Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

Without my subscription to Atlantic Magazine, I would not have thought of this comparison – George Washington to Donald Trump.

But Atlantic performed a public service by writing about the difference between America’s first president, George Washington, and the person who now wants to gain the nation’s highest political office again, Donald Trump.

I hope others will read about the thoughtful comparison.

Here is how Atlantic writer Tom Nichols described the situation:

“Washington’s life is a story of heroic actions, but also of temptations avoided, of things he would not do.  As a military officer, Washington refused to take part in a plot to overthrow Congress.  As a victorious general, he refused to remain in command after the war had ended.

“As president, he refused to hold on to an office that he did not believe belonged to him.  His insistence on the rule of law and his willingness to return power to its rightful owners — the people of the United States — are among his most enduring gifts to the nation and to democratic civilization.”

Then, Nichols drives home the point with these words:

“Forty-four men have succeeded Washington so far.  Some became titans; others finished their terms without distinction; a few ended their service to the nation in ignominy.  But each of them knew that the day would come when it would be their duty and honor to return the presidency to the people.

“All but one, that is.”

And, who is the one? 

Donald Trump, of course.

He wants back in the Oval Office – it is a national tragedy that he once occupied that office – and says he will not honor results of the election if he loses to Democrat Kamala Harris.

From Nichols:

“Today, America stands at a critical moment.  A vengeful and emotionally unstable former president — a convicted felon, an insurrectionist, an admirer of foreign dictators, a racist and a misogynist — desires to return to office as an autocrat.

“Trump has left no doubt about his intentions; he practically shouts them every chance he gets.  His deepest motives are to salve his ego, punish his enemies, and place himself above the law.  

“Should he regain the Oval Office, he may well bring with him the experience and the means to complete the authoritarian project that he began in his first term.”

Nichols’ editor, Jeff Goldberg, put it this way:

“Even those who believe they understand Washington’s greatness will be surprised by the degree to which Trump is so obviously his opposite — Trump, who seeks to be a dictator, who believes he is smarter than any general or statesman, who evinces no ability to learn, who possesses no humility, who divides Americans rather than unites them.”

As I wrote earlier, The Atlantic has gone beyond the call of duty to compare Washington and Trump and contend that Washington knew when to step away from power.

Not Trump.

He wants power for its own sake and will call on his MAGA hordes to put him over the top, even if he loses to Harris.

So, my fond hope is that, in fact, Trump will lose and that, in so doing, he will be removed from any hope of regaining power.  Will he leave on his own?  Probably not.

But keeping him from the power he seeks is one way to relegate him to where he belongs, which is in the dust bin.

Call me a bit of an optimist in that regard.

So, go Harris and Tim Walz!

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

Donald Trump and J.D. Vance have no idea what they are talking about when it comes to national health care policy.

So, health care stands much like almost every other public policy topic for those running on the Republican presidential ticket.

They don’t care about policy, including for health care.  Or they don’t even want to know about it.

Doing so would just distract them from criticizing everyone and everything.

Consider two recent developments:

• In the debate against Kamala Harris, when Trump was asked whether he had a plan for health care coverage that would either replace or improve upon the Affordable Care Act, he said only this:  “I have concepts of a plan.”

• Then, to compound this incomprehensible statement, Vance, in the vice-presidential debate against Democrat Tim Walz, claimed that, as president, Trump worked hard to save the Affordable Health Care Act, which had been developed by President Barack Obama.  Of course, Trump tried to do just the reverse.  He wanted to send it to the dust bin.

New York Times opinion columnist Paul Krugman wrote about some of this in a recent post.  It started this way:

“Donald Trump has been ridiculed, rightly, for his answer, during his debate with Kamala Harris, about whether he had a plan for health care coverage that would either replace or improve upon the Affordable Care Act:  ‘I have concepts of a plan.’

“He has been running for president or sitting in the White House for nine years, and that’s all he has?

“But the other day, J.D. Vance, his running mate, gave us a bit more insight into those concepts — concepts that, if implemented, would have the effect of denying health care to millions of Americans, particularly those who need it most.”

Krugman continued:

“On September 15 on ‘Meet the Press,’ Vance — after noting that people in good health have very different needs from those with chronic conditions — called for de-regulation, saying that we should ‘promote some more choice in our health care system and not have a one-size-fits-all approach that puts a lot of people into the same insurance pools, into the same risk pools.’

