This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

In previous blogs, I have said that I read the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post every day. 

Why?

Well, look only at excerpts of two editorials that ran this morning to grasp that I want to gain perspectives on both sides of major public policy issues facing our country.

From the Journal, I get the right-of-center perspective.

From the Post, I get the let-of-center perspective.

The excerpts.

FROM THE WASHINGTON POST:  The heavily redacted affidavit in which the FBI requested court permission to search Donald Trump’s home, released Friday, is more tantalizing than it is revealing.  But what is visible, despite pages of blacked-out text, makes the Justice Department appear thoughtful and deliberate — and the former president quite the opposite.

On the orders of a federal magistrate judge, the DOJ unsealed the document claiming to establish probable cause for entering Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate to seize suspected sensitive materials improperly transported from the White House. The most important information — the specific pieces of evidence that persuaded the court to permit the FBI search — were obscured to protect the probe and the witnesses who have assisted it.

But the text that remained visible still contained some useful information. This includes a closer look at the Trump camp’s back and forth with the National Archives and Records Administration and the FBI before the search, a granular list of the classification markings on the materials in question, and a mention of the possibility that “evidence of obstruction will be found.”

FROM THE WALL STREET JOURNAL:  A federal judge on Friday released a heavily redacted version of the FBI affidavit used to justify the search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, and we can’t help but wonder is that it? This is why agents descended on a former President’s residence like they would a mob boss?

It’s possible the redactions in the 38-page document release contain some undisclosed bombshell.  But given the contours of what the affidavit and attachments reveal, this really does seem to boil down to a fight over the handling of classified documents.  The affidavit’s long introduction and other unredacted paragraphs all point to concern by the FBI and the National Archives with the documents Trump retained at Mar-a-Lago and his lack of cooperation in not returning all that the feds wanted. ‘

So, which of these two venerable journalism outfits is right?  Well, I am not close enough to the process to make a final decision.  But my instincts lie with the Post for this simple, basic reason:  No one is above the law and that includes Trump.

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

I have written several times previously about this inhumane and tragic Trump Administration policy – separate children from their parents at the border, often literally by tearing away the little ones from their screaming parents.

Read this:  “Children were clinging to whatever part of their parents they could hold on to—arms, shirts, pant legs.  Finally the agent would pull hard and take away the child.  It was horrible.  These weren’t some little animals that they were wrestling over; they were human children.”

It was – and is – tragedy beyond belief.

What’s more, it was intentional.  Donald Trump and his minions, acolytes and sycophants did it.  And they congratulated themselves for the action.

The Atlantic Magazine wrote about this, publishing an 18-month investigation that involved more than 150 interviews, a review of thousands of pages of government records, and 30,000 words written by a solid journalist, Caitlin Dickerson.

Reading the entire story is worth it.  But here I re-print a summary written by Atlantic National Editor Scott Stossell that appeared under this headline:  “The Policy Was Wrong, Period.”

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Okay, I, a dedicated golfer, have a simple solution to the controversy roiling the sport I love.

Instruct the pro golfers who have defected to LIV golf from the PGA Tour to utter this simple, yet profound, phrase:  I did it for the money, not to grow the game of golf.

In other words, I did it to grow my wallet, not grow the game.

That honesty would do it for me.

Otherwise, enough from Greg Norman, Phil Mickelson, Brooks Koepka and their like.  No more talk about how they hope golf grows in the future by their actions today. 

Just take the money, admit it, and run. 

Then, we can get back to real competitive golf, not the LIV exhibition funded by blood money.

Plus, there have been some notions around that, if U.S. corporations do business with Saudi Arabia, which finances LIV golf, then it is okay for golfers to take tainted money from the Saudis. 

I object.  One mistake – corporate business with the Saudis – doesn’t authorize another, LIV golf.

So, if wallets are to be grown, so be it.  Just don’t mix that with growing the game we love.

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Attending church yesterday at our regular location in Salem, Oregon, Salem Alliance Church, produced this awe-inspiring experience.

