PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

I am little hesitant to write again about “critical race theory” because I am not sure I have much new to offer to the swirling debate.  I guess I could add that ignorance doesn’t usually stop me.

But, an essay in the Wall Street Journal this morning prompted me to think again about the subject.  It appeared under this interesting headline – “The Hedgehogs of Critical Race Theory” — and this first paragraph:

“The political philosopher Isaiah Berlin turned an obscure fragment by the ancient Greek poet Archilochus (‘The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing’) into an intellectual’s cocktail-party game.  In a famous essay, published as a book in 1953, Berlin suggested that the world is divided between hedgehogs and foxes—between those who believe in One Big Thing (one all-sufficient super-explanation), and those who are content with a more modest, irrational and even incoherent idea of history’s unfolding. Karl Marx was a supreme hedgehog: Everything, for him, was about the conflict of economic classes.  Franklin D. Roosevelt was a restlessly improvising fox. “

The essayist, Lance Morrow, used the above to contend that many people today start with important truths – slavery was wicked, for example – “and then get carried away into monomania.”

Here are two paragraphs that summarize Morrow’s contention:

“The hedgehog’s trajectory may begin on the side of undeniable and important truth—for example, the truth that slavery was a great wickedness in America (as it was elsewhere in the world), and that race prejudice has been a chronic American dilemma and a moral blight that has damaged and scarred the lives of millions of black American citizens over generations.

“All true—a truth to be acknowledged and addressed. But hedgehogs, who deal in absolutes, are liable to get carried away. Their truth changes shape as it coalesces into a political movement and gets a taste of power and begins to impose itself programmatically. Its ambitions swell, it grows messianic, it embraces civic idiocies (defund the police!) and beholds the astounding impunity with which it may run amok in the streets and burn police cars and shopping malls, as it did last summer, and the ease with which it may take over city councils and mayors’ offices and turn so many of the country’s normal arrangements upside down.”

I agree with Morrow’s basic notions, though, for me, I summarize my views a bit differently as follows:

1. It makes all the sense in the world for all of us to become more aware of racism, both in society and in our ourselves.  The latter often can be subtle, but still important.  Knowing more and learning more about racism and ourselves are solid goals.
2. Things go too far when “critical race theory” becomes a political catch-all phrase that forms a prism through which every other issue is judged.  Concern about racism becomes political, not personal.  And, political overkill makes it almost impossible to recognize progress we have made as a nation against imbedded racism.  The fact is that recognition of progress – as well as how far we have to go — can create incentives for more progress.
3. As a Christian, I also recognize what God says about race in the Bible.  HE says we should not be a respecter of persons and that everyone – regardless of race, skin color, geography or history – can be a CHILD OF GOD.  Good for us to remember that God calls us to respect and love all others just as he does.

My wife, to her credit, takes action to illustrate her love for other, especially refugees.  They arrive in the Salem nearly every week and often are helped by a program run through our church, Salem Alliance.

My wife’s role has been to provide clothes, food and furniture to these refugees as they arrive here trying to build a new home for themselves.  So, concern for immigrants is not something that just happens at our southern border.  It is right here where we live.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

My family had the recent good fortune to spend a week in Hawaii.

Yes, the entire family.  And it was good to be together on the island of Maui.  Mostly post-pandemic.

Here a few of my impressions after the week-long trip.

PANDEMIC – ALIVE OR NOT?  In advance of our trip – we departed on July 5 – we had to get a Covid test and prove that we were still “negative.”  The result would allow us to board the Alaska flight to Hawaii.

Of course, about three days after we left Oregon, the Covid test requirement was shelved, though given late news about rise of the Delta variant, it would not surprise me to see the Covid test requirement reinstated.

In Hawaii, there was evidence of the pandemic, mostly the requirement to wear masks inside any building, including restaurants, hotels, and golf pro shops.  Otherwise, no imposing requirements.

RENTAL CAR CRUSH/  We heard in advance about the crush of rental car reservations in Hawaii, but, in our case, it turned out that we had no difficulty.

Here’s the way the Wall Street Journal wrote about the issue this weekend:

“Stories of painfully long waits, non-existent cars, astronomical prices and other travails are common on social media.  Some frustrated customers have taken to invoking a scene from the sitcom ‘Seinfeld,’ in which comedian Jerry Seinfeld reacts to a car rental company running out of cars:   ‘You know how to take the reservation, you just don’t know how to hold the reservation.’”

