And This is why Rick Perry Didn't Woo The Media

In Rick Perry's 2010 run against Bill White, he fairly scandalized the Texas Media by not once agreeing to sit down with the various Newspaper editorial boards to "seek their endorsement."  When asked about it, he said it was because he knew they weren't going to endorse him anyway, so why bother?  He was excoriated and ridiculed.  And won by (if I recall) ~7 percentage points.

And he was right to eschew the Texas Media, beyond what was absolutely necessary to get his message out.  Here's a contemporary example of what he was dealing with:
Headline: "Perry Ending Calif. Trip Empty Handed- So Far." 

It's also important to recognized that "So Far" is on a second line.  Note the tone of the headline (which is all most people will read or remember): "That loser Rick Perry who thought he could compete when to California to woo businesses and came back empty handed.  Ha!"

Never mind the fact that a business, even a small business, can't just decide to move in 3 days.  Small business people are exceptional, but they aren't miracle workers.  Larger companies take even longer just to make up their minds to move.

Never mind that Texas has already been successful in either wooing businesses away from California all together, or at least into expanding into Texas.

Never mind that apparently Rick Perry was in Governor Brown's head enough, that Brown thought he had to insult Rick Perry, instead of sticking up for his own state's business climate.

Now, all of that is of interest to me, here in Texas.  Why should it interest you outside of Texas? 

Texas is one of the most conservative States in the Nation.  We have plenty of doozies, but our local Democrats tend to be only flirting with insanity, rather than being actually insane.  Rick Perry himself was once a Democrat, back when "Conservative" and "Democrat" went together without hysterical laughter.  Our news organizations tend to reflect that.  Even the very liberal Dallas Morning News can't stomach some of the more blatant bias in, for instance, the New York Times.  If a Republican Governor in a Republican State knows that he can count on the State (and local) Media machines to be hostile, then it's time our national Republicans learned the lesson, too.

John Boehner: MSNBC is not your friend.
Mitch McConnel: The New York Times will never like you.
John McCain: ABC, CBS, and NBC will be glad to use you against other Republicans, but they will never, ever support you.

National Republicans need to take a page out of Rick Perry's book (actually, they need to take several, but one hopeless battle at a time) and start treating the National Media as the Hostile, if not outright Antagonistic actors they are.