“It’s not clear whether Vance was laying out a real vision for health policy or just floating his own concepts of a plan.  These remarks by Vance — who is closely associated with the Heritage Foundation’s president, Kevin Roberts, one of the architects of Project 2025 — sounded similar to this airy statement in the Project 2025 manifesto:

“The federal government should focus reform on reducing burdens of regulatory compliance, unleashing innovation in health care delivery, ceasing interference in the daily lives of patients and providers, allowing alternative insurance coverage options and returning control of health care dollars to patients making decisions with their providers about their health care treatments and services.”

Why, Krugman asks, would Vance stake out such an unpopular position, conveying the impression that he was speaking for Trump as well?

“I don’t know whether he was blurting out in public what Project 2025 proponents say to one another in private or whether he was just winging it on an issue he really hasn’t thought through.  Of course, these explanations aren’t mutually exclusive.

“In any case, while Trump doesn’t have a health care plan, Vance’s remarks offer a pretty good preview of what he’ll propose if he wins.  It might be summed up as:  ‘Trump to Sick Americans:  Drop Dead.’”

Back in the day, just after I retired as a health care lobbyist in Oregon, I wrote this:  “It’s time for something different, a middle-of-the-road plan that takes into account perspectives from reasonable folks on both sides of the aisle in Congress.”

I outlined what I called “four legs of the health care stool.”

1.  It won’t be popular in some quarters, especially with some Republicans, but, first, a critical component of reform is to require all citizens to have health insurance, either by buying it if they can afford it, or by having it provided, at least partially, by government if they cannot.

Without everyone in the to-be-insured pool, any system will collapse.  The very rationale for insurance is that the largest pool possible should be covered to spread the risk.

Think of it this way.  All of us who drive cars are required to have automobile insurance.  If we don’t, we pay a price.  The same policy should exist for health insurance.

2.  Second, a catastrophic health insurance plan should be provided so that those who cannot afford regular insurance have an option for a lower-cost plan, such as has occurred to a degree with what has come to be called ObamaCare.

3.  Third, just as is now the case with ObamaCare, any new middle-of-the-road health coverage approach should accommodate people with pre-existing health conditions.

I have mixed emotions about this because, inevitably, the price of insurance has gone up and will go up further with the added risk of covering pre-existing conditions.  Yet, there is a reasonable social consensus that people should not be penalized financially for health problems largely outside of their control.

And, I firmly believe in the concept that human beings should take care of other human beings (if they are willing to accept help) rather than send the differently-abled to the scrap heap.

4.  Fourth, any new plan should allow broad access to health-savings accounts (HSA).  ObamaCare pushed millions of Americans into high-deductible insurance without giving them the opportunity to save and pay for care before insurance kicks in.  

There should be a one-time federal tax credit to encourage all Americans to open an HSA and begin using it to pay for routine medical bills. And HSAs, combined with high-deductible insurance, could be incorporated directly into the Medicare and Medicaid programs.

Now, the reality is that, given the achievements of ObamaCare, health care policy is not necessarily top-of-mind as it used to be, nor has it been a major issue in the current presidential campaign.

Trump and Vance should be thankful for that, because if health care policy rises in the public consciousness, the two of them have nothing good to say about health care – or perhaps even nothing at all.

Which is what they have to say about almost anything these days.

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

My wife (she is also my tour guide) and I just returned a day or so ago from a 10-day cruise from Montreal, Canada, and then back to Montreal after nearing the Atlantic Ocean.

Overall and on balance, a good trip.

But, as always, I am very glad to be back home, which is Salem, Oregon.

Here, I have been reflecting on the good and the bad of the recent 10-day voyage:

The Bad:  When we arrived at the Montreal Airport, we couldn’t believe how difficult it was to get out of the airport for a ride to our hotel the day before boarding the cruise ship.

The line to get a taxi stretched for several blocks, both inside and outside the terminal.  The problem was that there was only a two-lane road for all taxes, limousines, buses, and Ubers.

Had we chosen to try for a taxi, it would have been a one-hour wait to get one.

We opted for Uber and even that took a half hour to find our ride.

The Good and Bad on the Ship, Insignia:  When got in our room on the 700-passenger ship (a small number by cruise comparisons these), there was a problem.  There was a leak from the bathroom that made our floor wet.

That’s the bad.  The good was that ship personnel were able fairly quickly to move us to a different room – and, yes, there was one available.

