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 (Les AuCoin), 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. I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that it what I long for in both politics and golf. The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions like. And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

It is hard to believe that I, as the director of the department named in the headline, have kept it closed for so long.

As all Americans have endured the pandemic made worse by President Donald Trump, have watched as Trump fails to grasp the significance of the Black Lives Matter movement, and have grown nauseous by Trump’s ever-increasing personal aggrandizement at the expense of the country, there have been many quotes worth remembering.

So, here are a few.

A COMING ELECTION TSUANIMI: “’There’s a tsunami coming,’ said Terry McAuliffe, a former Virginia governor and former Democratic National Committee chairman.

“If he’d (Trump) early on jumped in front of the coronavirus and been a leader, this guy would’ve been unbeatable. But every opportunity he’s had to stand up and be a leader, whether Charlottesville or anything else, he’s failed each time.”

“The danger for Trump will be if the voters he lost are not willing to come back. Democrat pollster Peter Hart said this is the case, based on his extensive focus group interviews.

“Voters have arrived at a place that they’re done with Donald Trump,” Hart said. “The last four years have been total chaos, and the public says: ‘Stop the music. I want to get off.’ ”

COMMENT: Think of the Trump machine as the Titanic. It’s sinking.

AND THIS FROM THE WASHINGTON POST ABOUT THE TRUMP COMMUTATION OF ROGER STONE’S PRISON SENTENCE: “The United States is supposed to be a place in which laws apply equally to all. And while it never has — and never will — live up to that ideal in full, no modern president before Trump has so clearly renounced it.

“The president seems to be doing his best, within the confines of the U.S. constitutional system, to emulate the gangster leadership of Russian President Vladimir Putin, a man whose ruinous reign Trump has always admired. If the country needed any more evidence, Friday confirmed that the greatest threat to the Republic is the president himself.

COMMENT: Just when you think Trump has hit bottom he goes lower.

FROM COLUMNIST MAX BOOT IN THE WASHINGTON POST: “Three months ago — all the way back on April 5 — I proclaimed Donald Trump the worst president ever. Oh, how innocent I was. Sure, I knew he was bad. But not this bad.

“Back then I thought he was barely edging James Buchanan in the annals of presidential ineptitude. But now, with the commutation of Roger Stone’s well-deserved prison sentence and so many other vile acts, he has disgraced the nation’s highest office as no previous occupant has come close to doing.

“But what makes Trump the worst president ever is not simply that he is colossally incompetent. It is that he is also thoroughly corrupt. It is hard to think of a single major decision he has made for the good of the country, rather than for his own advantage. Trump has so egregiously abused the power of the presidency that he makes Warren Harding and Richard Nixon look like choirboys.”

COMMENT: Good. Max Boot agrees with me.

A “NEVER TRUMP” MOVEMENT: “The unsolicited video submission to a group called Republican Voters Against Trump is just one small part of a broader “Never Trump” rebellion that began four years ago as a largely ineffective cadre of appalled Republicans, but which has transformed in recent weeks into a potentially disruptive force in this year’s presidential race.

“Groups such as the Lincoln Project and Republican Voters Against Trump emphasize guerrilla tactics and scathing ads as they troll the president. The movement seeks to build a national political operation to oust both the president and his supporters in Congress, with a particular emphasis on persuading white suburban voters who consider themselves true Republicans to break from the president.”

COMMENT: Again, good.