Unlike Romney, Perry espouses a long-held anti-Washington, anti-regulation philosophy that doesn’t leave hard-core conservatives wondering whether he’s a soul mate.

Romney’s response to the Perry surge has been calm and measured. He still points nearly all his criticisms at President Barack Obama.