Perry still not a bad bet for GOP nod

Nate Silver:

The political betting market Intrade, as of this writing, gives Mitt Romney a44 percent chance of winning the Republican nomination. I’ve been pretty bullish on Mitt Romney’s chances of securing the Republican nomination for several months now and I’d probably be a buyer at that price.

But there is another Republican who may be an even better buy: Rick Perry.

Mr. Perry’s Intrade contract has been bid down substantially since Thursday night’s debate. Going into the evening, bettors gave him roughly a 36 percent chance of winning the Republican nomination. Now, his odds are all the way down to 26 percent.

I understand that Mr. Perry had a poor evening on Thursday night. But that seems like an awfully strong reaction to it — probably an overreaction.

One misconception is that Mr. Perry’s standing had been declining in primary polls prior to Thursday evening. This simply isn’t the case, at least not to any degree of statistical significance.

In polls conducted of Republican primary voters between Mr. Perry’s entry into the race on Aug. 13 and his first debate on Sept. 7, he averaged 29.0 percent support. Since then, his support has averaged … 28.4 percent. That is obviously not an appreciable decline.

 (This stands in contrast to polls of general election voters, among whom Mr. Perry’s standing has declined to a statistically significant degree. That may create problems for Mr. Perry over the long-run — but the effects hadn’t yet been apparent in polls of the primary electorate.)

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I think he has a point.  It is too early to write Perry off because of his debate performance.  He still has time to get a new debate coach who can better prepare him for these events.