Perry's 'giddy' speech goes viral

AUSTIN (KXAN) - It's Governor Rick Perry like we've never seen him. At least that's what some are saying - after a weekend speech in New Hampshire went viral.

"You know, we're kind of into those slogans, man,” he said to the audience at the Cornerstone event. “Live free or die. Victory or death. Bring it."

A YouTube version of the video brought headlines media phrases like: “a bit giddy,” “unusual,” “bizarre,” and “rambling and, at times, incoherent.” It has even drawn comparisons to the Howard Dean scream.

"Write your checks,” Perry said. “Gold is good. If you've got any in the backyard. If they print anymore money over there in Washington, the gold's going to be good."

"That's a good rendition of Gov. Perry,” said Linda Yarbrough, an Austin voter. "Approachable and warm."

"His speech is sort of slurred," said Mike Beaty. "He sort of drifts from being on point. He does it in the debates all the time."

This comes as a new University of Texas and Texas Tribune poll shows voters in his home state do not even rank him at the top of the GOP presidential contenders. Businessman Herman Cain edged Perry out by one percentage point 27-26, but they are virtually tied within the margin of error.

Jim Henson with the Texas Politics Project warns voters not to take the short clips of Perry's speech out of context. The  version most are seeing runs little more than eight minutes , while the entire speech was about 25 .

"Once there's an impression made, and that impression becomes viral, and it's not so much the video but the read of it,” Henson said. “Then you've got to work doubly hard to try to undo it."

So far, the Perry campaign has told the Huffington Post in an email that "The Governor is passionate about the issues he talks about."

And with more than 200,000 views in its first few days, the bigger economic message in the viral video is one Perry wants voters to know. So, all of the attention might actually be to his benefit.