This was not our experience.  The rental car line was long when we arrived in Hawaii, but our vehicle was ready and waiting.

We had heard stories about folks renting U-Haul trucks and moving vans when cars were not available.  We didn’t see that, but, then again, we were watching the beautiful Hawaii ocean, not rental cars.

GOLF ON MAUI/My son, Eric, and I managed to play four times on Maui, twice on the Gold Courseat Wailea, once on the Emerald Course there, and once on the King Kamamaha private course.

Good golf, but….

On the Gold Course, here are strange policies.  First – okay, I guess – everyone has to wear a mask in the clubhouse.  Then, to get to the driving range, you have to grab a few clubs and borrow a special golf cart to drive about 100 feet. 

Then, finally, you don’t get the key for your regular golf cart until about five minutes before you tee off. 

I could think of better ways to arrange things.

Plus, in Hawaii, grain on greens plays havoc with your golf ball.  You have to know how to reads the grain, then adust for it.

Overall, he golf was good.  And, in case anyone wonders, son Eric beat me every time.  And that is fine – it makes me proud of him.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

My daughter posed the question in the headline to me on our recent trip to Hawaii.

Of course, there is more to do in Hawaii that ponder this question, but nonetheless it is a good one.

When I was in a position to hire employees in state government or in the lobbying and public relations company where I worked for nearly 25 years, I always focused on assessing a candidate’s ability to write.

To me, the ability to write clearly and solidly indicated an ability to think clearly and solidly.  But, my daughter properly said, it could be the other way around.

Either way, both thinking and writing are important, no matter what kind of job you aspire to or hold.

As I have focused on the ability to write during my career, I have come up with some “good writing” hints:

• Think of an ANGLE for what you write, something you believe will entice readers to continue to read.  If you don’t like the word “angle,” use proposition or main point.

• Incorporate ACTIVE VERBS.

• Follow this general rule – BEST FACT FIRST.

• Use SPRING TRANSITIONS.  Let the last sentence of a paragraph SPRING to the next, something like, which I am making up as I go:  Governor Brown won plaudits for her effort to find middle ground on various issues at the Capitol.  Call it an attempt at bi-partisanship.  Then, on to the next paragraph:  Bi-partisan efforts also marked the work of Senator Mark Hass as he tried to forge a compromise on tax policy in the Senate Revenue Committee.

• Include the 5 WS AND THE H — who, what, when, where, why and how.  

• Use the INVERTED PYRAMID style – best fact first, then other facts and perspectives that may be of lesser importance.

• Don’t hesitate to describe to YOUR OWN EXPERIENCE in what you write because doing so will have the potential to bring your ideas alive. 

Consider these to be guidelines.  Not hard and fast rules.  For, writing is an art, not a science. 

Let your personality show through what you write.

So, think clearly and write clearly.  Or write clearly as a reflection of thinking clearly.  Either way works.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

The question in the headline arose as I read a column last weekend by Michel Gerson who writes for the Washington Post.

The issue also crossed my mind as I note how mad Americans appear to be at each other.  Nowhere is this more apparent than in
Congress where Republicans hate Democrats and Democrats hate Republicans.

Here’s how Gerson started his piece:

‘If we were to judge the health of our republic by the sanity and stability of Fox News hosts, these would be dark times indeed.

“After Army General Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently defended the academic study of critical race theory at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Laura Ingraham vented:  “Why is Congress not saying, ‘We’re not going to give you a penny until all of this is eradicated from the military budget? Nothing.’”  She is asserting, in essence, that the military should be defunded if it doesn’t share her latest culture-war mania.

“It’s true that our nation is more than the sum of its ideological grifters and bottom feeders.  But Ingraham’s remarks are relevant because conservative media has reshaped one of the United States’ political parties in its angry, ignorant image.”

Gerson posits that “significant actors in our political life have lost something important.  They no longer care about the integrity of our constitutional process or accept the existence of a shared public reality.  They care only about achieving their preferred political outcomes.  This was the motivating spirit behind the January 6 Capitol revolt and is the continuing inspiration of former president Donald Trump’s big electoral lie: If American systems and institutions don’t deliver the results we seek, burn them down.”

