Liberals just aren’t good at dirty politics. There is no left wing Karl Rove, or Dick Cheney or even Ann Coulter. When liberals try something dirty they just end up desperately sounding like someone who wants to be the ‘bad cop’ but just can’t manage it.
With that in mind, I have to give DailyKos a little credit for trying to get traction with this “Perry the Porn-Perv” story they’ve been promoting over the last couple of days. I’ll be honest, I hadn’t gotten over the Perry “Niggerhead” story. I still wasn’t sure if that was the name of his old family hunting grounds or a new brothel that Karrine Steffans was starting in Vegas . However, Porn Perry might have an even better run on the Daily Show than the ranch. According to this Kos post Rick Perry invested millions of dollars in Movie Gallery which was the largest porn distribution company in the country and was at one point the target of protests by the conservative American Family Association which is now supporting his campaign.
This sounds wonderfully hypocritical on the part of Governor Perry and could sink him politically, but DailyKos is forcing the issue somewhat. Movie Gallery was a large national chain of video stores just like Blockbuster and Hollywood video used to be, the only difference is that they were the only national chain that carried porn movies. This allowed parents to slip into a back room and get a copy of “My Baby Got Back #36” while their kids rented “Finding Nemo” for the hundredth time. To be fair, investing in Movie Gallery doesn’t make Perry anymore of a porn monger than buying “Back to Black” made you complicit in Amy Winehouse’s drug problems, but the press likely won’t make that distinction. There is a bright side for Governor Perry though: this isn’t the first time Porn and Politics have come together, the most popular porn DVD in 2008 was a happy mishmash of the two, I’m pretty sure that now he can score an endorsement from Lisa Ann.
This article originally appeared on Politic365.com.