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.

To almost no one’s surprise, Democrats in Congress – at least in the House – are pushing to propose a so-called “Medicare for All” proposal in the next Congress.

The reason, apart from political momentum coming out of the recent mid-term elections, is that the D lawmakers plan to capitalize on a Texas judge’s ruling against ObamaCare to jump start their push for a single payer system in the next Congress.

They don’t want to wait for another judge, or even the U.S. Supreme Court, to overturn the Texas ruling. They want to move ahead on their own, even with an uncertain end in Congress.

So, bring on the single payer system, another example according to humorist Dave Barry in his annual Year End Review, of “Congress Continue to spend huge amounts of money that we don’t have.”

I suspect single payer advocate Senator Barry Sanders doesn’t give a lick about too much government spending.

Sanders and other supporters of a single-payer health system are arguing that now is the time to start moving in a new direction from the Affordable Care Act, in part because they feel the 2010 health law will never be safe from Republican attempts to destroy or sabotage it.

“In light of the Republican party’s assault, a version of Medicare for all is necessary for the future,” said Topher Spiro, vice president for health policy at the Center for American Progress. “There are just too many points of vulnerability in the current system.”

The court decision in Texas that invalidates ObamaCare in its entirety came on the heels of sweeping Democrat victories in the midterm elections, a combination that has energized advocates of “Medicare for all.”

I have opined on health care policy so often that I am bit hesitant to do so again.

Still, it is important to consider health care issues from the standpoint that, even if it’s a long stretch, I continue to hold out hope that reasonable Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle – yes, there are some – can find a way to carve out the smart middle ground rather than just propose a full D or a full R program.

That should have happened by now, but in the Obama years, Democrats were so eager to put a pelt on the wall that they proposed the “Affordable Care Act” even though some of them had not even read the bill before they voted for it.

In retaliation, Republicans, when they were in complete charge of the Congress, could see no other approach than to kill the existing law.

No middle ground and we end up with nothing that works for most Americans.

Even as advocates fawn over it, the single payer system won’t work. For one thing, if Democrats in the House pass it, Republicans in the Senate, who are still in charge there, will just not consider it.

Why not do what I have advocated for years? Get smart people from both sides in the same room, sit around a circular table, and build a health care system that will last – and not further break the U.S. government dollar bank.

In a statement for hill.com, Representative Debbie Dingell, D-Michigan, said this: “We need to do everything we can to ensure every single American has access to affordable, quality healthcare. Medicare for all has the potential to do just that as it can reduce the complexity and cost with a single payer health care system.”

Yet, Dingell doesn’t say so, but the effort could very well create divisions within the Democratic Party, as leaders who want to protect and strengthen the health law are reluctant to completely embrace government-run universal health insurance.

The lawsuit in Texas is almost certain to be overturned, they argue, and their time is better spent making sure people with pre-existing conditions remain free from discrimination by insurers.

Oregon’s own senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) said Democrats should focus on making sure the insurance landscape doesn’t revert to what it was before ObamaCare.

“The first thing we have to do is make sure people don’t lose what they have today — the pre-existing conditions protections — and going back to the days when there was health care for the healthy and the wealthy,” he said.

Well, with all due respect to my friend Senator Wyden, his first step is not the only step that should be taken.

To those who believe I don’t have ideas about health care reform, let me just reiterate what I think should be the underpinning of any new health care legislation: A government mandate that, in order to be alive in this country, everyone would have to buy health insurance.

Think of it like automobile insurance. In order to drive, you have to buy insurance and, if you don’t, you pay a price.

The same should be true of health care. If you want to live there, you should have to buy insurance, which would put all of us in the insurance pool – and the larger the pool, the better to spread the risk.

Of course, any smart legislator would have to design an element of any plan that would provide insurance – say, an extension of Medicaid or Medicare – to cover those who have no money to buy insurance.

A country like ours should be able to build a good system that has the potential to surmount the left, which says government should pay all, or the right, which says government should not be involved at all.

Find the smart middle.

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.

A news report on a proposal from Oregon Secretary of State Dennis Richardson to create a new, less expensive state government procurement system deserves more than quick consideration – the kind it got about a week ago.

So, I write this blog to highlight what I consider to be a far-sighted proposal.

Richardson, whom I lobbied for years at the Capitol when he served as a state representative from Central Point, always has possessed a penchant for going beneath the surface to ask tough questions.

My interchanges with Richardson occurred when I lobbied him in his role as a key member of the Joint Ways and Means Committee, which, at the Capitol in Oregon, develops the two-year budget for state government. His deep dives did not always produce a workable concept, but at least they were dives – and that was often more than you could say for some of Richardson’s counterparts on Ways and Means.

Now, as the only Republican to hold a statewide public office, Richardson is going deep again in an issue related to state government’s multi-million dollar procurement policy.

Under this headline – Oregon is wasting millions of dollars — here is how the Oregonian newspaper described the Richardson proposal:

“If Oregon had used a web-based procurement program in the last biennium, it could have saved more than $1 billion, a state audit has found.

“The state’s purchasing system for goods and services consists of paperwork and old computer systems, which auditors said resulted in inconsistencies and ‘does not adequately analyze state spending data’” Of roughly $8 billion in spending per biennium, auditors said the state has data on approximately $1 billion or 12.5 per cent of the purchases.