He also suggests that what can be done about threats to American democracy is not to respond in kind.  Anyone, he writes, “who believes that the primary object of politics is to discredit and crush your political enemies is contributing to the crisis.” 

Rather, Gerson advocates two responses:

1.  Individual action to make the country better, inasmuch as all of us are not able to control big-picture trends.
2. What he calls “do-gooderism, which means, he says, activities such as civic education, a year of national service, ranked choice voting, or independent redistricting commissions.

“Let me rise in defense of do-gooderism as a defining American characteristic.  Our civic crisis of vicious polarization can yield only to efforts at civic healing.  Our social crisis of fragmentation and declining social trust can be confronted only by efforts to reknit social ties.  Our spiritual crisis of rising depression, addiction and suicide can be opposed only by community institutions that are in the business of meaning.

“Civic healing is possible only with a measure of civic idealism.  It has worked in the past.  Thousands of influential institutions were created in the late 19th century to fight political corruption, advance civil rights, promote democratic character and respond to the suffering and dislocation of urbanization and industrialization. And there are currently thousands of institutions attempting the civic, social and spiritual healing of the United States.”

Regarding civics education, I agree with Gerson.  That’s why, for last year or so, I have served on a committee created by Oregon Common Cause to explore ways to promote ethics in government.  We have arrived so far at two conclusions:  (a) School districts should, without a requirement do so, improve the content of civic education in their curricula, including an emphasis on ethical behavior and conduct; and (b) public officials should be asked to sign contracts pledging to act in ethical ways.

Still, in addition to the work of ethics committee on which I have served, a requirement is this:  Conduct yourself as an individual with a commitment to ethical behavior and don’t consider someone who disagrees with you to be your enemy.

For one thing, you might learn something from those who differ with= you.  For another, differing should not be an excuse for making enemies. 

To close, Gerson says this:  “… do-gooderism on steroids is exactly what our nation requires.  We need the social return of love — love of country and love for our impossible, invaluable neighbors.  This may be sentiment, but it is also sanity.”

Agreed.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

There is a reason why I read two national newspapers every morning.

The Washington Post reports politics from the center, though left just a bit.

The Wall Street Journal reports politics from the center, though right just a bit.

Read both and then, with other sources, come to your own views,

Today, we have another example of the left and the right as the newspapers dissected the indictment of the Trump organization and one of its main leaders, Allen Weisselberg, the number two person in the organization who reported directly to Trump.

The Post says it’s a huge issue.  The Journal says not so much.

So, read the excerpts below and come to your own decision, as I have done.

My view:  Trump and his lackeys, including Weisselberg, deserve severe punishment for their intentional schemes to defraud America by not paying taxes and other tactics.

From the Washington Post/

Sounds familiar. Previous reporting about the Trump family’s tax returns portrays a multigenerational family enterprise devoted to tax avoidance, if not outright evasion. Thursday’s 15-count indictment lays out a separate, sprawling, 15-year conspiracy to funnel millions in unreported compensation — in the form of rent-free Manhattan apartments, leased Mercedes, private-school tuition payments, and the like — to senior Trump Organization executives, including CFO Allen Weisselberg, who allegedly received $1.76 million on which he paid no taxes.  Both Weisselberg and lawyers for the Trump Organization pleaded not guilty.

“To put it bluntly, this was a sweeping and audacious illegal payments scheme,” Carey Dunne, general counsel for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, said at the arraignment.  “Contrary to today’s assertion by the company’s former CEO, this is not a ‘standard practice in the business community,’ nor was it the act of a rogue or isolated employee.”

From the Wall Street Journal/

Democrats of all stripes have devoted years to investigating Donald Trump and finding very little.  The latest example is Thursday’s indictment of the Trump Organization and its chief financial officer for classifying employee benefits as business expenses rather than compensation.

Manhattan D.A. Cyrus Vance Jr. and New York Attorney General Letitia James subpoenaed millions of documents and years of tax returns, and that’s all they’ve come up with.  The indictment lists 15 criminal counts, including second-degree grand larceny.  But the evidence in the indictment boils down to misreporting compensation to the Internal Revenue Service and New York tax authorities.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

Like many others, I feel compelled to comment on the heat.

I do so because I know many people care about what I say and write.  Right?

Here, then are just a few tidbits about what we have gone through over the last few days:

• Record heat in Salem a couple days ago – 117 degrees; yes, 117 – beat the heat in La Quinta, California on the same day.

