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.

Here’s a far-fetched idea.

How about those who represent us in today’s political system – as well as us, as voters – work together to solve the country’s problems?

Possible?

Should be.

Probably not.

This notion crossed my mind as I listened a few weeks ago now to Attorney General William Barr announce release of the report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, a report about possible collusion with Russians to affect the 2016 election.

It would seem possible that, with release of the report, at least in a redacted version that was in line with statutory authority, the release would mean the end of occupation or preoccupation with the Mueller report.

No.

Democrats didn’t get what they wanted, potential criminal charges against Donald Trump, but they are not inclined to stop their hunt for a way to bring Trump down through investigations.

In many ways, I wish them success for, in Trump, we have the nation’s worst ever chief executive, someone who tries to lie his way out of every dilemma he faces, most of them of his own making.

Here’s the way the Washington Post, Dan Balz, one of the most experienced journalists in Washington, D.C., put it the other day:

“The Trump presidency long has been an exercise in normalizing extraordinary behavior, with President Trump repeatedly stretching the limits of what is considered appropriate conduct by the nation’s chief executive. The report from special counsel Robert S. Mueller III puts into high relief the degree to which President Trump has violated the norms.

“The principal focus of the special counsel’s investigation was on questions of criminality. But there is more than the issue of what rises to the level of criminal conspiracy or criminal obstruction when judging a president and his administration. These are questions that go to the heart of what is acceptable or normal or advisable in a democracy. On that basis, the Mueller report provides a damning portrait of the president and those around him for actions taken during the 2016 campaign and while in office.

“The 448-page document is replete with evidence of repeated lying by public officials and others (some of whom have been charged for that conduct), of the president urging not to tell the truth, of the president seeking to shut down the investigation, of a Trump campaign hoping to benefit politically from Russian hacking and leaks of information damaging to its opponent, of a White House in chaos and operating under abnormal rules.”

So, the Mueller report, far from exonerating Trump, described him in accurate terms. According to Balz, “President Trump repeatedly stretched the limits of what is considered appropriate conduct by the nation’s chief executive.”

An understatement!

Still, Democrats would be better off if they would get about the business of governing. That would be the best way to hold Trump to account, defeating him in 2020.

If the Ds just head off into further investigations of Trump, however they would be warranted given his abhorrent content, what they could do is fuel Trump supporters to elect him again. Perish the thought of four more years in the Oval Office.

So, with all of us dominated by bad news every day, is there a chance for public officials in the Nation’s Capital to work together? That’s the question I asked at the beginning of this post and I suspect the answer is a hearty and unfortunate no.

I wish we could return to a time when Republicans and Democrats found a way to disagree agreeably.

No longer and all of us, as citizens, are worse for the descent into the political abyss.