PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE: This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus use an image from my favorite sport, golf. Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and a private sector lobbyist. This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

It is not hard to come up with a Top 10 list of problems with Donald Trump. The hard part is to limit the list only to 10.

Normally, in politics, any one of the problems listed below would disqualify a candidate for election, especially for the nation’s highest office. But, on many occasions, Trump appears to get what amounts to a pass.

At least, that has been true until recently when a list such as that below is raising new worries and causing a bevy of Republicans to distance themselves from Trump, declaring him to be unfit for office. Beyond Trump, their concern is that he may take other Republicans down with him, thus ceding control of the U.S. House or the U.S. Senate to Democrats.

Several weeks is an eternity in politics, so anything could happen, including a Trump pivot toward recovery. Plus, Hillary Clinton is not the most attractive candidate as she contends with a number of negatives, including questions about her honesty (which she even underlined recently as she failed again to apologize for using a private e-mail system to risk national security resort to a word – “short-circuiting” – which defies definition) and indications of conflict-of-interest between Clinton as Secretary of State and the Clinton Foundation.

All of that said, here is the Top 10 list re: Trump:

1. He ridicules a disabled individual

2. He ridicules Senator John McCain’s war-time service and POW status

3. He ridicules reporter Megyn Kelly

4. He ridicules parents of U.S. Muslim war hero who died defending this country

5. He aligns himself with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin

6. He compliments Korean dictator Jim Jung-on for his prowess

7. He claims a successful business record that actually was marked by bankruptcies and past-due bills that left others holding the bag

8. The treats women as if they are objects

9. He fails to understand anything about the checks-and-balances system of the U.S. government

10. He disavows any interest in public policy, only contending that he and he alone can solve all problems

As I write this list, I find myself wishing that the campaign for President could be about ideas rather than skewering the other side. For one, how about a debate over the proper role of government in our lives?

To listen to Clinton, she is promising bigger government handouts for almost every imaginable interest group. In a way, Trump did the same in his Republican convention speech in Cleveland.

Perhaps it wouldn’t attract much political attention from the masses, but I’d like to see a candidate advocate, not just for more taxes and higher spending, but, instead for more effective spending of current tax dollars. This would not just be a typical debate over wasteful spending; it would be a debate about getting more bang for our buck.

Naïve, you say. Yes. But a bit of naivete in this current campaign could go a long way to give smart voters something to be for, not just something to be against.