It turned out to be a special Sunday, one that illustrated that ALL people – yes, ALL people – can be children of God.  “His family” accommodates all who come to Him.

When we arrived at church, we saw an incredible gathering on the platform.  About 30 people from Middle East countries were there to lead us in music and worship.

Many were young children with their parents.  There was an overall leader, a gentleman who co-runs a great program, Salem For Refugees, which began in our church five years ago or so and continues to be a priority for the church.

The individuals on the platform sang worship songs in these languages, some in their own language and some in languages they learned:

• Swahili

• Urdu

• Farsi

• French

• Spanish

• English

One of the most awe-inspiring moments occurred when the leader asked everyone – those on the platform and those in the audience – to sing the same song in their own language.  It was a great combination of sounds – and it was on key, even if we didn’t know all of the words in other languages.

The individuals on the platform are in Salem because of the work of “Salem For Refugees.”

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the official definition of a refugee “is someone who has been forced to flee his or her country because of persecution, war, or violence.  A refugee has a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group.  Most likely, they cannot return home or are afraid to do so.  War and ethnic, tribal and religious violence are leading causes of refugees fleeing their countries.”

In response, Salem For Refugees began at our church to lead all of us in Salem to view refugees as people, to provide for their living and learning expenses, and to give them a chance to choose God, if they had not already done so in their native lands.

Refugees have come from the Middle East, Afghanistan, Ukraine and other places, with Salem as a place that welcomes them.

Overall, the organization provides direct financial support to families re-settled in Salem and the support includes such expenses as rent, utilities, and furniture.

But more than money is involved.

The organization leads an effort for all of us to see refugees as REAL PEOPLE…people who need our help to survive and thrive.

As I said above, our Sunday service also illustrated that Christ accepts all people who accept Him.  Not whites like myself who happen to live in the United States.  Not persons like myself who happen to speak English.  Not persons like myself who happened to grow up in a church.

ALL people!

The words of Scripture put it very well.

Matthew 11:28: “Are you weary, carrying a heavy burden?  Then come to me. I will refresh your life, for I am your oasis.  Simply join your life with mine.  Learn my ways and you’ll discover that I’m gentle, humble, easy to please.  You will find refreshment and rest in me.”

We saw this first-hand Sunday, an awe-inspiring experience.

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

There are a host of ways to describe the presidencies of Donald Trump and Joe Biden.

I have used many descriptions to deride Trump and commend Biden.

Here is the way Washington Post writer E. J. Dionne made the point in a recent column:

“Whatever else they were doing, the voters who put Biden into the presidency in 2020 were seeking something closer to a functional, normal democracy.  

“This was the opposite of what we had when Trump rampaged around the White House, obsessed only with himself, his image, and the attention-grabbing havoc he could wreak.

“That normality means Biden does not grab the headlines, particularly on cable news and social media, the way Trump still can.

“No one who runs for president lacks ego, but Biden is a fundamentally decent man who has spent his life thinking about what legislation he could pass, which problems he might start solving, and how he could tilt the economic playing field a bit more toward the kinds of people he grew up with in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.”

Excellent point.

Biden may not win re-election if he actually runs again and, clearly, he is not perfect as the U.S. political leader.  But he deserves consideration, not for achieving all he or the left wants, but for behaving in a decent way.

That’s more than we’ll ever get with Trump, who, as Dionne writes, is “obsessed only with himself, his image and the attention-grabbing havoc he could wreak.”

Further, consider this by writer Tom Nichols as it appeared in the most recent on-line edition of The Atlantic Magazine.  Under the headline, “A Deepening Void,” Nichols used telling words to describe Trump.  And, intentionally, I quote it at length because what Nichols writes details the coming “civil war” in America due substantially to Trump.  Or, perhaps a certain kind of civil war is already is here.

From Nichols:

“Civil war is among the many terms we now use too easily.  The American Civil War was a bloodbath driven by the inevitable confrontation between the Union and the organized forces of sedition and slavery.  But at least the Civil War was about something.  