When my wife and left there about a month ago, we did so to avoid that kind of heat.  Then turns out we brought it back with us.

• On the day after the 117-degree temperature, my wife and I walked at 6 a.m.  Guess what the temperature was?  62.  Imagine!  55 degrees difference.

• One of the guys I played golf with this week said he heard that the heat here made it almost the hottest place on earth.  Not sure that’s true, though it was hot.  And I didn’t bother checking anywhere to verify the comment.

• Speaking of golf, do you know what the hot air means?  It’s good.

It means that the air is lighter and the golf ball goes farther!  Just so you know.

That’s all I have.  Enjoy the weather, including the heat.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

I currently serve as the director of several departments – the Department of Pet Peeves, the Department of “Just Saying,” the Department of Inquiring Minds Want to Know, and the Department of Good Quotes Worth Remembering.

I have chosen to leave the latter department closed for a few weeks, but, now, despite the heat, I am opening the department again.

So here goes.

TENSIONS OVER THE INFRASTRUCTURE DEAL IN WASHINGTON, D.C.:  The Washington Post’s Catherine Rampell writes this:

“President Biden’s bi-partisan infrastructure deal was on, and then possibly off, and now seems back on again.  But there are at least three major issues that could still blow things up.

“Biden announced last Thursday that he and a group of 10 bi-partisan senators had hashed out a deal on infrastructure.  Almost immediately, there were clues that the White House was anxious about how this compromise would play with the Democratic Party’s left flank.

“One red flag was the apparent attempt to inflate the size of the package.”

So, Rampell noted that Biden, only two hours after endorsing the deal, created a quagmire by saying that he would only support and sign the deal if Congress passed other issues on his agenda, issues that would appeal to the left.

Soon, recognizing the dissonance, the Administration tried to walk back the threat, but some Democrats in Congress wouldn’t let it die, which risks the entire infrastructure package.

Rampell also posts three additional risks for the package:  The size of it, what else the Biden Administration and Democrats want, and how to pay for it.   

MORE ON CRITICAL RACE THEORY: Also in the Washington Post, columnist Eugene Robinson writes this about “critical race theory,” a notion that is getting a lot of media attention these days:

“Republicans’ hissy fit over critical race theory is nothing more than an attempt to rally the party’s overwhelmingly White base by denying documented history and uncomfortable truth.

“This manufactured controversy has nothing to do with actual critical race theory, which, frankly, is the dry and arcane stuff of graduate school seminars.  It is all about alarming White voters into believing that they are somehow threatened if our educational system makes any meaningful attempt to teach the facts of the nation’s long struggle with race.

“The Republican state legislators falling over themselves to decide how history can and cannot be taught in schools — and blowhards such as Senator Ted Cruz from Texas who warn that children are being taught “every White person is a racist” — know exactly what they’re doing. They seek to create a crisis where none exists in hopes of driving up GOP turnout in next year’s midterm elections.”

COMMENT:  If you want to read more about the critical race theory subject, go to Atlantic Magazine.  There, writer Adam Harris performs a service by providing background on a theory that has moved from academic circles to political controversy.

TRUMP AND LAWYERS:  Washington Post contributing columnist George Conway writes this about former and disgraced president Donald Trump and lawyers:

“Donald Trump could never really count on the lawyers.

“No matter how many cynical or craven congressmen, toadying aides, grifting consultants, unhinged activists, disinforming talking heads and deluded cultists he may have had, Trump still needed the lawyers. He needed serious members of the bar to provide at least some semblance of a legal justification for his attempted self-coup.

“They never did.

“Nearly six months after Jan. 6, as Trump’s private business stands on the verge of indictment, we’ve been learning more about how lawyers stood in the way of his attempt to commit the ultimate abuse of public trust during his final days in office.”

RATING AMERICA:  In the Wall Street Journal, retired executive editor Gerard Baker asks this question:

“This July Fourth, that sacred day when we commemorate the hijacking of the American continent by a gang of white supremacists in a desperate bid to hold onto their slaves, I have a question for progressives:  What do you want this country to be?

“I understand the many frustrations with its flaws.  We all have those.  I understand anger at the myriad inequalities and injustices. The work of progress is never even close to complete.

“But is there anything that would actually make them love this country? Do they understand why so many people—not only in America—admire it?”

