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.

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Preamble: As I was writing this blog, I had the good fortune to listen to a public television presentation of Neil Diamond, one of my favorite singers still active in America. His final song – Coming to America – calls to a mind a different time in America, one where we valued people as people…and immigrants adding to the value and texture of our country. To our shame, that is no longer the case, at least for some, as Donald Trump has led us to hate others with whom we disagree. Too bad – and that perspective adds to this blog about the timidity of Republicans to oppose Trump.

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I wonder how long it will take Republicans to reject President Donald Trump and label him to be what he is, which is the worst president in U.S. history, one guilty of substantial misdeeds, some of them criminal, some of them creating a substantial security risk for the country.

It will take a dose of political courage to do the deed. But it needs to be done for the sake of our future.

All of this came to mind this weekend as I read a piece by Peter Wehner, a contributing writer at The Atlantic, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, and Egan Visiting Professor at Duke University.

Under the headline, “The Exposure of the Republican Party,” he wrote this, referring to facts emerging from the current impeachment process:

“That the president acted the way he did should surprise exactly no one, given his disordered personality and Nietzschean ethic, his pathological lying and brutishness and bullying, and his history of personal and professional depravity.  The president is a deeply damaged human being—and therefore a deeply dangerous president.

“But what was on display on Capitol Hill was not simply an impeachment inquiry into an unscrupulous president; it was the ongoing, deepening complicity and corruption of the party he leads.

“What makes the Trump era so unusual isn’t partisanship and political tribalism, which have been around for much of human existence. It is the degree to which the transgressive nature of Trump—his willingness to go places no other president has gone, to say and do things that no president before him has done—has exposed the Republican Party.

“There is hardly a pretense anymore regarding what the party, and the right-wing media complex, are doing. They are driven by a single, all-consuming commitment: Defend Donald Trump at all costs. That is the end they seek, and they will pursue virtually any means necessary to achieve it. This from the party that once said it stood for objective truth, for honor and integrity, and against moral relativism.”

I continue to wonder when Republicans will display backbone to oppose Trump, even if they believe it will come at the expense of their own power.

Better, I say, to act within ethics, honesty and principle than to cave in reflexively to a reckless president.

The early days of public hearings into impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump included explosive revelations by various State Department officials who tied Trump directly to asking Ukraine to investigate Democrat presidential candidate. From Bill Taylor to Donald Kent, to Marie Yovanovitch, they said Trump’s conduct risked the reputation of U.S. foreign service officers in favor of thugs and corruption.

More from Wehner: “But as damaging as Bill Taylor’s testimony proved, it was merely another massive boulder in the avalanche of evidence against the president. We are well beyond the point that any disinterested person can deny that the president abused his power and acted in a corrupt manner, in ways the American founders explicitly warned against.

“But what was on display on Capitol Hill on was not simply an impeachment inquiry into an unscrupulous president; it was the ongoing, deepening complicity and corruption of the party he leads.

“We are facing a profound political crisis. What the Republican Party is saying and signaling isn’t simply that rationality and truth are subordinate to partisanship; it is that they have to be obliterated for the sake of partisanship and the survival of the Trump presidency. As best I can tell, based on some fairly intense interactions with Trump supporters, there is no limiting principle—almost nothing he can do—that will forfeit their support. Members of Congress clearly believe Trump is all that stands between them and the loss of power, while many Trump voters believe the president is all that stands between them and national ruin. In either case, it has led them into the shadowlands.”

Wehner says he is still a conservative and has devoted a large part of his life to the Republican Party – at least the former party. Therefore, he avers, it is painful to watch all of this unfold for a political party that used to be led by a credible, though imperfect, stalwart like Ronald Reagan.

“The Republican Party under Trump is a party built largely on lies, and it is now maintained by politicians and supporters who are willing to live within the lie.”

Surely, part of Republicanism is to oppose the left of the Democrat party which wants to make America all about government, putting bureaucrats in charge of nearly every area of life – health care, education, infrastructure, debt – all the while imposing huge tax increases that cannot be sustained.

I say this:

• It’s time for Republicans to stand up against Trump as a matter of commitment to principle, adding their voices to Senator Mitt Romney from Utah.
• It’s time for Republicans to find a credible alternative to Trump who can oppose the machinations of the far left.
• It’s time for Democrats to identify a candidate who has a chance to beat Trump – if, that is, he survives impeachment.
• It’s time for all Americans to support solutions from the center – the smart middle, as I like to call it – instead of opting for disagreement and dissension.