“Compared with the bizarre ideas and half-baked wackiness that now infest American political life, the arguments between the North and the South look like a deep treatise on government.

“The United States now faces a different kind of violence, from people who believe in nothing—or at least, in nothing real.  We do not risk the creation of organized armies and militias in Virginia or Louisiana or Alabama marching on federal institutions.  Instead, all of us face random threats and unpredictable dangers from people among us who spend too much time watching television and plunging down internet rabbit holes.

“These people, acting individually or in small groups, will be led not by rebel generals but by narcissistic wannabe heroes, and they will be egged on by cowards and instigators who will inflame them from the safety of a television or radio studio — or from behind the shield of elected office. Occasionally, they will congeal into a mob, as they did on January 6, 2021.

“There is no single principle that unites these Americans in their violence against their fellow citizens. They will tell you that they are for ‘liberty’ and ‘freedom,’ but these are merely code words for personal grudges, racial and class resentments, and a generalized paranoia that dark forces are manipulating their lives.

“These are not people who are going to take up the flag of a state or of a deeper cause; they have already taken up the flag of a failed president, and their causes are a farrago of conspiracy theories and pulpy science-fiction plots.

“What makes this situation worse is that there is no remedy for it.  When people are driven by fantasies, by resentment, by an internalized sense of inferiority, there is no redemption in anything.  Winning elections, burning effigies, even shooting at other citizens does not soothe their anger, but instead deepens the spiritual and moral void that haunts them.

“Donald Trump is central to this fraying of public sanity, because he has done one thing for such people that no one else could do:  He has made their lives interesting.  He has made them feel important.  He has taken their itching frustrations about the unfairness of life and created a morality play around them, and cast himself as the central character.

“Trump, to his supporters, is the avenging angel who is going to lay waste to the ‘elites, the smarty-pantses and do-gooders, the godless and the smug, the satisfied and the comfortable.’”

And, then, this from Norm Ornstein, an author and political scientist at the American Enterprise Institute:

“…oaths mean little to Trump.  Fealty to the law meant nothing to him.  The country’s interests meant nothing to him.  The only oath he has taken is to his own greed and self-preservation.”

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Me.

That’s why, in retirement, I had nothing better to do the other day than read a column by Benjamin Dreyer that appeared in the Washington Post.

I wish I had his job.

He is Random House’s executive managing editor and copy chief and the author of “Dreyer’s English:  An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style.”

I like words (better than numbers), so his job would have been a great one for me.

Here is how Dreyer started his column:

“The Washington Post’s style-meisters a few months ago quietly re-styled the name of what is bringing you these words, from the ‘Internet’ to the ‘internet.’  I hope my hosts here will forgive me, but the switch, made long after many other publications had gone lowercase, put me in mind of Hiroo Onoda, the Japanese intelligence officer who, disbelieving that World War II had wrapped up in 1945, continued to stalk the Philippines for another 29 years before, finally, facing and accepting reality and surrendering.”

Word-style folk like Dreyer tend to lean toward what he calls “the Onoda-ish:  Mistrustful of change, never quite wanting, in the face of orthographic evolution, to be the last one to lay down their arms, but certainly never wanting to be the first, either.”

Dreyer remembers how, when fresh copies of the 10^th edition of Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary came out in 1993, he riffed through the pages to find out whether words had changed.  He found at least one:   The words “light bulb,” as they were in the 1983 ninth edition, acknowledged modern life and became “light-bulb”? 

And he also remembers the 11^th edition when the word “light-bulb” became “lightbulb.”

Other changes include not capitalizing the word “internet” or changing the word e-mail to email.

See, this is big stuff in the words business!

