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Texas has created a lot of jobs over the 10 years that Rick Perry's been governor -- there's no doubt about it.

Perry, who formally launched his presidential candidacy on Saturday, is making his state's economic prowess a centerpiece of his campaign. Already he's been bragging about his state being the "epicenter of job growth."

Texas has gained more than 1 million net new jobs in the decade Perry has led the state. And it's been going strong since the recession ended.

But that doesn't mean that all is well with employment in the Lone Star State. Texas leads the nation in minimum-wage jobs, and many positions don't offer health benefits. Also, steep budget cuts are expected to result in the loss of more than 100,000 jobs.

Perhaps most importantly, Texas can't create jobs fast enough to keep up with its rapidly growing population. Since 2007, the state's number of working-age residents expanded by 6.6%, nearly twice the national average.

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Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who just announced he's running for president, has taken a different tack. A week before announcing his candidacy, he led a prayer meeting for evangelical Christians in Houston.

In any case, Gov. Perry's decision to make his Christian faith a central part of his political identity opens him up to questions not usually asked of presidential candidates.

The press has traditionally been unwilling to question politicians about their religion. But in Perry's case, Christianity is front and center on his platform. I hope David Gregory will ask him some of the following questions when he next appears on Meet the Press, and that other members of the media won't shy away from them either.

First, are Rick Perry's political positions in line with Christ's teachings?

I see a fundamental inconsistency between Perry's concerted opposition to government social programs and his promotion of himself as a Christian politician. When asked about the impact of Texas's low-tax, low-service policies on the poor, he suggested that people who wanted more government services could find them in New York or California.

Christ teaches us to feed the hungry and care for the sick, not to abandon them. Perhaps Gov. Perry hasn't read that part of the Bible where Christ admonishes us to care for "the least among us."  

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Since moving to the Big City, it has been my observation that, just like "mainstream" media, "mainstream" churches are now bastions of Leftism.

(Leisher @ Aug. 16 2011,08:58)

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Finally, who is more likely to fill a church on Sunday, blue collar union guys or people who live in gated communities? Churches are simply pandering to their audiences.

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A day after appearing to outshine Michele Bachmann on her home turf in Waterloo, albeit with some tough rhetoric aimed at President Obama, Rick Perry might have gone a bit too far in criticizing Obama and even the Federal Reserve while campaigning in Iowa yesterday. For Texans, this is typical Perry. But for Americans who do not know him, it's eyebrow-raising rhetoric. In fact, he sounded more like Trump or Gingrich. "I think the greatest threat to our country right now is this president trying to spend his way out of this debt," Perry said last night in Cedar Rapids, per NBC’s Carrie Dann.

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Perry, who earlier this week accused climate change scientists of manipulating information for financial gain, doubled down on his skepticism that manmade phenomena are affecting the world's climate.

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Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann's campaign said Monday she was only joking when she described Hurricane Irene and last week's earthquake in the eastern United States as a warning from God.

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And earlier Wednesday, Jason Tomsci, a Carson aide, said the congressman’s sentiments were valid. “Members of the tea party are holding up a lot of things that the president wants to do and want to gut critical services and programs that they know are important to African Americans as well as Latinos and other minorities,” Tomsci said.