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.

On this day, as analysts across the board try to interpret results of elections in Virginia and New Jersey – elections that may portend a wave of Democrat victories in the coming mid-term elections – it is worth looking at more good quotes.

So, the Department of Good Quotes Worth Remembering, one of the departments I run as director, is open again.

From Holman Jenkins in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ): Yelp does not give two hoots about Russia. Yelp’s problem is having to compete with Google in providing online reviews while depending on Google for traffic. News stories incriminating Google and Facebook for transmitting “fake news” are written by reporters whose amour propre is offended by fake news nearly as much as their paychecks are undermined by it. Bottom line: Skepticism is an endlessly useful quality to cultivate.”

Comment: Jenkins’ last sentence is a particularly good one. Skepticism is a solid trait to possess in this day of fake news and other mindless campaigns to win supporters. But should skepticism yield to cynicism? I say no. Stay skeptical.

From WSJ editorial writers:  “Mr. Trump tried to distance himself from the defeat by tweeting from Asia that ‘Ed Gillespie worked hard but did not embrace me or what I stand for.’ Don’t forget, Republicans won 4 out of 4 House seats, and with the economy doing record numbers, we will continue to win, even bigger than before!’ “Sometimes Mr. Trump’s comments are so transparently false you wonder if he’s laughing as he writes.”

Comment: For Trump, it’s always about him – all the time. He endorsed Gillespie, but, when Gillespie lost, it was because, Trump says, “he didn’t embrace me.” No, the consensus of many analysts is that Gillespie’s loss amounted to a repudiation of Trump in the minds of Virginia voters.

Daniel Henninger in the WSJ:  “Ed Gillespie is the canary in the mine shaft for Republican politics. We’ll push that further: Virginia is the canary in the mine shaft for all of American politics.

“Years ago, coal miners who worked down amid the dangers of carbon monoxide would keep a caged canary nearby. If the canary looked dead, the miners got out. The big difference for our comparison is that while miners are smart enough to recognize toxic gas, our two political parties are not. The American people are the canaries.”

Comment: I have to confess that, while I heard the canary line before, I didn’t know its derivation. As Henninger described it: “Years ago, coal miners who worked down amid the dangers of carbon monoxide would keep a caged canary nearby. If the canary looked dead, the miners got out. The big difference for our comparison is that, while miners are smart enough to recognize toxic gas, our two political parties are not. The American people are the canaries.” From Henninger, a well-honed image.

More from Henninger:  “For Democrats, political identity is by now well-established as a function of one’s race, gender or sexual self-definition. Refined further, a Democrat is a ‘person of color’ or a ‘woman’ or a ‘transgender’ person. Those who don’t qualify for a category keep mum. From these identities, flow many streams of potential violations, slights and transgressions justifying political action against ‘them.’  The Democrats’ not unreasonable takeaway from Virginia will be that identity politics works, so do more of it.”

Comment: The point is that, so far in this country, “identity politics” works. There is not enough evidence to spot a trend, but the early indications no doubt will not be lost on Democrat strategies heading toward the mid-terms.

Still more from Henninger:  “The Republicans’ political identity, if the media consensus is to be believed, is almost wholly a function of some inchoate white anger also directed at ‘ them.’   Donald Trump won the presidency because he mined white anger at the margins against a different “them” of immigrants and globalization, meaning the whole wide world is arrayed against whatever it means to be a “white male” in 21st-century America.  The Republicans’ logical takeaway from Virginia should be that in competitive election venues their political anger has bigger numbers than your anger.”

Comment: Republicans ought to figure out some other way to build credibility with voters that trying to use just anger. That’s what Trump did in his election, now about a year in the rear-view mirror. Going forward, there should be something other than just anger.

From Michael Gerson in the Washington Post:  “Political commentators are supposed to be somewhat objective and analytical when it comes to tracking trends. In that spirit, I find the polling snapshot of President Trump at one year since his election to be interesting — if ‘interesting’ is defined as a downward spiral of polarization, pettiness and prejudice that threatens the daily functioning and moral standing of the American republic.”

Comment: Gerson used the last phrase in his piece to indicate how far “we” are groveling toward the bottom, sometimes in our conduct individual-to-individual, but surely in our tolerance of politics that heads toward the basement.  Gerson says both parties, Republicans and Democrats, are exhausting themselves, which leads me to opine that it may be time for a third party – one that capitalizes on a move to middle where the best solutions lie anyway.