All of this meant that one of my goals for cruising – move in and unpack one, then don’t repack until the end of the cruise – didn’t quite come to pass.  But I guess unpacking twice isn’t so bad!

On another good side, I marvel how staff on a cruise ship do what they do, often with a smile on their faces.

Those who served us sign a contract for six-month stay on ship.  In other words, every week they welcome new folks on-board.

In two examples:  (1) We met a server from the Philippines who told us he missed a three-year-old daughter – no wonder; (2) We also met a server from the Ukraine who, thankfully, told us that her family was safe even in the midst of war.

As usual, these two and others on the ship were sending paychecks home to their families.

The Bad:  The weather wasn’t great on our trip.  So what.  We’re from the Pacific Northwest, so we are used to rain and clouds.

The Good:  We were able to make the best of it by getting off ship every day, except one when we sailed all day.

The Good and Bad on the Trip Home:  First, the bad.  After we had boarded our plane in Montreal and after it had pushed back from the gate, the pilot stopped and said, “We have an unusual light in the cockpit, so we are going back to the gate.”

On the good side, a mechanic came on board and fixed the problem in about an hour.  The alternative would have been to get off the plane, spend the night somewhere in Montreal, and then try for the flight home the nest day.

On the bad side, the deal meant we would be late getting to Vancouver, B.C. for our flight back to Oregon.

Unbeknownst to mid-flight, Air Canada staff took the initiative to re-book us on Alaska Airlines flight to get us back to Oregon.

Without today’s technology, there would have been no way to achieve that within the time allowed.  And the partnership with Alaska proved fruitful.

Nor would it have been possible, as we were set to board on Alaska flight, for staff to confirm that our suitcases were on-board, having made the trip from Air Canada to the new carrier.

After all this, the inevitable question is whether I would make this trip again if the opportunity arose.

Perhaps not, but even with that admission, this recent trip was a good one, all things considered.

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

I don’t live in rural America, but a good story a week or so ago in the Wall Street Journal caught my attention as it dealt with seven retirees who are making it in that part of America.

I read the story, at least in part, because my wife and I, too, are retired, though not in a rural area.

We live in a relatively small town in Oregon – Salem — which, among other things, is the State Capitol.  Which is convenient for me because I spent a lot of years as a state lobbyist in Oregon, meaning the Capitol where legislators hung out was only about five miles away from my house which eventually became my office.

Here, before I report a bit more about the Journal story, is a summary of what it is like for my wife and me to live as retirees in Salem.

• We have been in Salem since 1979, so we have managed to make a lot of friends here – friends who would do anything for us, just as we would do for them.

• We live on a golf course in Salem, so I get to play my avocation there often, sometimes even every day in a week.

• My wife and son – he and his wife live down the street from us here – have worked as real estate agents for years, though my wife is now retired.  And, we watch with pride as our son continues to ply that trade.

• Golf is good for him, too – and he always has been far better at that sport than I have been, which gives me an immense source of pride.

• About four hours north lives our daughter and her family, which means that, for us, it is a weekend trip to see her.

• We have been part of the same church in Salem for more than 30 years and the long tenure has been a God-send – yes, literally, a God-send – as we have made fast friends where we have been allowed to express our love for God.

Then, this summary from the Wall Street Journal:

“Older Americans are leaving expensive cities and suburbs to retire in the country.

“The move to remote mountain and lake areas is helping reverse a long decline in the rural population.  From April 2020 to July 2023, the rural counties retirees flocked to grew 4 per cent versus less than 1 per cent for rural America as a whole.

“Baby boomers often find that their retirement savings goes further and lasts longer in the country, though rural life comes with challenges, too.

Doctors and nurses might be in short supply.  Winters can be harsh and grocery stores a long drive away.  And shoveling driveways or stacking firewood requires either good health or good help.

“…even retirees say the trade-offs are mostly worth it.”

Here are retiree examples from rural America.

• Jim Moore’s money got him more when he left Manhattan for a far less crowded and costly island off the coast of Maine.  With a year-round population of about 1,300, Vinalhaven lacks New York’s energy and dining, but Moore, 63 years old, said he’s landed “in the right place.”  The island’s friendly culture reminds him of growing up in rural Connecticut, he said.

• A few years ago, Allen and Diane Sonntag moved to Rogersville, Missouri from Tucson, Arizona to make their retirement savings stretch further and to be closer to family.  They searched the country for the best retirement destinations with the lowest cost of living.   Cost put California, Oregon, Michigan and Illinois out of contention. 

