AUSTIN — Despite heightened visibility after his commanding re-election victory this week, Gov. Rick Perry today insisted that he will not be a presidential contender in 2012 as he began a two-day round of nationally televised interviews to promote his newly released book, Fed Up! Our Fight to Save America from Washington.
Interviewed by Meredith Viera, co-host of NBC’s Today Show, the 60-year-old Republican governor dismissed Viera’s suggestions that the release of his book his might be aimed at stoking national attention toward a run as president. Viera pointed out that Barack Obama and George W. Bush both published books at the outset of their presidential campaigns.
"So you don't see any scenario where the party is going to come to you and say we need you in 2012 and you would accept?" Viera asked.
Saying he doesn’t see that scenario "at all," Perry responded, "I'm not running for the presidency of the United States."
He also said that he has the world's "greatest job" as governor of Texas and said that the arguments he lays out in his book should be a further illustration that he is not a contender for president. Anyone running for president, he told Viera, is not going to be taking on the issues "with the power that I do."
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