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 is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

I had a refreshing time over the last few days happening to catch Biden press secretary Jen Psaki return to what was normal in presidential administrations – holding briefings for reporters.

It was a routine that was largely scrapped during the Trump years, perhaps because those who were charged to deal with media didn’t know what to say, especially in view of all Trump’s subversive tweets.

With Psaki, you get quality, honesty and skill, if, for no other reason, than that she represents a president with those qualities.

When she doesn’t know the answer to a question, she says so – and pledges to get back to the reporter if or when she finds out answers to the question.  That alone adds to her credibility.

Her intention is to hold such briefings every weekday.

I watched this with a degree of interest honed because of my own experience as a press secretary, albeit for an Oregon governor (Vic Atiyeh), not a president.

Briefing reporters is a skill learned only with experience, not by a book.  Psaki has that on-the-ground experience honed, for one place, as spokesperson for the State Department in a previous administration.

Here are excerpts on this subject from a column by Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sulliivan that appeared under this headline:

The media can be glad for the Biden White House’s return to normalcy.  But let’s not be lulled.

“White House press secretary Jen Psaki was prepared.  She was professional.  She was non-combative.

“And she didn’t peddle a whopper of a lie, the way Sean Spicer did on Day One four years ago with his ‘alternative facts’ about the supposedly record-breaking size of the inaugural crowd (for Trump).

“The first official words by President Biden’s spokeswoman included truth and transparency.  ‘Rebuilding trust with the American people will be central to our focus,’ the former State Department spokeswoman told a small group of socially distanced reporters as she promised a return to daily briefings.

“In fact, Wednesday night’s session with reporters, the first of the Biden administration, was so normal — so weirdly normal — that you could be forgiven for thinking that you had mistakenly put on an old episode of ‘The West Wing.’

“This return to norms is wonderfully welcome after the horrors of the past four years.”

Sullivan also described what she called “potentially dangerous” ground for reporters and editors who, even in a new time, post Trump, need to retain their intention to be skeptical – and not cynical.

“The national press — battered by four years of abuse by the president, and by the incompetence and falsehoods of his spokespeople — is in a precarious position,” she wrote.  “We run the risk of being seduced by an administration that, in many cases, closely reflects our values: multiculturalism, a belief in the principles of liberal democracy, and a kind of wonky idealism.”

To Sullivan, for the media, there’s “a difference between truly holding power to account and grandstanding.”

She says the national media should show toughness by resisting false equivalency, by calling out lies, and by identifying racism or white supremacy in plain language instead of euphemisms.

I suspect she’ll get support for that stance from the Biden Administration.

Back to the main point of this blog:  It is to commend the Biden Administration for getting a solid start on dealing with the media and to compliment Psaki on conducting herself as real press secretary.