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.

Some of you could ask why, at this Christmas season, I choose to wrote a blog on something other than Christmas joy. Good question.

But…

As we prepare to enter the New Year, there have been a number of good quotes worth remembering as various columnists reflected on current events. They also commented on prospects for 2018, the second year of the Trump administration.

So, as director of the Department of Good Quotes Worth Remembering, I am opening the department again.

From a Wall Street Journal column by Kimberley Strassel: “To read all this coverage, you’d be justified in believing that the entire Republican Party had been hit with a stupid stick. Its members united to jack up the taxes of millions of middle-income voters, throw the country into recession, and saddle today’s toddlers with a future debt crisis—all to enable the transfer of tax plunder to fat-cat donors. And not only did it pass this colossally idiotic policy, it did so enthusiastically, in full view of the public—guaranteeing a 2018 GOP midterm wipeout. What dimwits!

“This is the Democratic line, and the media is embracing it. Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi bet that the GOP would fail to enact tax reform, so they pressed their members to boycott negotiations. Instead, Republicans are delivering bigger paychecks and the prospect of accelerated economic growth, and not a single Democrat can take credit. The Democratic Party’s only path is therefore to spin an obvious GOP victory into a disaster. The press, with all its biases and insularity, once again is all in, with another attack on reality.”

Comment: This is another indictment of the current Washington, D.C., especially on part of Democrats. Rather than get around a table with Republicans to produce a solid tax reform proposal (for the first time in more than 30 years), the D leaders “pressed their members to boycott negotiations.” The good news is that Republicans prevailed anyway.

I could add that both Republicans and Democrats have played this “I will not be involved game.” The Rs did so when the Democrats and President Barack Obama passed ObamaCare without one Republican vote. The Rs did it this time around with tax reform.

I suggest that both bills – ObamaCare and tax reform – would have been better if they would have represented bi-partisan achievements.

From a Wall Street Journal column by Peggy Noonan: “The president thinks this kind of thing (the post tax reform party at the White House where Trump basked in the glow of “his” achievement) makes him look good. It doesn’t, it diminishes him: Keep the buffoon happy. Here is what would make him look good, and elevate him: normal human modesty. If he modestly waved off the praise, shut it down, said, ‘Please, let’s talk about the bill and how it will help our country . . .’

“He would look bigger, as modest people always do, and his praisers would not look smaller.”

Comment: Instead of talking about the benefits of the tax bill for the American public, Republicans fawned over Trump. Of course, that’s what Trump’s wants – fawning.

In the new year, all of us ought to hope for two things – first, that Republicans will set about to sell their tax reform bill on its merits, and second, that they’ll stop catering to the president’s desire for continual praise.

More from Noonan: “And the bill is going to prove popular. The Democrats bet wrong on this. Almost immediately on passage, Wells Fargo and Fifth Third Bancorp announced a raise in their lowest wage to $15 an hour. AT&T said it would give about 200,000 unionized workers a $1,000 bonus and increase capital spending $1 billion. Comcast said it would give 100,000 employees bonuses and spend more than $50 billion in infrastructure improvement.”

Comment: It’s hard to argue with various corporate actions in the wake of passage of the tax bill. Sending money to thousands of employees tended to counter comments from Democrat leaders that the only beneficiaries would be corporate fat cats. Was this only a public relations gambit? Who cares? The actions represented real money in the pockets of real people – and there is more to come.

From Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker: “Not only has the president’s frequent ‘fake news’ defense against any story he dislikes helped codify the idea that the media, especially CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post, seek only to misinform, but this strategic deception has created a volunteer class of the arrogantly ignorant.

“While such consistent dishonesty is annoying, my greater concern is for the future of the republic. The health of our democratic system of government relies at least somewhat upon a reasonably well-informed citizenry. When truth is relative, facts are fungible and the loudest voice wins the day, why, anyone really can become president.”

Comment: As usual, Parker digs beneath a label such as “fake news” to underscore the implications of the Trump criticism of anything with which he disagrees. To decry the Trump tendency as a risk for our democratic system of government, she uses good phrases such as “the arrogantly ignorant,” “facts are fungible,” and “loudest voice wins the day.”

That’s Trump’s world. Not mine.

From a column in the Oregonian by John Kitzhaber, former Oregon governor: “I agree that funding for the Oregon Health Plan is a shared social responsibility, but jeopardizing health insurance coverage for 350,000 Oregonians to make that point is equally unfair and unnecessary. Let’s put this into perspective. We need a stable, long-term — and equitable — funding strategy for the health plan, which contributes to the state’s chronic structural budget deficit. As The Oregonian correctly pointed out, the governor and legislative leadership failed to address either issue. But defeating the ballot measure will only make it that much more difficult to do so in the future.”

Comment: Interesting that Kitzhaber, still operating under an ethical cloud from his fourth (not to mention short) term as governor, is trying to emerge by going on record on health care issues, his area of expertise. Also interesting that the Oregonian, which called for his resignation, is giving him a platform when, it could be condtended, he doesn’t deserve. Still, Kitzhaber accurately describes what’s at stake as Oregonians face a vote to confirm hospital and insurance taxes to fund low-income health care. He contends, properly I think, that defeating the ballot measure will make it more difficult to establish a better funding mechanism down the road.