EL PASO DISSED: GOVERNOR'S MISSTATEMENTS HURT

Say it once and it may be a slip of the tongue. Say it twice and
you're dissing your constituents while trying to make a point.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry had to have known, you'd think, that bombs
related to narco violence in Juarez are not exploding in El Paso.

But he's said they are -- twice now.

El Paso's battle has not been amid drug cartels fighting each other
and government forces in Juarez. Our battle has been to convince the
rest of America we are, indeed, the second-safest large city in the
U.S. and it's safe to come here as a tourist or for business purposes.
We want people to come here to live.

Perry has been at odds with the Obama administration over the federal
government's handling of border issues -- from illegal immigration to
illegal narcotics trafficking. He has been right to do so. The feds
have been lax in those areas. And Perry has resorted to using state
money to help make the Texas border safer.

But he was way overboard, at the expense of El Paso's good name, when
he told Fox News, "You've got bullets hitting City Hall in El Paso.
You've got bombs exploding in El Paso."

Bullets from Juarez did hit City Hall earlier this summer. They arced
over the Rio Grande from less than a mile away, but were not related
to any incident on this side of the border.

We laud the governor for taking border security issues under his wing
at a time the federal government is slow to do so.

But we feel he used El Paso, perhaps because we're tucked away in a
bottom corner of the U.S. map, to try and ram his point home.

Had he said it only on Fox News, then it's more believable that a
campaign spokeswomen would say, "He knows bombs are not going off in
El Paso."

But then he said it again Friday in Laredo.

We are the 22nd-largest city in the U.S. We are the nation's
second-safest big city. We fight for recognition. And as Mayor John
Cook said, "(Perry's statements) makes my job a little more
challenging."

The perception we're amid the Juarez narco violence is untrue, but
real. People in other parts of the country think that.

Perry did harm to the name and the goals of El Paso by trying to make
a point to the nation that the federal government isn't doing its job
of protecting our southern border.

Of course, he knew bombs aren't going off in El Paso.