• Jim and Sharon Erwin like to spend as much time as possible exercising outdoors and enjoying the natural beauty of Gunnison, Colorado.  They didn’t want to spend retirement: stuck in California gridlock.  They sold their Yorba Linda house for a nearly $400,000 profit about 20 years ago and moved to Parker, Colorado about a half-hour south of Denver.  Then, when Parker felt too crowded, they sold again, netting nearly $300,000 from the sale of their home in 2017.  The couple settled roughly 200 miles away in Gunnison, Colorado., where their son went to college. 

• Jim Betz and Lorraine Ziek lived and worked for years in South Kortright, New York, a town in New York’s Catskill Mountains where cows outnumber people. They never considered moving or retiring anywhere else.  “I never thought I’d be rich. But we’re not only rich in our resources, we’re also rich in our life together,” said Lorraine, adding that she and Jim “have really excelled at this retirement thing.”

Do I know any of the people in these examples?  No.

But I relay their experiences because, in a way, they mirror my own.  With critical help from my wife, I have managed to make retirement work – financially and otherwise.

I enjoyed my professional work over about 40 years, but at the end of that period, it was time to move on to retirement.

One example for me was my father who worked in education for many years, including as a high school principal, then retired at about age 62 so he had about 15 good years with his wife, my mother.  They traveled a lot in those good years.

With my Dad’s example, I made my own system work through a combination of planning and luck.

And, I am ready for more.

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

I have been out of politics for several years – mostly, other than reading about it – and I am very glad that is true.

There is one basic reason:

It used to be that, in politics, you tried to tell the truth.  Sometimes you might have failed, but then, you corrected the record or you paid a price for spreading falsehoods.

Today?

I have written about this before, but I cannot help myself to do so again.  There is just so much to write or report.

Lying often is the name of the game in national politics today, especially if you are Donald Trump or J.D. Vance as they try to win the U.S. presidential election.

Rarely does Trump pay an appropriate price for lying.  Same for Vance.

Lying is just what they do as a matter of course.  Second nature to them.  And, now, Vance is supporting a man he said only a couple years ago was ill-suited to be president or to run for the job.

The Washington Post Fact-Checker column reported that, as president, Trump told more than 35,000 lies.  Now, the same column reported these falsehoods spread by Vance during the vice-presidential debate:

• “We’re the cleanest economy in the entire world.” — (False, the United States ranked 17th.)
• “We have 320,000 children that the Department of Homeland Security has effectively lost.” — (False, this is a ginned-up number that includes the Trump years.)
• “Donald Trump could have destroyed Obamacare.  Instead, he worked in a bi-partisan way to ensure that Americans had access to affordable care.” — (False, Trump acted to kill it repeatedly in a partisan way.)
• “Remember Trump said that on January 6th, the protesters ought to protest peacefully and on January the 20th, what happened? Joe Biden became the president.” — (False, this is a whitewash of what happened.)

Then, this from Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post.

“Trump is a master liar.  There are his insulting lies (Vice President Kamala Harris is ‘mentally disabled’).

“Then there are his xenophobic (‘They are eating the dogs, the people that came in.  They’re eating the cats.’) and antisemitic (saying Jews will be responsible if he loses) lies.

“There are his economically ignorant falsehoods (e.g., foreign countries pay tariffs).  There are his lies to raise resentment and anger at the current administration (e.g., it is denying aid to hurricane victims, crime is rising, tens of thousands of migrant murderers are running loose).

“There are his lies to deflect blame (e.g., former House speaker Nancy Pelosi is responsible for the attack on January 6, 2021; sexual assault victim E. Jean Carroll, who successfully sued Trump for defamation twice, was lying).

“There are his lies about Democrats (e.g., they favor infanticide).

“Trump also recycles numerous lies about the American people (e.g., everyone wanted to repeal Roe v. Wade, women love him) and his own record (e.g., his economy was the ‘greatest’ ever, he had a perfect call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, troops under his command suffered only ‘headaches’ from an Iranian attack).

“He even lies about what he said (e.g., denying he ever signaled openness to restricting contraception).  His lies undermining democracy might be the most dangerous (e.g., he won in 2020, millions of illegal immigrants are registering to vote).