COMMENT:  I don’t always agree with Baker, but this time, I do.  He is right.  America has flaws.  But reasonable people in this country – yes, there are some left – are working to support and make improvements.  Of necessity, that requires looking backward to assess failures – including, for example, in race issues where there is so much more to do — but it does NOT require denigrating the country that has played such major role in supporting freedom.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

There is an old saw in the lobby game that says what this blog headline touts — “if something good happens, take credit for it.”

An overstatement, no doubt, but there is a case to be made for the words because if the reverse is true – something bad happens – you get credit, read debit, for that, too.

So, it is that I read the following paragraphs in the Wall Street Journal this morning:

“WASHINGTON—President Biden walked back comments tying the fate of a roughly $1 trillion bi-partisan infrastructure agreement to a separate, Democrat effort to pass a broad anti-poverty plan, recommitting to the bi-partisan deal after Republicans threatened to withdraw their support.

“Biden said Saturday that his earlier comments ‘created the impression that I was issuing a veto threat’ on his proposal, ‘which was certainly not my intent.’

“The bottom line is this: ‘ I gave my word to support the infrastructure plan, and that’s what I intend to do.  I intend to pursue the passage of that plan, which Democrats and Republicans agreed to on Thursday, with vigor,’ he said in a statement.  Biden will travel to Wisconsin on Tuesday to discuss the merits of the agreement, according to a White House official.”

Now, no doubt it was my blog yesterday that prompted the new Biden position.  My words were, of course, compelling.

In yesterday’s blog, I used this quote from the Wall Street Journal:

“Politicians in Washington renege on their bi-partisan promises all the time, but what are we to make of a deal in which one side admits it is pulling a bait and switch from the start?

“That was the astonishing news Thursday as President Biden and Speaker Pelosi endorsed a bi-partisan Senate infrastructure deal even as they said the price of their support is getting the rest of their agenda, too.”

With Biden’s new position – he reiterated his support for infrastructure deal without conditions – there is little doubt but that I should get credit for the emerging bi-partisan deal.

Okay.  Just let me have my few moments of glory.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

Here’s a new buzz-phrase:  Critical race theory.

It is a phrase that is being used by many on the left to indicate that everything in this country around race and the U.S. is completely racist through and through.

Or, I guess that’s what it may means.

But, many Republicans dispute the contention and, thus don’t like what the phrase has come to mean.

Over the past few months, and particularly through June, hosts and anchors on Fox have ramped up the conversation about the theory.

The concept has been around for more than 40 years, according to EducationWeek, but it has become a major programming theme on Fox News only in recent months as parents, buoyed by conservative activists and groups, have vocally opposed the teaching of the theory — or something similar to it — in schools throughout the country. Republican-led state legislatures have voted to outlaw it.

Whenever the phrase is used by the left, it is not necessarily defined.  And those who use the phrase don’t want a discussion.  They, apparently, want all of us to salute.

Three columns dealing with the theory have caught my attention recently.

In the Washington Post, Dana Milbank wrote that “critical race theory (at its core, the belief that racism in America is systemic) has been around for decades in academic circles without attracting much attention — until Fox News took it up last summer.”

Typical.  Fox News is the apparent source – a bad one – for a new political horse to ride.

Milbank continued:  “As The Post’s Laura Meckler and Josh Dawsey report, a Fox News guest, Christopher Rufo, declared that critical race theory had ‘pervaded every institution in the federal government’ — and Trump and his allies took it from there.  

“The irony, of course, is that Republicans are now proving that systemic racism exists — and they, along with Fox News, are the primary offenders.  With their united stand against the voting-rights bill…they’re the ones reducing Americans ‘to their racial identity alone.’”

Retired Wall Street Journal senior editor Gerard Baker also dealt with the issue.

“I learned economics from a Marxist,” he reports.  “It was the height of the Cold War, a critical moment when the survival of the West seemed in doubt, an age when many people, even those under no illusions about the unfolding terror of Soviet communism, wondered whether capitalism’s days might be numbered.

“(My tutor) was first and foremost a teacher, an intellectually insatiable pedagogue with a desire to foster among his students a hunger for a broad understanding of the discipline.”

Think of that.  A requirement for critical thinking.  Not a requirement to accept one train of thought.

