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.

The words in this blog headline – character and Trump – don’t go well together.

They are dissonant.

And Trump, soon to be inaugurated as president of the United States for a second time, proves his lack of character every day.

Two examples:

• Rather than praise first responders who are risking their lives to fight wildfires in California, he criticizes them.

• Rather than nominate Cabinet members and other high-level officials with strong experience and character, he proposes persons who wouldn’t pass regular job interviews.

The latter emerged yesterday when one Pete Hegseth appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee to tout his credentials to run the Department of Defense.  It didn’t take long.

He fell flat on his face, though you wouldn’t know it by Republican senators who prostrated themselves before Trump to appear ready to vote to confirm Hegseth.

Here is how The Atlantic writer Tom Nichols put it:

“Not long after Secretary of Defense nominee Pete Hegseth read his opening statement and began fielding questions from the Senate Armed Services Committee, I began thinking:  I hope neither America’s allies nor its enemies are watching this.

“The hope was, of course, completely unreasonable.  Such hearings are watched closely by friends and foes alike, in order to take the measure of a nominee who might lead the most powerful military in the world and would be a close adviser to the president of the United States.

“What America and the world saw today was not a serious examination of a serious man.  Instead, Republicans on the committee showed that they would rather elevate an unqualified and unfit nominee to a position of immense responsibility than cross Donald Trump, Elon Musk, or the most ardent Republican voters in their home states.

“America’s allies should be deeply concerned.  America’s enemies, meanwhile, are almost certainly laughing in amazement at their unexpected good fortune.”

Another commentator said, “Democrats failed to land a decisive blow against Hegseth,” but I add that it’s hard to identify a fatal blow when just the facts about Hegseth should render him incompetent to run anything, much less the Department of Defense.

The Hegseth confirmation hearing is only the first of several in Congress this week.

In this corner, the betting is that most Trump nominees will pass muster in the Senate, as if that’s a credential, given the fealty Republicans are showing to Trump.