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 grist for this mill these days if only because the federal government shutdown is in its third week.

That, of course, provides “opportunities” for many to comment, from the left and from the right. The reality is that no one wins the political battle over blame in a shutdown.

All of the parties – President Trump and his minions on one side and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her dutiful servants on the other side – look like what they are, which are juveniles not up to the challenge of leading this country.

That said, this, remember, is one of three departments I direct with a free hand to operate as I see fit. The two others area the Department of Pet Peeves and the Department of Just Saying. Items below could fit in any of the three departments.

I lead with the shutdown.

From the Washington Post: Trump administration officials are making an urgent case that the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border has reached a crisis level, laying the groundwork for President Trump possibly tp declare a national emergency that would empower him to construct a border wall without congressional approval.

With the federal government partially shut down amid his stalemate with Congress, Trump will attempt to bolster the administration’s position Tuesday by delivering a prime-time televised address to the nation from the Oval Office — the first of his presidency. He will then travel Thursday to visit the nation’s southern border.

“There is a humanitarian and national security crisis,” Vice President Pence told reporters Monday, a line that he and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen repeated several times. Pence also said he expected attempted crossings by undocumented migrants to “dramatically increase” as winter gives way to spring.

Such a move would be a fraught act of brinkmanship at the dawn of a newly divided government, sparking a firestorm with House Democrats and certain challenges in federal courts. But Trump believes forcing a drastic reckoning by executive action may be necessary given the Democratic resistance and the wall’s symbolic power for his core voters, officials said.

Comment: Remember my basic point: Nobody wins a shutdown. If Trump conjures up an “emergency powers” resolution – as he might do in a nationwide TV address tonight — he will just play into the hands – and politics – of Pelosi who is likely to respond in court, as well in the court of public opinion through more investigations of Trump.

From the Wall Street Journal: Margaret Thatcher famously said the problem with socialism is that you “always run out of other people’s money.” The trouble with resisting socialism is that until the money runs out, free-spending progressive policies are remarkably seductive. Their appeal comes from what economists call lying prices: advertised prices that don’t reflect the full cost of what you’re buying.

When prices lie, people make bad choices—especially when they think something is free. Take rush-hour commutes. We jump in our cars hoping for a quick trip only to find the streets clogged; with access priced at zero, demand exceeds supply. Absent a price signal to encourage carpooling or other alternatives, we creep, beep and waste huge amounts of time and fuel. Transportation consulting firm Inrix tallied up the cost of this waste in a study last year, calculating that $305 billion of value was burned in traffic across the U.S. in 2016, with the typical Los Angeleno wasting more than $2,800.

For many politicians, lying prices are actually a goal. Policies that set dishonest prices or fudge budgets can fuel the growth of government and lure voters leftward. Senator Bernie Sanders and his socialist followers use such sleight of hand to obscure the vast costs of proposals for “free college” and “Medicare for all.”

This from a summary of Sanders’ plan: The spending figure for Sanders amounts to 10.7 per cent of GDP in 2022 when the plan kicks in and then up from there. National defense—routinely derided as too expensive and wasteful—is a mere 3 per cent of GDP today. And brace yourself: Doubling all currently projected federal individual and corporate income tax collections would be insufficient to finance the added federal costs of the plan.

Comment: The Wall Street Journal is right to emphasize the sham of inaccurate costs as left-wing Democrats, led by Sanders and would-be president Elizabeth Warren, campaign for ever-more government spending. Remember, there is no free lunch.

Perhaps the most egregious example of fake pricing comes from the Sanders’ “Medicare for All” program. It would literally break the federal bank, but Sanders could care less as he touts his socialism.

From Wall Street Journal editorial writers: House Democrats are up and running, and their first bill is instructive. Couched as an anti-corruption and good-government measure, it is really an attempt to silence or obstruct political opponents.

A central part of H.R. 1 is “campaign-finance reform,” no surprise given the progressive fixation with money in politics, which oddly turns to mist when Tom Steyer or Mike Bloomberg are spending. The House bill requires some advocacy groups to publicly disclose the names of donors who give more than $10,000, even if the groups aren’t running ads that endorse candidates but merely inform voters about the issues.

Comment: No surprise here. The Ds, under Pelosi, produce their first bill while being in charge of the U.S. House. It is not a solid piece of public policy. Instead, it aims to get-even with the Rs.

More from the Wall Street Journal: “Democrats profess to be upset with Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib for daring to say in public about Donald J. Trump what they all think in private: “We’re gonna go in there and we’re gonna impeach the mother—.”

Apparently, the Michigan freshman hasn’t been around long enough to know that Democrats are supposed to pretend that impeachment is a solemn legal matter rather than a political exercise. She also made the mistake of using foul language in a video that went viral, not that she’s apologizing for a word of it. But give her credit for showing the public the reality hiding behind Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s wait-and-see pretense.

Comment: It would no surprise if House Ds moved to impeach the president. In fact, on occasion, given Trump’s over-the-top approach, impeachment might even be warranted. But the Tlaib language mimics the kind of talk that usually comes from Trump.

Remember, impeachment is indictment, not conviction.  Acting on an indictment, if the House chooses to move, would be the province of the Senate, which is not likely to convict no matter how much Trump might deserve it.