Baker goes on to suggest that critical thinking on all counts “is the essence of a liberal education:  The nurturing and development of independent minds by erudite teachers of various ideological persuasions through exposure to the widest range of intellectual inquiry.”

And it is in peril, he contends.

“The crisis engulfing our institutions represents the struggle for ascendancy of an ideology that is literally the antithesis of the educational values that have driven the West’s unrivaled economic, social and technological progress for the past few centuries.

“Critical race theory—and its various post-modern cousins—is not some interesting interpretation of social and political history that we are free to examine, embrace or discard.  Its proponents do not seek to frame a critique of modern America to be tested alongside alternatives.

“They insist that a traditionally liberal approach to evaluating the merits of competing ideas is itself an outgrowth of an illegitimate system of oppression.  Rejection of their critique is the product of false consciousness, since critical thought is itself invalid, the product of white male hegemony.”

The third writer on this subject is Washington Post columnist, Michael Gerson, one of my favorites.

He wrote this:

“Though our nation is beset with systemic racism, we also have the advantage of what a friend calls ‘systemic anti-racism.’  We have documents — the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the 14th Amendment — that call us to our better selves.  

“We are a country that has exploited and oppressed Black Americans.  But we arealso the country that has risen up in mass movements, made up of Blacks and Whites, to confront those evils.  The response to systemic racism is the determined, systematic application of our highest ideals.”

Gerson is right. 

We have the wherewithal to inveigh against racism – and work hard to remove racist thoughts and actions from ourselves.  And we can do so without denigrating this country as the “critical race theorists” want us to do; we can consider all viewpoints on all issues, then reject some and accept others.  And recognize the good points in OUR country. 

It is one trait of a civilized culture.

PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  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.

That was the headline in a Washington Post editorial this morning – and I agree with it.

At one point post-Donald Trump, I vowed never to write about him again.  I have broken the vow on a couple occasions and am doing so again, given what is at stake.

He so defamed the office of President of the United States that he deserves to remain defeated.  Still, though, he talks of rebounding.

And, for the life of me, I cannot understand why folks – even some of my friends – can stay tethered to Trump, apparently believing that he should rebound.

Here’s the detail of what the Post wrote:

“Many Republicans want the nation to ignore and forget President Donald Trump’s poisonous final months in office — the most dangerous moment in modern presidential history, orchestrated by the man to whom the GOP still swears allegiance.

“Yet,” the country must not forget how close it came to a full-blown constitutional crisis, or worse. Tuesday brought another reminder that, but for the principled resistance of some key officials, the consequences could have been disastrous.

The House Committee on Oversight and Reform on Tuesday released emails showing that the White House waged a behind-the-scenes effort to enlist the Justice Department in its crusade to advance Trump’s baseless allegations of fraud in the 2020 election.

“On December14, 10 days before Jeffrey Rosen took over as acting attorney general, Trump’s assistant emailed Rosen, asserting that Dominion Voting Systems machines in Michigan were intentionally fixed and pointing to a debunked analysis showing what ‘the machines can and did do to move votes.’  The email declared, ‘We believe it has happened everywhere.’

“Later that month, Trump’s assistant sent Rosen a brief that the president apparently wanted the Justice Department to submit to the Supreme Court.  The draft mirrored the empty arguments that the state of Texas made to the court before the justices dismissed the state’s lawsuit.

“Piling on the pressure, then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows also dispatched an email asking Rosen to examine allegations of voter fraud in Georgia.  A day later, Meadows apparently forwarded Rosen a video alleging that Italians used satellites to manipulate voting equipment.  These were just some of the preposterous White House emails claiming fraud in arguably the most secure presidential election ever.

“To his credit, Rosen rebuffed the White House’s entreaties to deploy the Justice Department’s vast powers on behalf of Trump’s lie, adding his name to the roster of honorable state and federal officials who showed fidelity to truth and duty at that crucial moment.

“Given Mr. Trump’s reckless actions after losing the 2020 vote, and the violence they spurred, the newly released emails are unsurprising.  But consider that fact for a moment:  It is unsurprising that the president of the United States leaned on the Justice Department to help him try to steal an election.  The country cannot forget that Trump betrayed his oath, that most Republican officeholders remain loyal to him nonetheless — and that it could be worse next time.”

The country should never forget the damage Trump did to the United States – and, thus, he should stay where he is, sequestered and out of touch…so “it cannot be worse next time.”