“We should not forget the ‘merely’ ludicrous assertions of his own powers. (e.g., Hamas would not have attacked Israel if he were president, he could ‘settle’ the Ukraine war) and dystopian predictions if he loses (e.g., we won’t have a country, there will be a bloodbath’).

“And his absurd conspiracy theories can never be disproven (e.g., the Deep State).  His exaggerations about his wealth, his physical health and his cognitive performance are among the most cringeworthy.

“His lies are so prolific, they prompt some to question whether he knows he is lying.  But like many authoritarian leaders, Trump uses his go-to tactic to bend reality and bamboozle the public.  He lies to conceal his own abject failures, criminality, incompetence, disloyalty and ignorance — and the lies are made more potent when the right-wing media echoes his lies and the mainstream media presents his distortions as he said-she said disputes.

“For him, it’s better to be called a liar (and rely on the public’s suspicion that ‘all politicians lie’) than acknowledge his manifest faults and failures.

There are psychological explanations for his lying.  There are historical and political explanations for his lying.  But the consequences of his lies — stoking fear, hatred and distrust of democratic elections — are disastrous for democracy, which depends on a shared understanding of reality.”

So, with Trump – as well as Vance — the best approach is to be skeptical about anything they say because it is not likely to be true.  More than skeptical.  Don’t believe them.

Hold to the truth standard and you’ll vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, as I will.

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.

Forgive me for writing about myself.  Better, I guess, that another blog devoted to Donald Trump.

Forgive me for writing about…myself.

But, with time on my hands these days, I have found myself recalling my experience as a state lobbyist.

One of the memories are some of the sayings I used to advocate for my clients.

Here is a brief summary:

• That’s the first step down a slippery slope:  This was a phrase I sometimes used to indicate that doing one thing could lead to another thing and the result would be the bad news of falling to the bottom.  I advocated, don’t take the first step.

• That’s like a circular firing squad:  This was a phrase I used – not very often, perhaps – to indicate that taking a certain action without adequate thought could lead to more than one victim.

• That’s like ready, shoot, aim:  Similar to the phrase above, this was meant to indicate that a proposed action had not been vetted sufficiently.

• What goes around comes around.  This was a phrase used by legislators and lobbyists alike to indicate that one individual action often was not the end.  What went around often came back in another form.  It served to be a good reminder that individual actions are not just that – individual.

• Your word is your bond:  For me, this was less a saying than an aspiration.  I conclude with the phrase because I thought it was a good mark of a successful, effective lobbyist – someone you could trust to stick to his or her word.  And, if you said one thing at one time and then learned something new, you could buttress your credibility by correcting the record, indicating again that “your word was your bond.”

Think of this phrase.

It would be good if it marked, not only lobbyists, but all of us in society.

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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 blog headline was drawn from a column by Frank Bruni that appeared in the New York Times.

It was so well-written and reasoned that once again I reprint it in total in this, my blog.

Bruni cuts to the heart of the matter as he assesses the vice-presidential debate between J.D. Vance and Tim Walz.  If you look at the debate through a normal prism, then Vance won.

But, Bruni counsels, don’t use normal appraisals to assess aspects of this “abnormal election” between Democrats on one hand who may not be all we want them to be, and Republicans on the other hand who….read this paragraph:

“…are prepared to incite violence if it serves his purposes (Donald Trump’s purposes).  We know that because he has done so already.  That candidate will invent ugly fictions and promote illegal schemes to overturn the results of an election that doesn’t go his way.  That’s not my paranoia talking; that’s his record.  He places his vanity, his cupidity, his every want and whim above the integrity of our democracy, the dignity of the presidency and the welfare of the nation.  Just a week of his social media posts and a month of his rallies make that clear.”

So, with this, here is Bruni’s column.

*********

I’m ashamed of myself.

During stretches of Tuesday’s vice-presidential debate, I found myself admiring — sort of — JD Vance. I awarded him points for unflappability, wishing Tim Walz could mimic that composure and tap a well of confidence as deep. I envied his crispness, willing Walz to state his case as clearly and cleanly.

Vance’s answers seemed to have commas, semi-colons and colons in all the right places, while Walz’s herky-jerky statements were linked (or not) by ellipses.

The paper-grading professor in me gave Vance a high mark, Walz a barely passing one.

But the 2024 election isn’t an essay contest. Nor is it a beauty pageant, with the debates functioning as the interview segment. It’s a morality play. It’s about fundamental values. And Vance’s are rotten, no matter how much oratorical perfume he sprays on them, no matter how eloquently he diverts you from the stench.

