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 to 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 press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon, as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as 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 more I know about Elizabeth Warren and her proposed policies, the less I like them.

And I worry that, if she wins the Democrat primary to run for president, she will have the effect of boosting election prospects for Donald Trump. That is, of course, if Trump survives impeachment.

Take from the “rich” and give it to others. That’s exactly what Warren wants to do. Which continues to recall the good quote, which is that “it’s always easy to spend other people’s money.”

Warren envisions big government being responsible for many areas of our lives. No thought of individual responsibility, along with increased commitments from the private sector, including those with money, to increase charitable contributions.

[Is there a role for government in all of this? Absolutely. I am not part of the Republican “we hate government” notion; I just think government and personal responsibility should work together rather than being some kind of either-or deal.]

Witness the following concerns about Warren as expressed by commentators following her on the campaign trail – and, if you notice that many of the quotes below are from the Wall Street Journal, I plead guilty without apology:

* From Andy Kessler in the Wall Street Journal: “Warren told the New England Council last year, ‘I am a capitalist to my bones.’ She then told CNBC, ‘I am a capitalist. Come on. I believe in markets.’ It was almost as if she didn’t believe it herself. Then came the caveat: ‘But only fair markets, markets with rules. Markets without rules is about the rich take it all, it’s about the powerful get all of it. And that’s what’s gone wrong in America.’ She clearly doesn’t understand capitalism.”

* From Wall Street Journal editorial writers mimicking concerns by many others after Warren released her fanciful Medicare for All funding plan: “Now we know why Warren took so long to release the financing details of her Medicare-for-All plan. The 20 pages of explanation she released reveal that she is counting on ideas for cost-savings and new revenue that are a fiscal and health-care fantasy.

“You certainly can’t criticize the new Iowa Democrat caucus front-runner for lack of ambition. Despite criticism from fellow Democrats, she is sticking to her plan for a government takeover of American health care, including the elimination of private insurance that 170 million or so Americans now have. She continues to claim that this will cost ‘not one penny in middle-class tax increases.’ She walks on water too.”

* From William Galston in the Wall Street Journal as he accused Warren of committing political hara-kari: “Warren should be commended for the wealth of detail in her plan, which allows voters to judge it for themselves. This said, she may well have penned the longest suicide note in recorded history. There’s no reason for the entire Democrat Party to sign it.”

* From a letter to the editor writer in the Washington Post: “The insidious thing about Warren’s plan to dismantle American free enterprise is that she aims to sneak it past moderates by calling it ‘accountable capitalism,’ as if it is some mild tweaking of the capitalist system that has served the nation so well and has ensured freedom of the individual as no other system can.

“Warren proposes to make the market work.  In a free-market system, no one makes the market work. Thousands of individuals make choices based on the market conditions they face, and the outcome is the consensus view. This brilliant and efficient synthesis of opinions and desires of the many disappears in a market that is meddled with for the purpose of making it work. Warren is free to flog her government takeover, but she doesn’t get to sell it as a variety of capitalism. It is nothing of the kind.”

* From Daniel Henninger, deputy editorial page editor of the Wall Street Journal: “So this is what nationalized health care looks like. We knew that half the U.S. population—some 177 million people—would lose their private insurance. Now we find out that federalized health care would cost nearly $52 trillion over 10 years, paid for by myriad bureaucratic “savings” and new taxes. There’d be a new Employer Medicare Contribution (i.e., a tax) plus an annual tax on the unrealized capital gains of the “wealthiest,” plus a threat to abrogate drug companies’ patents if they don’t comply with federal price controls. Doctors, some warned, might leave the profession.

“Warren has let the cat out of the bag: Progressivism is basically undeliverable pie in the sky. Indeed, by stringing together in detail so many progressive wish lists, she has made clear how difficult, if not impossible, it is for them to survive the most basic tests of political or fiscal plausibility.”

So, I agree, Warren has gone over-board. Initially, I was inclined to give her at least some credit for announcing how she would fund her “more government” goals on health care.

Now, I say rubbish. Her plans don’t hold up under scrutiny and also verify the left’s intent to have government control every area of private lives from health care, to education, to paying for higher education, to….you name it.