It’s been a long 12 months for Rick Perry. The governor started 2011 in triumph, at the peak of his political power, with a high gloss on his boots and a national audience of conservatives eager for just the tale he was telling. He ends it treading water.

Texans who gave big money to Kay Bailey Hutchison to try to unseat Rick Perry for governor in 2010 haven’t gelled around a single candidate in the presidential race. In fact, the majority of them seem to still be sitting on the sidelines.

Rick Perry's "oops" moment was costly in our survey of political and government insiders, and we also took soundings on third-party candidates, court-drawn political maps, and the strength of the Tea Party.

It’s not enough to say Washington has gone too far with job-killing regulations and reckless spending. Rick Perry now wants to destroy the nation’s capital as we know it.

Nobody is required to pay attention to you just because you’re running for office. Not the news media, not the money people and not the voters. But where is the line on who’s in and who’s out?

The Justice Department didn't find fault (put an asterisk here) with the Senate and State Board of Education redistricting maps from Texas, but told a federal court in Washington, DC, that it thinks the maps for the congressional delegation and for the Texas House go backwards in minority representation.

A group of Tea Party activists pushing for stricter immigration laws Monday asked Gov. Rick Perry to leave the presidential campaign trail and call the Legislature back into session to tackle a ban on so-called sanctuary cities.

It hurts to be the front-runner in the GOP presidential race. Just ask Gov. Rick Perry. Watch highlights from the CNN/Tea Party Express debate Monday night in Tampa, Fla.

Speaking at the 112th Veterans of Foreign Wars National Convention in San Antonio, GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney took aim at "career politicians" for putting the country in bad shape. It was a thinly veiled swipe at Gov. Rick Perry.

News analysts described Gov. Rick Perry as the Tea Party darling when he announced his bid for the presidency. But at a recent Tea Party gathering in Waco, that status seemed tenuous.

The state senator from McAllen sat down with the Tribune to talk border security, how Democrats move forward after voter ID and what he thinks the upper chamber will look like in 2013.

The state comptroller talks about the flip in her position on abortion, the data breach at her agency this spring, what office she might seek next and how all of the politics of those subjects mix.

Two new political outfits, based in Austin and started by a former legislator who served with and worked for Gov. Rick Perry, will try to rally veterans to the governor's presidential race in Iowa and South Carolina.

Gov. Rick Perry, taking flak from social conservatives, took a step back from his laissez-faire approach to New York’s gay marriage law on Thursday. Now he says it threatens the definition of marriage everywhere, including Texas.

Gov. Rick Perry’s name won’t appear on the key Iowa Straw Poll ballot, but he’ll face a test of his strength among Western conservatives this weekend in Denver in a straw poll of declared and undeclared Republican candidates.

The contentious sanctuary cities legislation debate left a bitter aftertaste for some Texas Latinos, but will it translate into change at the ballot box next year? 

For the latest installment of our unscientific survey of political and policy insiders, we asked what state issues will get national play if Gov. Rick Perry runs for president, how his record will be used for and against him and whether all the attention might affect races here.