The hell of the debate matched the hell of this presidential campaign, in which there’s a temptation — a pull — to evaluate performance, parse communication or dissect policy, employing criteria that we attentive citizens have used across the decades. But such assessments are utterly beside the point.

The race for president pits a Democratic ticket with many shortcomings against a Republican ticket with no scruples whatsoever, decency against indecency, respect for the democratic process against unfettered ambition, and psychological stability (Kamala Harris) against a spectacular lack thereof (you know who).

In that context, it’s pointless, even reckless, to dwell on Walz’s visible nervousness during the debate or his many missed opportunities.

Yes, he failed to nail Vance appropriately and effectively for spreading the dangerous calumny — or is it cookery? — that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating other people’s pets. Yes, that suggested a discouraging limit to Walz’s political skills.

But it didn’t erase those lies, just as Vance’s mild, even milquetoast manner on the debate stage didn’t expunge his record of hateful, bigoted remarks that demonize whole groups of Americans in the interest of whipping his followers into an election-delivering frenzy.

Vance would drive a truck through and over a huddle of thirsty people if they were the sole obstacle between him and higher office. Walz would hit the brakes, climb out of his vehicle and offer them some of his Diet Mountain Dew.

Our reflexes prompt us to observe and analyze this election as we have many others, and so some of us chide Harris for avoiding interviews and, when she does give one, often leaning on vague, canned answers. That’s a fair, worthy complaint to the extent that it’s pushing a person who’s seeking the most powerful office in the world to flex her intellectual nimbleness and present a comprehensive plan.

Some of us tuned in to the vice-presidential debate to gauge Walz’s steadiness in circumstances with higher stakes and higher visibility than the ones he was accustomed to before Harris made him her running mate, and we’re disappointed that he wasn’t sturdier.

That’s understandable, and that’s responsible in and of itself. Walz could end up a proverbial heartbeat away from the presidency.

In addition to which, the range of skills that he and the other players in the presidential contest demonstrate and the degree of competence that they project could determine the election’s outcome. Those factors are tactically relevant.

But as I wrote last week and will surely write again before Nov. 5, the normal stuff — the details of one economic proposal versus another, the major and minor line items on the candidates’ curricula vitae — doesn’t matter in this abnormal election, because a single consideration nullifies all others.

It’s this:

One candidate is prepared to incite violence if it serves his purposes. We know that because he has done so already. That candidate will invent ugly fictions and promote illegal schemes to overturn the results of an election that doesn’t go his way. That’s not my paranoia talking; that’s his record. He places his vanity, his cupidity, his every want and whim above the integrity of our democracy, the dignity of the presidency and the welfare of the nation. Just a week of his social media posts and a month of his rallies make that clear.

And the crucial takeaway from the vice-presidential debate was Vance’s audacious claim — I questioned my own hearing — that Donald Trump honored the peaceful transfer of power from one president to another when his administration ended and Joe Biden’s began. In what alternate timeline? In what parallel universe?

With that comment and with others, Vance laundered and sanctioned Trump’s depravity, telling us not merely that he stands with Trump but that he sinks every bit as low as Trump.

I’ll take all the ellipses in creation over that exclamation point.

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

Washington Post columnist Matt Bai wrote the other day to express deep concern about a man who could become president.

Yes, J.D. Vance who, if he becomes vice president alongside a man, Donald Trump who will be 78-years-old if he becomes president, perish the thought.

About Vance, Bai said, “He is not just a running mate, but a man who stands a significant chance of running the country.”

For me, that statement rings even more foreboding after Vance managed to create a false impression in the debate yesterday against Democrat Tim Walz — a false impression that he was reasonable and reasoned, without, unfortunately, having to defend many of the crazy things he has said and done over the last few weeks.

Though I didn’t watch debate – I don’t watch such things anymore – what I read in national newspapers the day after suggested that Vance came across as a different person than he actually is, which is that he wants to be like Donald Trump and to lead the MAGA crowd.

More from Bai in what he wrote before the debate:

“To understand why Vance could be the most consequential figure on either presidential ticket this year, and why you should pay close attention to his debate with Tim Walz, consider what almost happened to Richard M. Nixon.