“They estimated Oregon could have saved $400 million to $1.6 billion if it had a modern procurement system in place during the 2015-2017 biennium. For example, the state paid 17 different prices for one type of multifunction printer and 131 different amounts for surge protectors.”

Richardson then went on to make a key political point. He said “adoption of a statewide eProcurement system, if quickly implemented, could close Oregon’s 2019-21 budget gap of $623 million without raising taxes.”

My emphasis on the word “without.”

Richardson, without getting too political, was countering a proposal by Governor Kate Brown to enact various new taxes in 2019-21, both to close the supposed $623 million budget gap, as well as to give more money to priorities she avows for Oregon K-12 schools, housing and other subjects.

For her part, Brown has suggested the Legislature approve $9.7 million for the new procurement system. That would cover the cost to implement the system by mid-2021, although a Department of Administrative Services spokeswoman said there would be additional costs in the future such as licenses to keep running the system.

Richardson offered to help Brown put the new system in place more quickly.

I like Richardson’s proposal because it does what many state officials won’t do, which is to analyze, with a critical eye, current state spending. Often, the idea is just to continue spending from one two-year budget period to the next and, then, when that isn’t enough, score points from the left by advocating new taxes, including increased taxes on Oregon businesses.

To be fair, there could be a rationale for new taxes, especially if they are designed to spur improvements in such key areas as K-12 education quality, which itself is critical to citizens and businesses.

But, those tax increase proposals would be stronger if they followed critical looks at state spending first, not just spending as usual.

So, kudos to Richardson and his staff of auditors for coming up with an idea to improve the operation of state government.

Here’s hoping that Richardson’s proposal will receive a solid airing in the 2019 legislative session.

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.

Democrats are setting out to blame President Donald Trump for the shutdown.

Republicans are setting out to blame Democrats.

Guess what?

No one wins, at least in the mind of this citizen who also writes this blog, as well as many others who want government for the benefits of citizens.

I say that after watching TV yesterday to see Congress meeting, but not doing anything. Why are they there if they are not intending to do anything about the shutdown?

Of course, Congress needs the president to negotiate. It is not possible to negotiate with yourself and the president is in no mood to find middle ground. Negotiating with Trump is like negotiating with jello.

At least for that reason, leading House Democrats say they won’t negotiate with Trump until he lands on a position and stays there. That, in turn has prompted some Republicans to blame Democrats for pulling out of negotiations.

One bad turn deserves another. Stupid!

Leon Panetta agrees with me – or perhaps I agree with him. Remember Panetta?

He was budget director and White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton and defense secretary and CIA director under President Barack Obama. He served eight terms in Congress representing California.

Panetta wrote a piece for hill.com and the Washington Post that suggested there are five lessons from previous shutdowns that no one – not Trump, not Congress – has learned.

He begins his piece this way:

“When budget negotiations broke down between President Bill Clinton and the Republican Congress in late 1995, a shutdown of the federal government occurred during the Christmas holidays. Republicans in the House, under Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Georgia), insisted on greater savings and cuts from Medicare. Clinton refused.

“As the president’s chief of staff, it was obvious to me that the longer the shutdown went on, the more the public blamed the Republicans. On January. 6, 1996, the Republicans relented when Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kansas), the majority leader, passed the appropriations bills without the cut to Medicare and the House went along. But the political damage was done.

“Since that time, the leaders of both parties have recognized that shutdowns are a bad way to do the country’s business. And yet, time and time again, the lessons from those shutdowns are never learned. Today, parts of the federal government again are shut down during the Christmas season, and the same mistakes are being made — particularly by the president and the Republican majority in Congress.”

Of course, Panetta is a Democrat, so some will discount his analysis, especially as he participates in the same game he pillories — blaming someone, this time Republicans. But, in any event, here are his five never-learned lessons:

• Harming people never works
• The more you blame others, the more the public blames you
• Negotiations are impossible without trust
• Never negotiate in public
• If the president fails, Congress must lead.

Panetta ends his piece by asking this good question:

“In our democracy, we govern either by leadership or by crisis. If leadership is willing to take the risks that come with the responsibility of power, we can avoid crisis. If not, we will inevitably govern by crisis. There are no winners in a prolonged shutdown. As the midterm elections made clear — those who fail the nation will not only lose the trust of the people, they will likely lose the next election.”

Here are a few perceptions from me in my post in the cheap seats out West:

1. The easiest and quickest answer would to be to meet in the middle. Congress has about $1.5 billion in budget bills for the wall. Trump wants $5 billion. How about $3 billion? Too simple, you might say. Agreed. But meeting in the middle is what almost everyone does almost every day.  Think of union negotiations. One side starts high. The other starts low. The end always is somewhere in the middle.
2. Trump and the parties in Congress don’t know how to negotiate. Each side just wants to beat the other sides, not negotiate. And, then the public continues paying the bill.
3. In the way of a pet peeve, so-called “non-essential” employees will be subject to the shutdown, at least initially. Perhaps this is just a simple case of a bad label, but guess what? If a government position does not fulfill an “essential function,” why does that position exist in the first place? Just asking.

