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 Department of Good Quotes Worth Remembering is one of three departments I run with a free hand to manage as I see fit.  The others are the Departments of Pet Peeves and Just Saying.

From columnist E.J. Dionne in the Washington Post:  ‘Trump as ‘the chief law enforcement officer’ is akin to putting the Houston Astros in charge of policing cheating in Major League Baseball.

“It should worry Democrats that as the dangers posed by four more years of Trump (and two more years of a supine GOP Senate) become clearer, their presidential race may be coming down to a choice between a billionaire and a democratic socialist. ’Tis the final conflict, as The Internationale, the old anthem of the left, put it.  It’s hard to imagine a confrontation more likely to shatter the party.”

Comment:  Trump must have loved last night’s Democrat debate.  What candidates did to each other only benefits Trump who, remember, has designated himself as the “chief law enforcement officer” in the land.

More from Dionne:  “Can these Democratic candidates start competing over who is best positioned to bring together the majority of Americans who disapprove of how Trump is running things?

“Can they try to prove it by reaching out now to constituencies not part of their own natural base — and by taming the furies within their own factions?

“Can they look at the smirk on Trump’s face and realize the damage they’ll do our nation if they just pretend that this primary is like every other?”

Comment:  Dionne is not my favorite Post columnist, coming, as he usually does, from so far left.  But, this time, he raises a great point:  When will Democrat candidates start competing over who is best positioned to bring together the majority of Americans who disapprove of how Trump is running things?

From former deputy attorney general George Terwilliger in the Washington Post:  “Attorney General William Barr is under assault for what his critics decry as improper interference in the sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone.  But the claim that decisions by career prosecutors should in essence be unreviewable by those appointed to leadership positions in the Justice Department is not just wrong; it is also irresponsible.  Barr wasn’t intervening inappropriately.  He was doing his job.”

Comment:  To me, Terwilliger makes a great point.  The head of a government agency does not automatically have to accede to the actions of those under him or her.  He or she has the responsibility to make most of the final decisions.

To be sure, it would have better, in the most recent case involving AG Barr and the Stone sentencing recommendation, for the AG’s actions to come before the staff recommendation – so the final recommendation could occur without as much controversy.  But, still, Barr is the AG and, in this case, according to someone who knows and worked with him – Terwilliger — the “intervention” was entirely appropriate, no matter what sentence an independent hands down to Stone.

Call me guilty here.  I was a state government executive and, while I valued the recommendations of those who worked for me, I often had the responsibility to make the final decision.

From former Navy Secretary John Lehman in the Wall Street Journal on the National Security Council (NSC):  “Henry Kissinger grew the council to include one deputy, 32 policy professionals and 60 administrators. By my count, alumni of his NSC include two secretaries of state, four national security advisers, a director of national intelligence, a secretary of the Navy, and numerous high-ranking officials in the State, Defense and Treasury departments as well as the Central Intelligence Agency.

“But the NSC has only continued to expand. By the end of the Obama administration, 34 policy professionals supported by 60 administrators had exploded to three deputies, more than 400 policy professionals and 1,300 administrators.”

Comment:  Incredible!  What started out as a small group of analysts to help the president deal with often-competing government departments has become its own department, not in name, but in fact.  What this shows is what happens with government grows too fast – and when, after being voted into existence, there is no emphasis other than on growth.