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.

Despite what some of my friends say, I am not naïve.

I know that nothing I say will change the uncertain direction of pro golf.  I know that nothing I say will offset huge donations of money from the Saudis, despite the source of it — blood money.  I know that nothing I say will be effective in prodding the two major golf tours – the PGA Tour and the DP Tour overseas – to make long-overdue changes in the way they do business.

Still, I presume to comment.

Why? 

Well, the major reason is that, as a dedicated golfer, I hope for a solid future for the game I love despite the current tension.  Another reason is that it feels good to get certain perceptions off my chest.  Those are enough reasons.

So, here are a collection of comments from golf writers, with my comments:

FROM RICK REILLY, FORMER SPORTS ILLUSTRATED WRITER AND ESPN CONTRIBUTOR, AS WELL AS AUTHOR OF “SO HELP ME GOLF:  WHY WE LOVE THE GAME:”  “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but pro golf is a triple bogey right now. It’s teetering on the edge of a disaster.

“LIV Golf, Saudi Arabia’s effort to sportswash its murderous human rights record by buying off pro golfers with stupid money (Phil Mickelson: Reportedly $200 million), is working.

“These LIV golfers know the Saudis butchered Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi.  They know the Saudis jail dissenters, criminalize homosexuality, and oppress women.  And in response, the players have sent a message loud and clear:  We don’t care. We want bigger jets.

“It’s hilarious to hear Mickelson and the others try to justify working for blood money.  Well, sure, he knows the Saudis are ‘scary mother——s,’ as he told his biographer, Alan Shipnuck.  But he also says:  ‘I’ve also seen the good that the game of golf has done through history.’

“Right.  Nothing relieves the downtrodden people of a despotic nation like a well-struck 6-iron.  Remember when Kim Jong Il shot 34 one day and the North Korean people suddenly weren’t starving?  Yeah, neither do I.”

COMMENT:  Critics could say Reilly engages in overstatement, including the words he chooses to use, but he is right.  Various pro golfers have signed up with the Saudis and don’t care about the source of the money.  Plus, they are not playing real competitive golf now; they are playing for guaranteed money, no matter how they play.

So, forgive me – I have no intention of watching any of the LIV “exhibitions.”

FROM PAUL KRUGMAN IN THE NEW YORK TIMES:  “Even if you don’t play or follow golf — which I don’t — you’re probably aware of the controversy now engulfing the game.

“A number of the world’s top-ranked pro players, notably Phil Mickelson, made extremely lucrative deals to play in a new tour, the LIV Golf International Series, sponsored by Saudi Arabia.  The PGA Tour, which has traditionally dominated the sport, responded by suspending 17 of these players.

“The Saudis are obviously engaged in reputation-laundering — greenswashing? — in an attempt to make people forget about the atrocities their regime has perpetrated.  It’s less clear what motivated the PGA.  Did it consider the LIV series flawed, not a proper golf tour?  Was it attempting to squash competition?  Or was the problem with the LIV series’ sponsors?

COMMENT:  Good questions, including for the PGA Tour which has not come across as lily-white in the current kerfuffle.  See below for a contention that it needs to consider changing.

FROM EAMON LYNCH IN GOLFWEEK:  “Not everything remains unclear in the escalating war between the PGA Tour and its Saudi-funded rival, LIV Golf.  

“We know, for example, that moral arguments are meaningless to the amoral, that calls for loyalty are futile if directed to the disloyal, that appeals to a greater good are worthless to the selfish, and that emotional pleas are ineffective to the indifferent, even from families of those killed on September 11th.

“We know too that professional golfers view the current landscape in purely commercial terms:  What’s the maximum they can be paid for the minimum amount of work?

“The baggage that comes with any benefactor — which in this case includes the bonesaw dismembering of a critic, mass executions, systematic mistreatment of women and gays, and war crimes in Yemen — are mere moveable obstructions for those who have signed with LIV Golf and those who will do so.”

COMMENT:  Lynch has it right.

AND MORE FROM LYNCH:  “The PGA Tour and DP World Tour still have not presented a vision of a shared future based on the much-ballyhooed ‘strategic alliance.’  The failure to articulate adequately the potential of that future to members hints at an over-reliance on lawyers who are fearful of collusion claims and antitrust litigation.

“The resulting void has been exploited by the Saudis and makes both tours appear to be playing defense for the same, stale system and offering nothing new to players or fans.  Given free rein, those lawyers will one day proudly boast of how no one overran their majestic, deserted castle.

“The PGA Tour, in particular, has long needed a radical overhaul.  Its corporate culture lacks entrepreneurial spirit, values familiarity over innovation, and had never faced a credible threat to its dominance, business model or player loyalty.  

“Which might explain why, when finally confronted with such a threat, its response has been ponderous, achingly slow, and poor in laying out the alternative to golf being owned by the Saudis.

“It cannot rely on public revulsion at Saudi sportswashing to assist them, because that clearly isn’t working.”

COMMENT:  Faced with the obvious LIV threat, Lynch is right again.  The PGA Tour has no choice but to do a better job of presenting the alternative to LIV – real, genuine competitive golf worthy of affection from the masses, including me.

Consider just this one example.  Last week, in the first LIV event, Charl Schwartzel took home the first prize – a handout of $4 million – and everybody who played got a lot of money, including the golfer who finished last and did not break 75 in any of the three rounds of the LIV exhibition.

The contrast:  Yesterday, the golf was riveting in the final round of The U.S. Open at The Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts.  Englishman Matt Fitzpatrick prevailed over all the others, including by a stroke over Americans Will Zalatoris and Scottie Scheffler.

Great competitive golf.  Fun to watch.  I wish for more of the same.