On November 9, 2011, Texas governor Rick Perry stood on stage at a Republican presidential debate broadcast by CNBC from Oakland University in Michigan. He said he would eliminate three federal agencies. He named Commerce and Education. Then he could not name the third. He said: “I can’t. The third one I can’t. Sorry. Oops.”
The missing agency was the Department of Energy. Afterward Perry said: “I stepped in it, man.” The Texas Tribune called the moment perhaps the greatest embarrassment yet in a series of missteps.