“In 1952, Dwight D. Eisenhower needed a running mate and settled on Nixon, a 39-year-old first-term senator and military veteran, who had found instant celebrity among his party’s arch-conservatives for his ardent, often misleading attacks on alleged communists.  Nixon was, in other words, eerily similar to Vance — at least in his résumé.

“What you might not remember is that in 1955, Eisenhower, who at 65 was considered a notably old president, suffered a massive heart attack while on a golfing trip in Denver.  That Ike survived was pretty much a flip of the coin.  Had he died, America would have seen the Nixon presidency 14 years earlier than it actually did.”

Bai added that “we should not get to Election Day without pausing to consider that Trump is 78 and, statistically speaking, far more likely to die in office than the vast majority of our presidents were.  Which means we have to evaluate Vance, not just as a No. 2, but also as a man who stands a significant chance of running the country.”

Bai worries about what that would mean – and, given Vance’s real history, so do I.

Bai said that, “Like Trump in 2016, Vance has virtually no political experience; his only qualification when he ran for Senate two years ago — yes, it was that recent — was having written a best-selling memoir.

“We have only his accumulated rhetoric to go on — and the more you analyze that, the more it seems like maybe a job for a therapist rather than a policy expert.

“While other aspects of Vance’s worldview have come and gone depending on what’s expedient, one thing has remained chillingly consistent.  Vance is bizarrely obsessed with setting down rules for women in society, almost as if this were something America’s women were pleading with him to clarify.

His view, Bai writes, can be summarized this way:  

“This His I won’t compile a list here of his various moral edicts (others have), but I think we can fairly summarize Vance’s worldview this way: =e biological purpose of women is to have children, and after they’ve raised those children, their only remaining purpose is to raise their children’s children.  If they don’t have children, then they are ancillary members of the community and should have less say in how we’re governed.  And if they weren’t born here, or if they’re gay or transgender, then they’re polluting the common culture.”

And this from Bai:

“Vance stands at the vanguard of the millennials — the first American generation to see life as public performance, an unending series of selfies and posts and provocation.

“And maybe that’s the key to understanding him.  I think he attaches no real meaning to governance, beyond the opportunity to be an influencer.  He affects a nerdier, more cerebral veneer than Trump, but in this they are the same:  The point of the whole exercise is to be seen.

“Take a hard look at Vance, a man who could well become president overnight, and decide for yourself whether he is a kind of holy warrior for male superiority and White culture or whether he’s simply settled on the persona that makes him viral.”

I hope women, as they vote in the next few weeks, will take a hard look at both Trump and Vance and end up believing that their tarnished view of women would be going back, not forward.

I add that, the other day on a cruise from Montreal and back to Montreal – yes, that takes 10 days on the St. Lawrence River – I looked again at an old movie, “The American President.”

Good respite from focusing on today’s politics.

One of the stars, Michael Douglas, was shown making a great statement to the press about his girlfriend (he was a widower) who had come under political attack.

The line I remember was this:  “In this country we have serious problems and we need serious people who will deal with them.”

Not buffoons like Trump and Vance who see themselves as the center of their universe, which is anti-women – not to mention anti-the rest of us.

Perspective from the 19^th Hole 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.

I wrote this headline to summarize other passengers on our cruise in Canada aboard the Oceania lines ship “Insignia.”

My wife, Nancy, and I look around and all we see are old people.

Glad that, well, we are not among them.

Some signs of age among the passengers:

• The musical bands aboard play mostly slow music.  My wife used as good to describe it – melancholy.

• The stage shows memorialize a day gone by.  What were the Gatsby’s anyway?

• It usually is best to walk slowly behind folks as they make their way around the ship.  Otherwise, you bump into them.

We have been on several Oceania ships over the years.

Typically, guests tend to be 55-plus, with a mix of couples, solo travelers, and families with adult children looking for a food and beverage-focused experience.  There is mix of well-known and off-the-beaten-path ports of call.  While children are allowed onboard, there is no kids’ programming.

On several Oceania ships, including Insignia, the total of bookings is no more than 1,250 – in other words small by comparison to many other ships in other lines.

While on-line sources use the 55-plus number above, the average age of travelers is actually between 65 and 70.

This time, we boarded Insignia in Montreal and traveled down the St. Lawrence River to the Atlantic coast, then will be heading back to Montreal over the next few days.

So, to my fellow travelers, I say, (a) it is good to be with you, and (b) please move faster so us youngsters can make quicker progress.