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.

I am not sure I need to add my voice to the chorus of those analyzing President’s Trump’s first State of the Union speech, but “need” doesn’t drive this response – “wanting” to provide own comments does.

First, one news outlet even catalogued how many times Trump used a superlative word – a word such as best – in his 80-minute speech, comparing his total with other presidents. Too much analysis, too quickly and too superficial, I say.

Last night after the speech, one of the best pieces of analysis I saw came from Republican consultant Steve Schmidt. With a near frown on his face, he said he thought the speech underscored the fact that were two realities.

One was Trump’s attempt to set a tone of bi-partisanship and cooperation, even though some Democrats appeared to question the veracity of the offer.

The other reality, Schmidt said, was that the speech was given against a backdrop of a year of almost constant tweeting from the president, which continues to threaten almost of all of his accomplishments.

Schmidt, for one, said we should believe the State of the Union only if we see now a different Trump, one who follows up on his pleas for cooperation with the same attitude.

For me, I would add that Trump continues to strike me as an actor on a stage, albeit a reality show stage.

He says and does one thing in the first act and, then, enters the second act without regard to the first.

This time, the first act was Trump’s first year in office when he flouted the normal decorum of the presidency, but went far beyond decorum to lobby grenades via twitter against almost anyone.   To paint the picture of two Trumps, one news outlet last night said his tweets had cast aspersions on 83 Democrats, including Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, whom Trump labeled “crying Chuck.”

As I listened to the speech last night, it was almost as if the first year of the Trump presidency had not occurred. Portions of the speech would have been more appropriate for an inauguration where he called Americans to work together for the common good.

To no one’s surprise, Democrats were not impressed by Trump’s speech.

In one case, Representative Joseph Kennedy, delivering one of six Democrat responses, lamented the “fault lines of a fractured country.” He said the Trump Administration places outsize importance on “your net worth, your celebrity, your headlines, your crowd size. They are turning life into a zero-sum game where, in order for one to win, another must lose.”

Who knows which version – Trump one, Trump two or the Democrat criticism – will carry the day?

For me, I try to remember that a State of the Union speech is only a moment in time, not the full story. That will be written by all us if we aspire to a better America, one inclusive of everyone who shares the American dream.

That includes Trump as we watch whether his daily actions measure up to rhetoric.

Wall Street Journal editorial writers put it this way this morning: “The recurring evidence of the last year is that a disciplined performance like Trump’s on Tuesday’s is no guarantee of future comportment, but his presidency and country will be better off if it is.”

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And this footnote. Several news outlets are reporting that Oregon’s junior senator, Jeff Merkley, still holds aspirations of running for president next time around. That’s hard for me to believe, given my record with Merkley when he was an elected official in Oregon who behaved himself as if he knew every answer to every question and assumed anyone trying to lobby him was bereft of honesty.  Talk about being self-righteous!  On the tube last night, it was interesting, though not surprising, that Oregon’s two senators, Merkley and Ron Wyden, apparently preferred to sit on their hands without offering any support to anything Trump said. Perhaps that’s just what the minority does in all such speeches, frowning all the way.