AUSTIN - In the theater that is politics, Texas Gov. Rick Perry seemed to have had a successful run this week.

He snagged a long-sought meeting with President Obama on border security, even got the president to agree with his concerns. He toured the border in gunboats and armed choppers with Sean Hannity, a Fox News talk show host and darling of conservative Republicans, who pronounced him the frontrunner for the 2016 Republican presidential race.

Far from his famous "oops moment" that helped tank his 2012 national primary race, he appeared on top of his game on national news shows, prompting GOP consultant Matt Mackowiak to tweet on Friday: "The comeback continues!"

But will it be enough to get Texas' longest-serving governor back in national contention for the GOP presidential nomination, should he decide to run?

"He certainly appears to be trying to correct his image from 2012 - both from forgetting the third agency he wanted to abolish to coming across as pro-immigration for illegal immigrants' children," said Alan Abramowitz, a political scientist at Atlanta's Emory University who has written several books on national politics. "But it's a long way from 2016, and it also remains to be seen whether voters across the country want another Texan as president."

Perry's aides insist he was doing his job as governor through his activities highlighting the border crisis, not posturing for another national race. Press statements issued by his office stressed the importance of securing the border, where officials say the state is spending about $1.3 million a week on a law-enforcement surge as thousands of unaccompanied children continue to show up, most of them from Central America.

National headlines

The issue continues to make national headlines, as has Obama's refusal to tour the border to see the crisis first hand, as Republicans and members of his own party have demanded.

"It's making for great video theater ... and Perry has been projecting leadership," said Larry Sabato, the founder and director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. "He can now start off with the statement, 'I stared down the president. ... He wasn't even going to come, and I got him to meet with me.' He got Sean Hannity to come to the border, and that's great video that I'm sure we'll see again in 2016.

"He gives every indication" that he will run, he added.

Other potential GOP contenders weighed in to support Perry's calls for Obama to address the border crisis, including U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who sent road maps via Twitter showing Obama the way to the border from Dallas and Austin, the president's two Texas stops. In some early polls, Cruz leads Perry as a possible presidential contender.

On Perry's side in the ongoing war of words are recent polls showing that Americans overwhelmingly support stopping illegal immigration, and that nearly half of voters think the Obama administration has prompted the humanitarian crisis through lax enforcement. Several polls suggest most Americans believe the undocumented children should be sent home.

While Sabato and other political watchers say they expect Perry will continue to burnish his image by pushing for action to solve the border crisis, they doubt it will pay off for him in the long run.

"He's got a lot of rehabbing to do on immigration," said Bob Wickers, a California political strategist who guided the 2008 GOP presidential primary campaign of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and worked on Mitt Romney's unsuccessful 2012 run against Obama. "It's like (Agriculture Commissioner) Todd Staples in the lieutenant governor's race ... who voted for tuition for immigrants. He got religion later, yes, but the base never got past that.

"Perry's in the same situation. He's been all over the map on this and other issues."

Wickers is now a top strategist to state Sen. Dan Patrick, the GOP nominee for lieutenant governor.

'Pitch perfect in Texas'

Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said that while the border crisis may have returned Perry to national prominence "on an issue he is comfortable with ... it probably doesn't help his overall resurrection a lot."

"He may be pitch perfect in Texas, but outside of Texas he mystifies," Jillson said, citing Perry's comments in California last month comparing homosexuality to alcoholism. "Border security is an issue he can continue to ride for some time, but foreign policy and national security are another matter."

Even so, with the GOP presidential primary so far away and with so many possible candidates considering their options, Sabato said the real issue is who can win the general election, not just the GOP primary.

"He may be thinking, 'If I can just win the nomination, President Obama is so unpopular that I can win the general election,'" Sabato said. "But why would voters give Perry a do-over? That is the real question."

Out-of-state tourists touring the state Capitol on Friday seemed to echo that sentiment.

"Sometimes, the nice people of Texas with their guns and extremely conservative views are a little scary to some of the rest of us, frankly," said Cherie Becker of Milwaukee, who identified herself as an independent who voted for Romney in 2012. "You are next to Mexico down here ... were once a part of Mexico. Why is everyone so hateful about immigrants?"

Longtime Perry supporters like Steve Stephenson of Austin said Perry is spot-on about the border crisis, and he thinks the governor's view is beginning to resonate nationally.

"Never count Rick Perry out," Stephenson said. "He's the comeback kid."