Pataki vs. Perry?

Lack of enthusiasm drawn by the Iowa Freedom Summit this month suggests a possible return to the “classics.” Nine of the Iowa speakers intend to run for president in 2016. At the time, the classics category contained only two, who did not attend: former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-Fla.) and 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney, who just announced he is not running again for president. If attention turns now to the old standards and denies the upstarts, the classics field must be expanded. Competition must be brought in. Time to call up former New York Gov. George Pataki (R).

{mosads}The Iowa summit could be looked at as the first editing process of the 2016 election. Those who sallied forth might in hindsight be considered left behind. The results could suggest that it is time for conservatism to return to the classics represented today in the Jeb Bush factor, based primarily on the legacy of his father, President George H.W. Bush.

Pataki, governor of New York for three consecutive terms from 1995 until 2006, expressed an interest in running for president in 2012 and this month formed a super-PAC to explore a presidential bid in 2016.

“Obama’s government-controlled healthcare significantly jeopardizes jobs, our economy and our children’s futures by spending $1 trillion and adding $600 billion in new taxes on families and businesses,” said Pataki back then. “ObamaCare represents an unprecedented overreach of the federal government into the lives of individuals and tramples on the Constitution as evidenced by 19 states filing suit against the federal power grab.”

This is the language of the Tea Party, which many at the Iowa summit would agree with. The difference is that this comes from one of the most successful and proven governors in the post-war period.

In order to clarify things as the races succumbed to media drift, influenced no doubt by “American Idol,” I devised “Quigley’s Grading Scale of Presidential Candidates” in 2008 and 2012 which attempted to bring it all back home by grading candidates as you would cheese or maple syrup at a New Hampshire state fair. Top category was: governor of a big state. (Meaning the four “initiative” states: New York, Massachusetts, Texas and California.) This year, only former former Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) and George Pataki fall into this category. (Bush falls into the third category, governor of a smaller or secondary state. And very few candidates in recent years have approached the last category, “just anybody,” which included variously stand-up comics, masked lucha libre wrestlers and Charlie Sheen.)

The Iowa Freedom Summit might have been a touchstone event. The future of America, rising in the West in particular, might have awakened there. It did not. But in time the West will rise in influence.

Perry had a brief encounter with Pataki at a New York restaurant recently.

“Rick, you are a great friend, you were a great governor,” Pataki said to him. “If in fact the two of us are roaming through the snow in New Hampshire together next January, there is no one I will be prouder to stand next to than [Gov.] Rick Perry.”

A Perry/Pataki primary would for the first time in a long time ride the contours of our expanding history as Texas, the Southwest and the West advance America to a new East/West economic and cultural paradigm. Both distinguished governors understand the importance of this transition.

Those who do not could bring disaster.

Quigley is a prize-winning writer who has worked more than 35 years as a book and magazine editor, political commentator and reviewer. For 20 years he has been an amateur farmer, raising Tunis sheep and organic vegetables. He lives in New Hampshire with his wife and four children. Contact him at quigley1985@gmail.com.