I don't like Perry, but I like cheap shots even less...

  by Roland Hulme

 
Rick Perry has enough stupid policies to defend; without the media putting words into his mouth. 

Yahoo! were flirting with dirty rumors of their own here.

Lynn Sherr, from Parade magazine, recently interviewed Republican presidential contender Rick Perry.

During the course of the interview, matters turned to the 2012 presidential campaign and the current occupant of the White House. It seemed almost inevitable that this exchange would take place:

Governor, do you believe that President Barack Obama was born in the United States?

I have no reason to think otherwise. He's the President of the United States. He's elected. It's a distractive issue. 

You might be mistaken for thinking that Perry delivered a cut-and-dried dismissal of the persistent "birther" rumor - the one that claims President Obama was born in Kenya; and is not a "natural born citizen" of the United States, as is required by the constitution to become president.

But Yahoo! took it another way.

In a delicious overwrought piece of character assassination, they printed the following lead-in pictured above; casting Perry as a member of the wildly discredited "birther" movement.

Now, I have plenty I don't like about Rick Perry; but I feel the need to jump to his defense in this matter. Perry says enough stupid stuff on his own with Yahoo! deciding they need to add fuel to the fire. This "angle" on the Rick Perry interview is misleading, deceitful and untrue - and they should be ashamed of themselves for trying to leverage it.