I thought of Rick Perry...

...and his potential candidacy this morning when I read a piece in the Times about the victim of a hate crime in Texas. (Really, it must be a godforsaken place.) Here's the part that caught my attention (my emphasis):

Q: What was the extent of your injuries?

A: There were 38 pellets in my face. I couldn’t open my eyes or talk or open my jaw. I couldn’t even eat or drink anything. It was very painful to even swallow because I was shot in my throat. After a few hours in the hospital I could open my left eye. My face was heavily swollen. There were gunshot wounds. My face was horrible. I couldn’t believe it was my face. I prayed, “Please God, give me my face back.” ( Mr. Bhuiyan was discharged the day after being treated; he was told he did not have health insurance. For the next several months, he slept on people’s couches and had to rely on physicians’ samples for medication, including painkillers and eye drops. He had several operations on his right eye; he now has only limited vision in it.)

And I thought, do we really want a president who was the governor of a state with 25 percent uninsured, the highest in the nation? Is that supposed to be a good thing? How could that possibly be preferable to the Affordable Care Act, which I assume a President Perry would want to repeal?

What planet are these Republicans living on?