So, why aren’t the President and Congress negotiating from the standpoint of the public interest? Who knows? Both deserve equal blame.

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.

The headline on this blog is borrowed from a piece in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), a commentary which underscores the mercurial, unpredictable nature of the person who currently sits in the Oval Office.

As I write about Donald Trump again, I feel a little like Dana Milbank, a columnist for the Washington Post who has made a living for more than two years now, lofting huge criticisms at the so-called “leader of the free World” nearly every day – criticisms often warranted. But I wish an opinion columnist like Milbank would find other targets once in a while. He is literally making a living off Trump.

I don’t join – or want to join Milbank – though I believe Trump’s recent conduct deserves disdain.

So, I rely on a column by William Galston in the WSJ that describes Trump’s conduct in words that create a profound sense of uncertainty for the rest of Trump’s term or terms, however long that is.

Galston’s column used this subhead: Allies can’t work with the U.S. unless they can trust it to follow through on promises. Then, he went on:

“In a telephone call about Syria two weeks ago, President Trump reportedly told Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, ‘You know what? It’s yours. I’m leaving,’ upending his administration’s strategy and setting in motion events that culminated in the resignation of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.”

Galston says Trump’s behavior reminds us of some ancient truths we often take for granted.

“When we make a commitment,” he writes, “those who trust it make decisions that they would not otherwise have made. They may risk their fortunes, their honor and even their lives, relying on our word. If we break it, they may lose everything. And when they do, we are responsible.”

At least initially, Mattis persuaded the president to hold off the Syria withdrawal for six months. National security adviser John Bolton then took the lead in crafting a Syria strategy with three objectives—defeating Islamic State, establishing a new Syrian government, and inducing the Iranians to leave. Taken together, these goals implied the presence of U.S. troops.

In September, Bolton and other officials announced this new policy and assured all parties that it enjoyed the president’s support. There was no reason to doubt their sincerity, which made Trump’s declaration last week even more shocking, according to Galston.

The withdrawal will abandon Syria’s Kurds, who have borne the brunt of the battle against Islamic State, to the tender mercies of the Turks, who view them as terrorists. It will expose Syrians in Idlib and elsewhere to renewed attack from Bashar Assad’s forces. It will leave the Israelis face-to-face with the threatening Iranian presence in Syria. It betrays everyone who relied on the word of the U.S. And it hands a major victory to Vladimir Putin, who sees Syria as the linchpin of his effort to restore Russian influence in the Middle East.

“It is possible, Galston continues, “to suppose that Trump does not understand the difference between the government of the U.S. and a family business, and so does not understand why his mercurial behavior inflicts so much damage. When you are in charge of the executive branch, you cannot do everything on your own. You need an orderly policy process and senior officials who can implement the results of this process. These officials cannot be effective unless they can credibly claim to be acting on your behalf and with your support.

“When your national security adviser announces that a policy enjoys your imprimatur, the world will take him at his word—unless you contradict him and pull back the policy. Silence implies consent.

“An orderly policy process is also a president’s best protection against nasty surprises. During such a process, all arguments for and against a proposed policy will be aired, and the likely reactions of different groups with a stake in the outcome can be anticipated. The president is then in the position to make a considered judgment that objections cannot easily destabilize.”

Trump doesn’t care about decision-making processes in a huge institution — the federal government and specifically the White House. What he says is THE TRUTH.

He made a campaign promise that the U.S. was going to get out of Syria, so, unexpectedly, he makes good on that promise without a shred of thought for how the departure would or should occur.  Often, to put a phrase on it, the how matters as much as the what.

Trump telegraphed U.S. intentions to ISIS which continues to fight U.S. soldiers, he literally risked the lives of those soldiers, and he didn’t care about a variety of U.S. international relationships.

Back many years ago, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F. Kennedy sent former Secretary of State Dean Acheson to show photos of the Russian sites to Charles de Gaulle. The French president did not look at the pictures. “The word of the president of the United States is good enough for me,” he said.

Can one imagine a world leader today taking President Trump at his word?

I can’t.

Footnote: Or, for another example, consider Trump’s curious actions in defense of “his wall.” If you were a Member of Congress, it would be impossible to negotiate a resolution with Trump, unless you capitulated to his every whim. It’s like negotiating with jello. Push it one way, it springs out the other way.

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.

Over the last few days, we have endured another batch of Trump’s “tweets” in which he skewers everyone but himself at this Christmas season, saying he is “alone in the White House,” though, to be fair, he jetted off to Iraq to visit troops just after Christmas, his first visit to a war zone as president.

Give credit for doing what presidents do at Christmas time, which is to visit either military troops in the field or in Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, D.C.

As for being alone, my reaction is, frankly, I don’t care?

It is Trump who has isolated himself through of series of “decisions” – if you can call what Trump makes “decisions” – that put the country at risk.

If you aren’t careful, Trump’s diatribes could make you sick at the Christmas season. And that’s not worth it.

All of this led me a couple days ago to read a dispatch from a Washington Post reporter, Phillip Bump, who performed a solid journalistic service by going deep on Trump’s proposals for “his wall.”

More journalism these days should follow this model. It’s not reporting on the never-ending “horse race” in politics or considering all of Trump’s “tweets” to be news. It is analyzing, based on facts, the notion from Trump that “his wall” would protect this country from folks he considers beneath him. Call them immigrants. Or, from drug dealers.