Well, in response, sort of, to Dreyer, here are my hot buttons of language and its usage:

• I like to use hyphens such as in the word “bi-partisan,” which is in common usage today, though not so much in action in places like Congress.  If you don’t use the hyphen, the uninitiated could pronounce the word like this – “bip…artisan.”  Or, consider the word “on-line.”  Better with a hyphen.
• I like to use capitalization when I think it is indicated, such as in the word “administration” when applied, for example, to the Biden Administration.  Makes sense to me given the importance of those who work for any president.  Or, in Oregon, the word “Legislature” to describe the 90 lawmakers who meet in Salem every year.  Again, agree or disagree with them, they carry an important job, deserving capitalization.
• I like to use commas because, I believe, they aid in readability.
• According to Washington Post columnist Perry Bacon, the dispute over the FBI’s search of former president Donald Trump’s property at Mar-a-Lago highlights a flaw in our public discourse that has real and negative consequences:  The widespread use of the term “political” when what is really meant is “partisan.”  Agreed.  Good point.  Opponents of the search are being partisan, not political.
• And, in an example I have used before in previous blogs on words, I dislike “ize” words, such as, for example, prioritize.  Better to say, simply, “what’s more important than something else,” not prioritize.

Finally, this from Dreyer:

“These days, I find, language seeks its own pace.  Coinages pop up, introduce themselves and re-style themselves as they see fit.  And on-line dictionaries do their impressively nimble best to keep up, as we all do.  A few years ago, a lexicographer friend reminded me that the dictionary doesn’t dictate language but reflects it, and that, if the people inventing and writing and guiding the language didn’t do their jobs properly — pushing and dragging things forward as we see fit — then the dictionary can’t do its job.”

So, language is nothing if not alive and changing – or, if you prefer, growing.

I remember the times when a partner of mine in our lobbying and public relations business told me, as a journalist (at least a former one), that the best example of good writing was “the Associated Press stylebook.”  He lived and died by it.

I didn’t.  I took it as one viewpoint, perhaps good for journalists, but only advisory for others.  And, if I found a better way to use words in my post-journalism life – with hyphens, with capitalization, with commas, and without “ize” letters – so be it. 

After all, I am free actor who likes words that communicate.

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Stories in my most recent on-line edition of Links Magazine got me thinking about tough tee shots and tough putting greens.

The story listed holes where PGA tour pros said they feared tee shots and greens.

On tee shots, you can imagine that one was the 17^th island green at the TPC Sawgrass course, the site of the Players Championship every year.

That shot is followed by a tough tee shot on hole #18, a par 4 that features water all along the left side.  To me, the uninitiated one, it looks a lot like the tough drive on #18 at Pebble Beach.

As for greens, the consensus among touring golf pros, including Tiger Woods, is that greens on Oakmont in Pennsylvania are the toughest they face all year long. 

Oakmont’s vast, Poa Annua greens average 7,000 square feet and were shaved to .09” for the 2016 U.S. Open.  They are frighteningly fast, but also incredibly pure, so they’re never labeled “unfair.”  The Poa is hardier than bent-grass and thus able to withstand the double-mowing, rolling, and foot traffic year-round.

But, of course, I am not a pro and, though I have watched tee shots on the 17^th and 18^th at Sawgrass for years, the 18^th at Pebble, and have seen a number of tournaments on the Oakmont course, I have never played any of the three. 

So, I changed the subject to tee shots and greens I fear most on the course where I play much of my golf, Illahe Hills Golf and Country Club in Salem, Oregon.

The two most difficult tee shots for me are, probably in this order:

• Hole #10:  This is a long hole, a par 4 of about 410 yards, but it often seems to play longer.  Especially for old folks like me.  Not for pros who would use a driver or a 3-metal, then a wedge in.  I am lucky to have a hybrid in.

Plus, just to left on #10, directly adjacent to the fairway, there is out-of-bounds, which is easy to reach, if, as a right-handed player, who hit a hook or hard draw with your tee shot.  Lefties, of course, have the same risk with a fade or slice.

There is also a hill that bisects the fairway.  If you stay on top of the hill, you have about 200 yards to the green with a level lie.  If you get down the hill, the distance is more like 175 yards.  Just don’t stay halfway down, which gives you the toughest shot in golf – a long shot with a downhill lie.

This hole often seems more like a par 5, so a par 4 comes across as a great score.

