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.

For a couple years now, I have pondered a perplexing question. It is this:

How can some of my friends, who are smart and “good people,” not to mention women, be so solidly in the Donald Trump camp?

He lies as a matter of course.

He ridicules almost everyone, including, incredibly, the late Senator John McCain.

He gropes women, then congratulates himself for doing so in language that is incredible for anyone, especially a president.

He disdains all of the conventions and norms of being president – without saying, I add, that conventions and norms are an end in themselves; they are not, but they are a way to illustrate the integrity of the nation’s highest political office.

So, the question nags.

As is often the case, Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan wrote a piece late this week that helps me come up with an answer.

“I am watching Washington, D.C., “ Noonan wrote, “and thinking this: We have reached a new crisis point in Donald Trump vs. the Democrats. They are speaking of contempt citations, subpoenas, executive privilege, hearings. It’s a daily barrage. The Democrats are inching closer to impeachment, at least rhetorically, perhaps actually. We’ll see how well Speaker Nancy Pelosi can dance right up to the edge to appease some in her caucus, and not over it.

“But there is such a thing as context, and the Democrats seem to be ignoring it. This is a country divided.

“Almost half the country is for Trump—truly, madly, deeply. Half is against him—unequivocally, unchangeably. There is no resolving this. Or, rather to the extent it can be resolved, it will be resolved at the ballot box. The presidential election is 18 months from now, on Nov. 3, 2020.

“Until then, people are where they are and hold the views they hold, and don’t push them too hard.

“Democrats unveil charges and accusations—the president is a liar, he’s a tax dodger, an obstructor of justice. But in a way Trump’s supporters accounted for all this before they elected him. They are not shocked. They didn’t hire him to be a good man. Their politics are post-heroic. They sometimes tell reporters he’s a man of high character but mostly to drive the reporters crazy. I have never talked to a Trump supporter, and my world is thick with them, who thought he had a high personal character. On the other hand, they sincerely believe he has a high political character, in that he pursues the issues he campaigned on. They hired him as an insult to the political class, as a Hail Mary pass—we’ve tried everything else, maybe this will work—and because he agreed with them on the issues.”

“As a generalization, Trump supporters don’t want or value upstanding character. More Noonan: “Instead, they sincerely believe he has a high political character, in that he pursues the issues he campaigned on. They hired him as an insult to the political class, as a Hail Mary pass—we’ve tried everything else, maybe this will work—and because he agreed with them on the issues.”

There, the answer.

Paint me as anti-Trump.

I value high character in political life. When you see it, you admire it.

Of course, policies have to follow character. But, without character, policy withers away into nothingness.

We could argue about policy until you know what froze over. If we did so, while respecting the other side’s viewpoints, we’d be farther ahead.

We’d be practicing politics as it is meant to be practiced. We’d be searching for compromise without goring anyone who disagreed with us.

Too bad we do not appear to be able to return to this kind of politics. Blame Trump. Blame his supporters. Blame the other side, which cannot get about the business of legislating. I do.