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 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.

This, remember, is one of several departments I run with a free hand to manage as I see fit.

The others are the Department of Good Quotes Worth Remembering, and the Department of “Just Saying.”

The peeves below would have fit in the Department of “Just Saying,” but I choose to open the Department of Pet Peeves instead.

PEEVE #1:  PAYING PREMIUMS AND FILING CLAIMS

Insurance companies love when you pay premiums and hate when you make claims.

We are learning this again as we wait for coverage of water damage in our laundry workroom.  The insurer should have responded by now, but wait – this is a claim, so we sit on our hands.

Let me add this important point:  I have friends who have been or are in the insurance business.  They are good guys.  The issue is not the insurance agents or managers; It is the system that sucks.

PEEVE #2:  MISPLACED MEDIA FOCUS

I am peeved at the media for focusing incessantly on such idiots as Donald Trump, Kanye West, and Elon Musk. 

Why not spend as much time and effort focusing on citizens in this country who are striving to provide for their families and friends?  Such as immigrants to this country from Afghanistan, Ukraine, and to the south.

There are many great stories there, which would help all of us arrive at a more accurate perception of immigrants than what is often portrayed by the media.

So, enough of West, Musk, and Trump!

PEEVE #3:  DIVERTING FROM REAL, COMPETITIVE PROFESSIONAL GOLF

On this subject, I have made my views clear in the past.  As it is said, “crystal.” 

I dislike LIV golf and what it is doing to professional golf in this country and around the world.

It is making a mockery of the goal of competing to win and for prize money.  All LIV does is create exhibitions and pay those who play in such events millions of dollars just for showing up regardless of how they play.

Exhibitions are not necessarily bad in and of themselves.  They are just not my thing.

Especially if the money to fund them comes from the tainted Saudi Arabia Defense Fund.  If other industries do business with that country and with that fund, then they are wrong, too.  Two wrongs don’t make a right.

Does this mean that I believe the PGA Tour in the U.S.A. and the DP Tour in Europe are perfect?  No.

Both need to up their games, not only for the players and caddies, but for golf fans like me.  And both appear to be doing so.  An acknowledged top golfer, Jack Nicklaus, now retired, made this point yesterday.  He said the PGA Tour needs to continuing to improve its management to assure that all the recent changes work well.

If the improvement actions that have been taken by the PGA and DP are a response to LIV, so be it.

Further, what gets lost in the shuffle of all the controversy is a key, salient fact:  Both the PGA and DP Tours have designed events that produce millions of dollars for worthy charities.

Does LIV?  Absolutely not.