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.

If you don’t know to whom this blog refers, just think … unfortunately … Donald Trump.

CNN has come under intense criticism after it gave a serial liar, Trump, airtime the other day to spout his typical invective.

CNN tried to say that all it was doing was covering another presidential aspirant. 

Nice try!

Trump is not a traditional presidential aspirant.  He lies incessantly and refuses to give an interviewer, such as Kaitlan Collins, a so-called “rising star” at CNN, any space to ask credible questions or provide credible answers.

So, here, rather than go over this issue in more depth – there have been so many stories since the CNN debacle – I choose simply to include some quotes from those who thought CNN made itself look stupid.

FROM THE WASHINGTON POST:  “The former president repeatedly dodged or sneered at questions from CNN’s moderator, Kaitlan Collins, during the live, 70-minute forum at St. Anselm College in New Hampshire on Wednesday night.

“He doubled down on false claims that ‘a rigged election’ led to his 2020 ouster and referred to writer E. Jean Carroll, who just prevailed in her lawsuit against him for defamation and battery, as a ‘whack job,’ to cheers and laughter from the audience, made up of local Republican voters.”

Error! Filename not specified.According The former president repeatedly dodged or sneered at questions from CNN’s moderator, Kaitlan Collins, during the live, 70-minute forum at St. Anselm College in New Hampshire on Wednesday night. He doubled down on false claims that “a rigged election” led to his 2020 ouster and referred to writer E. Jean Carroll, who just prevailed in her lawsuit against him for defamation and battery, as a “whack job,” to cheers and laughter from the audience, made up of local Republican voters.

FORMER TV NEWS EXECUTIVE MARK LUKASIEWICZ:  “Predictably disastrous.  Live lying works. A friendly MAGA crowd consistently laughed, clapped at Trump’s punchlines … and the moderator could not begin to keep up with the AR-15 pace of lies.”

JOURNALISTS EVEN AT CNN AND OTHERS OUTSIDE THE ORGANIZATION:  They called the town hall a “debacle,” a “disaster,” and “CNN’s lowest moment.”

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL IN A COLUMN BY PEGGY NOONAN:  “Trump steamrolled the moderator, talking over her, dismissing her, as they stood together, as nasty.  He spoke with what seemed like conviction, backed down on nothing, made things up.”

ERIK WEMPLE COLUMN IN THE WASHINGTON POST:  “CNN host Kaitlan Collins has spent years in proximity to the lies of Donald Trump. She rose to stardom covering the 45th president, asking tough questions in the White House briefing room and experiencing the wrath of the Trump Administration’s anti-media policies:  In 2018, she was banned from a news conference for allegedly asking ‘inappropriate’ questions.

“So Collins knows better than to say what she said in the midst of Wednesday night’s CNN town-hall event with Trump. ‘The election was not rigged, Mr. President,’ she said after yet another Trump lie about his loss to Joe Biden in 2020. ‘You can’t keep saying that all night long.’

“Sure he can.  He can lie about presidential documents; he can lie about his impeachments; he can lie about his record in office; and there is nothing an impeccably prepared interviewer can do to prevent any of it.  She can rebut him, correct him, interrupt him, and otherwise battle with him over every point, but that’s no match for ceaseless mendacity.

“As CNN host Jake Tapper said after the affair, ‘We don’t have time to fact-check every lie he told.’”

I include myself in the Tapper’s word “we.”  There is no way to rebut Trump because, in the face of every issue, he just fulminates incessantly, lying by pattern all along the way.

I also cannot believe Trump is running for president again and appears to have the support of some voters.

If he is elected president, we, as Americans, deserve what we get.  Which is folly, degradation, and, yes, even sedition as Trump, ever the actor, tears the country down.