While I give Bump plaudits for his enterprise, here is a summary of what he wrote.

“For probably the first time in American history, part of the government is shut down for lack of funding because of a dispute over a construction project.

“President Trump, as you may have heard, promised during the 2016 presidential campaign that he would solve most of America’s immigration problems and many of its other issues by building a wall on the border between the United States and Mexico. This wall was going to be paid for by Mexico, he claimed, an assertion that was never believable. More believable: That the wall was going to be made of concrete slabs, a point he made in some detail on the trail.

“There was a problem, though, that also crept into his rhetoric. Trump warned drug dealers, stymied by the wall, would simply throw bags of drugs over the top of it, potentially killing anyone walking on the other side. So, he said, the wall needed windows or, somehow, to be transparent.

“Which brings us to Trump’s tweets about the barrier as the government was grinding to a halt. No longer would the wall be concrete planks, he said, but instead ‘artistically designed steel slats.’ There you are. An artistic steel-slat wall.”

Bump then does some math. The fence is a little taller than five stacked SUVs (an image of a car the Trump administration has used to indicate the size of the wall) — or, if we consider the spikes to be separate from the fence, the fence is a bit shorter than the five cars.

Now, it’s just simple algebra, Bump writes. The slats are slightly wider than the gaps in the image — meaning that they are in real-life, as well. By Bump’s calculations:

• The slats are about 10 inches wide.
• The gaps are nine inches.
• The fence is 341 inches tall — or about 28.4 feet — with 13-inch spikes on top.

The combined width of the slats and gaps is just over 19 inches. How many slats, therefore, would be needed, Bump asks?

He answers. The border is about 1,954 miles long. About 580 miles already have fence of some type. Assume that all the rest, regardless of terrain, would be getting the slat barrier.

There are about 1,374 miles to cover, but that excludes ports of entry. There are 48 on the border now. The largest is at San Ysidro, near San Diego.

Bump uses the Ysidro entry to estimate a maximum size of the gap needed to be left in the wall for ports of entry, which yields, he says, 7.2 miles of the border belonging to ports of entry, this leaving 1,366.8 miles for the rest of “Trump’s wall.”

The result? The U.S. would need about 4.6 million steel slats to cover that ground. At a height of 28.4 feet and a presumed thickness of one inch, each slat requires a bit less than 2 cubic feet of steel. For all of the slats, there would be a need for about 9 million cubic feet of steel.

Ironically, CNBC has reported that steel is a lot pricier than it was a year ago, thanks to the tariffs Trump imposed on foreign steel. At the beginning of 2018, this barrier would have cost 25 per cent less.

The crux of the question: Would the dimensions actually be something that would work to keep out people, as well as illegal drugs?

It clearly wouldn’t do much about the latter. Most drugs that cross that border illegally already come through ports of entry, smuggled in vehicles or on people crossing legally. What’s more, a barrier with nine-inch gaps seems like it might allow for pretty easy transfer of bulky packages, without having to throw them 28 feet in the air to clear the wall.

Also, a nine-inch gap wouldn’t necessarily keep people out.

It’s possible, I’ll admit, that Trump’s illustration (the one he is using to indicate what he hopes to build) isn’t meant to be a specific representation of the actual size of the barrier. But, as of writing, this is all moot anyway.

There’s no money to build the wall coming from either Mexico or the United States at this point, though, incredibly, Trump continues to contend that Mexico will pay for at least part “his wall.”

So, as much as Trump is hinging his presidency on getting “his wall,” it would not do much to stem the flow of either immigrants or drugs from Mexico to the U.S. Sure, he promised a wall, but, then as now, he didn’t know what he was talking about.

He was doing just what he always does, which is emote from the seat of his pants and hold everyone to the notion that he – and only he – knows the answer to every question. So, do what I want, Trump says, or go to hell.

Don’t call Trump a chief executive or president! Call him nuts!

NOTE: I post this on Christmas Day, which is appropriate because it is important for all of us to remember the real purpose of Christmas. Family fun, presents and Christmas lights are great. But the real meaning of the day and season is memory of when Christ came to earth as a baby to provide a way of salvation for all of us, if we CHOOSE to accept him. So, if you read this, read it with the meaning of Christmas in mind – the real meaning as it affects you where you are.

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 attended a presentation earlier this fall where the speaker made what, for me, was a very salient point.

When you consider just the size of our galaxy, he said, not to mention hundreds of others, you have to come to a belief that it did not all happen by chance and that God created it. Note the words “you have to come to a belief.” I suppose, on occasion, someone could come to an opposite belief, contending that everything happened by chance and that there is no godly order to the universe.

Some could question the speaker’s use of the phrase “you have to come to a belief” because that implies that there is not a choice. There is.

For me, I believe in God’s handiwork, but can I prove beyond a shadow of doubt that God is the creator? No.

What matters in all of this is that individuals must come to a position where they believe in God, a decision which involves things they cannot see or touch. They have to come to this decision on their own. The inverse is also true – individuals could come to a decision not to consider whether God exists or to reject any notion that he does, on their own.

