Perspective from the 19th 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 is one of five departments I run with a free hand to manage as I see fit.
So, I open the department heralded in this headline.
FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES:
“Examples are far too many to enumerate, but recall just a few (errors by Donald Trump): Trump described his political opponents as ‘vermin’ and said immigrants were ‘poisoning the blood of our country.’
“When Robert Mueller died in March, Trump posted that he was ‘glad he’s dead.’ When Rob Reiner and his wife were murdered in their home, he blamed the killings on Reiner’s criticism of him.
“He courted and excused political violence — winking at threats against officials who crossed him, joking about the near-fatal attack on Nancy Pelosi’s husband, and praising and then pardoning January 6 rioters.
“He revels in bullying, cruelty and hate as no president ever has. Beneath it all is the normalization of lying on an industrial scale: Tens of thousands of documented false claims as president, including false accusations against Americans and false representations to courts.”
COMMENT: There, another good summary of Trump’s actions, which for anyone else, would put them in jail.
FROM THE WASHINGTON POST:
“In interviews and speeches, President Donald Trump has maintained that mid-term politics don’t affect his decisions on Iran, that the war has been worth the cost, and that he would do it all over again despite Republicans bracing for defeat in November.
“But in some private conversation with advisers, Trump has signaled that he understands his decisions on the war have contributed to the especially poor political environment his party faces — making the president more intent on helping Republicans mitigate the expected losses.
“Trump in recent weeks has become sober about the gravity of the political situation, listening intently as he is presented with often discouraging polling, according to four people with knowledge of his recent comments, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. That shift has prompted him to take more action on the midterms — pledging to stump for candidates and opening his war chest in competitive races, for example — although it remains to be seen how effectively Republicans can gain ground over the next six weeks.
COMMENT: Good reporting by the NY Times, but this assumes that Trump thinks before he acts, or that he acknowledges that his actions have caused political problems. For me, the assumptions have been proven false time after time with Trump. He doesn’t think before he acts, nor does he assess his potential failures.
FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES:
“TV networks are denying Trump what he craves – attention.”
COMMENT: The sentence illustrates a lot. Notice that it doesn’t say that Trump craves success for the U.S. He craves attention for himself.
