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.

With all that has gone on over the years, it was hard to imagine “something else” with Donald Trump.

Well, that “something else” occurred the other day during Trump’s criminal trial in New York.

In court, he fell asleep.

Yes, he fell asleep!

His head nodded off and nearly touched the table in front of him.

This happened while the attorneys on both sides, with the judge, were trying to come up with a jury of 12 citizens.  In the end, they did, needing only to identify six alternates.

In the Washington Post, columnist Jennifer Rubin said falling asleep represented the least of Trump’s misconduct in court.

“His continued belligerence — juror intimidation, anti-trial screeds on his social network — thus presenting Justice Juan Merchan (who has already issued a gag order) with a dilemma:  ‘Jail Trump, allowing him to play the martyr, or permit him to bully witnesses and perhaps others associated with the trial?’”

Rubin posited her own idea of what to do.  Just levy huge fines against Trump on the theory that he responds, if nothing else, to money.

I also thought of another word this week as we watched the Trump unfold.  The judge issues a gag order that Trump continued to violate.

The term “gag order” is appropriate for me because, when it comes to Trump, that’s what I do – gag!