Let’s go back to our galaxy for a moment or two.

It’s no secret that the Milky Way is big, but new research shows that it may be much bigger than we ever imagined.

The research, described in the journal “Astronomy & Astrophysics,” indicates that our spiral galaxy’s vast rotating disk of stars spans at least 170,000 light-years, and possibly up to 200,000 light-years.

It’s hard – I say impossible — to fathom just how far that is.

If you could ride a light beam from one side of the disk to the other, it would take 200,000 years to span the distance. If you could drive across and averaged 60 miles an hour, it would take more than 2 trillion years. That’s about 150 times greater than the age of the universe, which is estimated to be about 13.8 billion years.

There are many other reasons to come to a belief that God exists, but just this one, for me, defies judgment on some other basis than that a higher power – God – created it. To believe somehow that this galaxy – and all others beyond it – just came into being strikes me as fanciful.

In the book, A Case for Christ by Lee Strobel, the author makes, as the title says, “a case for Christ.”

Here is the way Strobel puts it.

“It’s like this. If you love a person, your love goes beyond the facts of that person, but is rooted in the facts about that person. For example, you love your wife because she’s gorgeous, she’s nice, she’s sweet, she’s kind. All these things are facts about your wife, and therefore you love her.

“But your love goes beyond that. You can know all these things about your wife and not be in love with her and put your trust in her, but you do. So the decision goes beyond evidence, yet it is there also on the basis of the evidence.

“So it is with falling in love with Jesus. To have a relationship with Jesus Christ goes beyond just knowing facts about him, yet it’s rooted in the historical facts about him. I believe in Jesus on the basis of the historical evidence, but my relationship with Jesus goes way beyond the evidence. I have to put my trust in him and walk with him on a daily basis.”

That’s true for me. I believe God created the universe, and, as well, sent his Son, Jesus, to us as a way to bridge the chasm between us and God and, thus, have a relationship with God. Jesus was, in fact, God on earth.

This appears to have been true for President Ronald Reagan. In a letter to his father-in-law recently uncovered by the Washington Post, Reagan wrote this, speaking of Jesus: “It was ‘a miracle’ that a young man of 30 years without credentials as a scholar or priest had more impact on the world than all the teachers, scientists, emperors, generals and admirals who ever lived, all put together.”

“Either he was who he said he was or he was the greatest faker and charlatan who ever lived. But would a liar and faker suffer the death he did?”

With Reagan, I believe in Him and that means that I will live with Him forever in heaven, another fact that requires belief, not proof. While here on earth, I can have a relationship with him that relies on his grace, not my own performance.

Those who know me know that I cannot sing a lick. I couldn’t carry a tune in a wheelbarrow. Yet, the words of songs and hymns often capture my thoughts better than I could on my own.

Here is a good example.

Trying to fathom the distance
Looking out ‘cross the canyon carved by my hands
God is gracious
Sin would still separate us
Were it not for the bridge His grace has made us
His love will carry me

The cross that cost my Lord His life
Has given me mine
There’s a bridge to cross the great divide
There’s a cross to bridge the great divide

Good words, well-used: “God provides a bridge across the great divide. God provides a cross to bridge the great divide.”

Reflect on these and your own thoughts on this Christmas Day and season. And come to your own personal decision whether God exists and, if you believe he does, what that decision means for you in terms of a relationship with Him.

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.

In an article in the Washington Post, Matt Potter, an expert on resignation letters, got it just right when he opined on the letter written by U.S. Department of Defense director Jim Mattis.

“The artful resignation,” Potter wrote, “has more to say than just goodbye — it can start a trend.”

The plot thickened over the weekend as President Donald Trump, irritated over the positive publicity Mattis got as he resigned, told him that he, Mattis, would leave earlier than planned – be gone as of January 1, 2019.

Trump’s new chief of staff Mick Mulvaney told ABC’s “This Week” that the president and his defense chief “just could never get on the same page” on Syria, adding that Trump had said since his presidential campaign that “he wanted to get out of Syria.”

Asked whether Trump wanted a Pentagon leader willing to challenge him or someone in lock step with his views, Mulvaney said “a little bit of both.”

“I’ve encouraged him to find people who have some overlap with him but don’t see the world in lockstep with him,” Mulvaney said.

Back to Potter, the resignation letter expert, who says Mattis’ letter starts ominously, “with a frosty disregard for White House form.”

Other letters, including one from H.R. McMaster as he resigned his post as national security adviser, had been “thankful to Trump for the opportunity to serve him and our nation.” Former attorney general Jeff Sessions, unceremoniously asked to resign, had managed this response: “Thank you for the opportunity, Mr. President.”

But in Mattis’ letter, there’s a gaping hole where the addressee, Trump — who lives for public flattery — should be.

“I have been privileged to serve as our country’s 26th Secretary of Defense,” Mattis wrote, “which has allowed me to serve alongside our men and women of the Department in defense of our citizens and our ideals.” His words conspicuously avoided any expression of delight, honor or gratitude toward the president.

There’s more from Mattis, which goes to the heart of his reasons for resigning.

“My views on treating allies with respect and also being clear-eyed about both malign actors and strategic competitors are strongly held and informed by over four decades of immersion in these issues. Because you have the right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours on these and other subjects, I believe it is right for me to step down from my position.”

