Perry Jumps to First in Two New Polls

It’s a good day for Rick Perry: Two national polls place him firmly at the front of the pack of 2012 GOP presidential contenders. Gallup has him leading with 29%, followed by Mitt Romney with 17%. Poor Michele Bachmann is all the way down in fourth, with 10%, behind a third-place Ron Paul. Meanwhile, Public Policy Polling has Perry leading 33% to Romney’s 20% and Bachmann’s 16%. In both polls, the remainder of the declared candidates are down in the single digits. (In other interesting poll news, Rasmussen shows Paul running 38% to President Obama's 39% in a hypothetical 2012 contest.)

Over at Gawker, Jim Newell points out that Perry also led last week’s Rasmussen poll—but he still doesn’t think Perry should get too excited. “Doesn't this remind you of certain other polls from nearly this exact time four years ago, when another savior was just entering the race?” he writes, recalling Fred Thompson’s 28% lead, which quickly plummeted. On Twitter, Slate writer Farhad Manjoo concurs: “Hey Rick Perry: Four years ago, Fred Thompson led the Republican nomination polls. And in Sept. 2003, Joe Lieberman and Wes Clark were gonna win the Dem nomination.” (More Rick Perry stories.)