No one saw the letter as anything but a stinging protest over various Trump actions, including on matters of the military without, apparently, even asking for Mattis’ input.

That included Trump’s appointment of a new military Chief of Staff (not Mattis’ proposed pick), Trump’s unilateral decision to leave Syria where ISIS still remains alive and fighting, and a number of Trump decisions to turn his back on long-standing international alliances, including those that could oppose Russian and Chinese initiatives.

Potter says Mattis’ “Dear Boss” letter sits squarely in a military tradition that letters do not have to cater to a chief executive’s craving for adulation.

Potter continues: “It is a reckoning and a duty, at whatever cost. It may have been a surprise to us and, one must imagine, to Trump — no secretary of defense had ever resigned in protest. But it was not a surprise to Mattis. Most striking throughout his letter is the avoidance of even the most boilerplate terms of esteem or loyalty toward the president. With Trump’s craving for personal fealty from former employees — something of a lifelong obsession (and a sore spot right now, as he fumes on Twitter about his former lawyer Michael Cohen turning “rat”) — Mattis’ choice of words, and silences, would seem to represent some of the subtlest and most carefully pointed trolling imaginable.”

Mattis letter also appears designed to show Trump, pointedly, how leadership should be done and what dignity and discretion look like.

Mattis’ mature move – get out of the way for Trump when he, Mattis, disagrees with the president too often – could have two effects. One is that it could enable Trump to do more of what he always does without restraint, which is to move unpredictability through the thicket of international relations, thus risking America’s security.

Or, the resignation could prompt serious reflections on Trump’s management of the presidency, something he knows little about except when he emotes on Twitter, his favorite mode of communication in a world that deserves more.

Only time will tell. And a foreboding thought is that there are at least two more years of the Trump in the Oval Office.

 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.

The other day I was asked by my friends in the “senior golf group” at Illahe Hills Golf and Country Club to summarize new golf rules, which will take as of January 1, 2019.

I was asked because I had taken a recent United States Golf Association (USGA) and Royal & Ancient (R&I) seminar on the new rules, which were several years in the making.

As a friendly critic, I say the seminar would have been better if two things were done: (1) There should have been a summary of the major rules issues you could encounter on the golf course, not on all of the minutia; and (2) the presentations could have focused on explaining the rules, not just using a power-point presentation to put the actual rules language on the screen, then reading the lines with only a little interpretations

For the senior men, I might not have been the best person to prepare the summary. Others at my club know more about the rules as I do.

But I took on the task and what follows is a brief summary about what I wrote.

2019 GOLF RULES EXPLANATION/The United States Golf Association (USGA) and the Royal & Ancient (R&I) in Europe have spent several years revising official golf rules, including reducing the number from 34 to 24 and re-writing many of the rules in more up-to-date language. Still, the rules remain complicated, which owes at least to the fact that the game is played in the outdoors, not inside a stadium or pavilion.

For regular golfers, the best approach is to get a copy of the “Player’s Edition of the Rules of Golf” (effective as of January 1, 2019.) As was the case with old Player’s Edition, it is small and can be carried in your golf bag. Order it from the USGA through its regular website.

List of Major Rules You Might Encounter (in no priority order):

• You can now leave the flagstick in the hole whenever you want – no penalty
• In a nod to the Dustin Johnson issue at the 2016 U.S. Open, if your ball or ball marker is accidentally moved on the green, no penalty
• You can now fix any mark on a green (a spike mark), not just a ball mark
• If you don’t like to play in bunkers, you can now take the ball out, with a two-stroke penalty; and removing loose impediments is allowed  [This is one of the most interesting new rules if only because a phrase in the rules about what golfers are now allowed to do in a bunker enshrines this incredible language – you are now allowed “to pound the sand in frustration or anger” after hitting a bad shot from a bunker.]
• You now have three minutes to search for a lost ball, not five
• In a penalty area (formerly called a “water hazard”), you do not receive a penalty if you happen to touch the ground inside the area as long as you don’t use your club forcefully to improve your lie
• If you damage your club in the course of play, you are now allowed to continue using the club which might no longer meet equipment standards
• When taking a drop, you now do so from knee height, not shoulder height
• If you think or know you have hit a ball out-of-bounds, a local rule, if enacted, allow you to play the ball from where it went out or back on that spot and a line to the tee, with a two-stroke penalty
• No penalty now for hitting a ball twice with one swing

One last point: Rules should not get in the way of enjoying golf. Some rules could help golfers in playing the game, but the focus, in any event, should be on enjoying the game and friendships.

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.

There is a lot of talk in Washington, D.C. about prospects for impeaching President Donald Trump.

In fact, for Democrats, soon to be in charge of the U.S. House, it may be more than just talk. For Republicans, who knows, but it is important to add that Republicans in the U.S. Senate would have to vote to convict if the House chooses to indict. [See below for more on the impeachment process.]

Quickly, impeachment is a word not well understood these days. The bottom line is that it is essentially a synonym for indict. If the U.S. House of Representatives votes to move ahead on impeachment, it is to bring an indictment.

There will be some arguments against heading toward impeachment, especially with an uncertain outcome, not to mention the toll on the country. But, at the same time, some House members who will be in charge of the impeachment process, if there is one, appear to believe Trump’s alleged crimes are serious enough to warrant moving forward.

In a column in the Washington Post, Michael Gerson, one of the best writers going today, put it this way:

“As Mueller time approaches (a reference to the coming repot by special counsel Robert Mueller), it is likely that President Trump’s defense will consist of two phrases: ‘But that is not illegal’ and ‘But that is not impeachable.’

“It is a strategy that prevails by the lowering of standards. Because Trump did not plot election fraud directly with Russian President Vladimir Putin by Skype, and because Trump’s various crimes and misdemeanors do not constitute high crimes and misdemeanors, we should consider the president vindicated. Unable to make the case for his own virtues, Trump must aver that his vices are commonplace and inconsequential.”

Gerson continues using telling words:

“…When all this evidence is stitched together in a narrative — as Mueller’s report will certainly do — the sum will be greater than the sleaze of its parts. Russian intelligence officials invested in an innovative strategy to support the election of a corrupt U.S. businessman with suspicious ties to Russian oligarchs. The candidate and his campaign welcomed that intervention in public and private. And the whole scheme seems to have paid off for both sides.

“For the rest of us, the deal hasn’t worked out so well. A deeply compromised American administration has been unable to effectively counter a direct attack on our democratic institutions by a hostile foreign government — responding to a digital Pearl Harbor with a wink and a nod. ‘This is an existential constitutional crisis,’ says historian Jon Meacham, ‘because it’s quite possible that the president of the United States right now is a witting or at least partially witting agent of a foreign power.’

“Some of us are still too shocked to process this. The United States seems to have gone from zero to banana republic in no seconds flat. But whether this transformation has been illegal, it must be impeachable — or else impeachment has no meaning.”

Consider me shocked with many others in America – not newly shocked, but continuing to be shocked by the over-the-top conduct of the nation’s president.

And, to borrow Gerson’s excellent phrase, “the sum (of what Mueller reports) will be greater than the sleaze of its parts.”

Still, it is important to understand the ins and outs of the impeachment process, even though many of us observed the process when President Bill Clinton was impeached, but not convicted.

To gain some answers to questions, I reviewed a New York Times article that was written in mid-2017, but remains largely on point today.

What is impeachment? The Constitution permits Congress to remove presidents before their term is up if enough lawmakers vote to say that they committed “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Only three presidents have been subjected to impeachment proceedings. Two were impeached but acquitted and stayed in office: Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998 and 1999. A third, Richard M. Nixon in 1974, resigned to avoid being impeached.

What is the process? First, the House of Representatives votes on one or more articles of impeachment. If at least one gets a majority vote, the president is impeached — which essentially means being indicted.

Next, the proceedings move to the Senate, which holds a trial overseen by the chief justice of the Supreme Court.

A team of lawmakers from the House, known as managers, play the role of prosecutors. The president has defense lawyers, and the Senate serves as the jury.

If at least two-thirds of the senators find the president guilty, he is removed, and the vice president takes over as president.

What are the rules? There are no standard rules. Rather, the Senate passes a resolution first laying out trial procedures.

“When the Senate decided what the rules were going to be for our trial, they really made them up as they went along,” avers Greg Craig, who helped defend Clinton in his impeachment proceeding and later served as White House counsel to President Barack Obama.

For example, Craig said, the initial rules in that case gave four days to the Republican managers to make a case for conviction, followed by four days for the president’s legal team to defend him — essentially opening statements. The Senate then decided whether to hear witnesses, and if so, whether it would be live or on videotape. Eventually, the Senate permitted each side to depose several witnesses by videotape.

What are the standards? The Constitution allows for the impeachment and removal of a president for “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” But no controlling authority serves as a check on how lawmakers choose to interpret that standard, which makes it as much a question of political will as of legal analysis.

In the case of Clinton’s trial, for example, Robert Byrd, a Democrat senator from West Virginia at the time, told his colleagues that he thought Clinton was clearly guilty of perjury, but that removing him from office was a bad idea.

“To drop the sword of Damocles now, given the bitter political partisanship surrounding this entire matter, would only serve to further undermine a public trust that is too much damaged already,” he said. “Therefore, I will reluctantly vote to acquit.”

What about the 25th Amendment? Adopted in 1967, the 25th Amendment provides another mechanism for removing a president. It is geared toward dealing with a president who becomes too disabled to carry out the duties of the office, as opposed to presidential law breaking.

Under its procedures, if the vice president and a majority of the cabinet tell Congress that the president is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office,” the vice president immediately becomes the acting president. If the president contests that finding, but two-thirds of both chambers of Congress side with the vice president, the vice president remains the acting president for the rest of the term.

After all this, my view is that Trump deserves to be impeached in the U.S. House and convicted in the U.S. Senate. With Michael Gerson, I say “the sum of what Trump has done will be greater than the sleaze of its parts.”  So, reasonable citizens — I include myself under that label — deserve to see impeachment and conviction.

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.

The Department of Bits and Pieces is one of three departments I run with a free hand to do what I want to do and say what I want to say. The others are the Departments of Pet Peeves and Just saying. So, her goes with Bits and Pieces, which, among other things, means that I just want to cite the point quickly, make comments, and move on without writing a lot.

PURDUE UNIVERSITY REFORMS: President Mitch Daniels is receiving a number of plaudits these days for his initiative to reform the way the university does business with its customers – read “students.”

Among his initiatives – he is a former federal government budget director under President George W. Bush, so he knows what he is doing when it comes to budgets – are efforts to reduce the huge debt load that students often incur to complete a higher education degree.

One example is a plan to link what students owe to what they will make when they graduate.

Not surprisingly, from higher education’s ivory towers, Daniels’ initiatives have come under criticism from faculty members. This from a letter to the editor from a Michigan resident that appeared in the Wall Street Journal:

“University faculties possess an ingrained suspicion of, if not disdain for, any president who isn’t a ‘club member,’ meaning a lifelong academic. On top of being an outsider, Daniels is a conservative, a toxic mark in academia, where an entitlement mindset prevails that keeps delivering to insiders without any need for demonstrating sensitivity to ‘customer’ costs.

“More than a mere cost-cutter, Daniels has enhanced Purdue’s reputation as a top-tier university and has been a determined champion of free speech on campus. His model of leadership ought to be emulated at colleges across the country to return savings to students. Yet, despite these accomplishments, be assured most university presidents and faculty yearn for Daniels’s failure and ignominious exit.”

Comment: Daniels deserves high praise for bringing a sense of financial discipline to Purdue. His approach ought to provide lessons for other presidents around the country.

HOUSE SPEAKER PAUL RYAN DEPARTS: Outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan never explicitly mentioned President Trump in remarks to mark the end of his, Ryan’s, term. But he bemoaned the divisiveness that has been a hallmark of Trump’s relentless, bitter denunciations of his political opponents, almost always on Twitter.

“All of this gets amplified by technology, with an incentive structure that preys on people’s fears, and algorithms that play on anger,” he said. “Outrage has become a brand.”

He said combativeness “pulls on the threads of our common humanity in what could be our unraveling,” and he conceded that he didn’t know how to fix the problem.

Comment: Ryan deserves substantial credit for his three years as House Speaker, though he admits that he didn’t achieve many of his hallmark initiatives to reform entitlement spending. He came into the Speaker’s Office with a laudable record of advocating such initiatives from cogent public policy perspectives, but, when he came up against Trump and an ever-changing Republican party, he couldn’t get done what he wanted to get done. His job was a lot like herding cats.

HEALTH INSURANCE DEBACLE: A key element of the current legal fight surrounding the so-called Affordable Health Care Plan is the individual mandate, which requires Americans to acquire health insurance.

Under the original law, those who failed to comply with the requirement would have faced a tax penalty. But, in 2017, Congress passed a law that revoked the tax penalty, making the individual mandate essentially toothless.

Texas and 18 other states then sued, arguing that the revised law was still unconstitutional because of a legal principle called “inseverability” — the notion that some parts of a law are so intrinsic to other parts that invalidating one invalidates the others. Sixteen other states intervened in defense of the ACA.

Then, last week, a Federal Circuit Court judge ruled that, if the mandate was not in force, the entire law had to go down the drain.

Comment: Stupid decision! I suspect it will be overturned somewhere along the line, but the decision left health care policy in this country in limbo – again, or perhaps still.

As I wrote in a blog earlier this week, my proposal for health care reform would start with an individual insurance mandate. Without that, no insurance pool would work.

Think of it like car insurance. It you drive, you have to buy car insurance. In the same way, if you live, you should have to buy health insurance.

SPEAKING OF STUPID: Past and probable future Speaker of the U.S. House Nancy Pelosi uttered an incredible sentence when the Affordable Health Care plan was under consideration in the House she led in 2010.

Her quote: “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.”

Comment: Who knows what new bill Pelosi will want to pass without reading it.

OREGON GOVERNMENT SPENDING: Secretary of State Dennis Richardson showed up this week with a proposal that he said would avoid the need for new taxes for the 2019-21 state government budget, which will be the responsibility of Governor Kate Brown and the Oregon Legislature.

According to the Oregonian newspaper, here is a summary of Richardson’s proposal:

“If Oregon had used a web-based procurement program in the last biennium, it could have saved more than $1 billion, a state audit has found.

“The state’s purchasing system for goods and services consists of paperwork and old computer systems, which auditors said resulted in inconsistencies and “does not adequately analyze state spending data.” Of roughly $8 billion in spending per biennium, auditors said the state has data on approximately $1 billion or 12.5 per cent of the purchases.”

The auditors estimated Oregon could have saved $400 million to $1.6 billion if it had a modern procurement system in place during the 2015-2017 biennium. For example, they said, the state paid 17 different prices for one type of multifunction printer and 131 different amounts for surge protectors.

Comment: Good work by Richardson and his auditors, even as, publicly, he continues to fight a brain tumor. I continue to hope that, instead of just turning to new taxes, the state’s political leaders, including Democrats in the Governor’s Office, the House and the Senate, will look at current spending and find places to cut or operate more efficiently.

It should not be just tax and spend. It should be, review spending with a critical eye, then and only then, if a consensus can be produced, impose new taxes.

The e-government purchasing deal is exactly the kind of initiative frugal spenders ought to employ.