• Hole #9:  Just before you reach the 10^th hole, you face the toughest par 3 on the course, hole #9.

From the tee I play, it measures about 170 yards.  It’s tough to hit and stay on the green, which, from an architectural perspective, is smaller than it looks.

If you get on the green, you face a tough putt.  From just off the green, you face a tough chip.

Plus, to the left of the green sits the clubhouse, which, with a substantial draw or hook for a rightie or a fade or slice for a leftie, is easy to reach.  And, what’s more, the Clubhouse is out-of-bounds.

I asked one of good friends about the tough tee, tough greens issue at Illahe and, with his normal trenchant analysis, he provided this:

The #3 tee at Illahe is tough because the shot requires clearing a hill that crosses the fairway.  If you don’t clear the hill, you face a severe angle and side-hill lie to try to get to the green, which, depending on where you land, could be 150-170 yards away.

For a straight tee ball on #3, there also are two fairway bunkers that can catch a lot of shots that may look good at first, but, if you reach either of the bunkers, the shot to the green is tough.

Then my friend commented on tee #8.  A drive needs to be the right of the fairway to allow the best shot into the green.  On the green – and I know this gets into the second purpose of this blog, tough greens at Illahe, but so what – it is easy to pull your shot a little to the right, which results in a long roll off a downhill slide below the green.  The chip back up the hill is tough, as is the putt you’ll face.

Back in the day, Illahe’s former pro, Ron Rawls, one of the best golfers in the Northwest, told me he had a special club for #9, the tough par 3.  From his tees at the tips where he played, the distance was about 215 yards.

Three is a great score here, both for Ron and for me.

Now, specifically for greens at Illahe, it is hard to pick out the toughest because all of them have their own distinctive, not to mention, tough character. 

To anyone I talk to who is playing Illahe for the first time, I always say this:  Work hard to stay below the hole because, when you go deep and the pin is short, you have almost no chance.  A three-putt is good from above any hole.

The slope from back to front occurs, in particular, on holes #1, #7, #8, #11 #18…well, there could be others; you get the picture.

Plus, on Illahe’s 18 holes, our excellent superintendent has the greens running at about 11 on the stimp-meter!

So, overall, tough drives and tough putts make Illahe Hills what it is for me – a tough track that never gets old no matter how often I play.

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

I visited a business in town the other day where, out of apparent friendliness, a staff member began a conversation with me, of all things, by saying that the media was in line with Democrats on the left to bring the country to ruin.

He was not antagonistic; just convinced he was right.

I didn’t argue with him, but offered, quickly, an alternative view based on my background in journalism, as well as my focus on the solid journalists working for such publications as the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and The Atlantic Magazine. 

My view is that, other than in stories marked by the word “opinion,” these outlets don’t intentionally take sides.  They try to report “news” as objectively as it is possible for a human being to do.  Do they get objectivity right all the time?  Of course not.  But the effort is noteworthy.

The store employee talking to me, laughed a bit and said he had no problem with hearing a different point of view – and I add that tolerating differences occurs far too infrequently these days, so I appreciated his deference.

This minor episode came back to me as I read a column by George Will in the Washington Post.

A solid journalist, Will’s column appeared under this headline:  Josh Hawley, senator-as-symptom of a broken news business.

Will is right. 

Missouri Senator Josh Hawley is crazy, intentionally so because, by that measure, he hopes to be re-elected and, perish the thought, could be considering a run for president in the future.

Here is how Will started his column:

“Like an infant feeling ignored and seeking attention by banging his spoon on his highchair tray, Senator Josh Hawley last week cast the only vote against admitting Finland and Sweden to NATO.  He said adding the two militarily proficient Russian neighbors to NATO would somehow weaken U.S. deterrence of China.

“Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton responded:  ‘It would be strange indeed for any senator who voted to allow Montenegro or North Macedonia into NATO to turn around and deny membership to Finland and Sweden.’”

That evening, Will wrote, Hawley appeared on Fox News to receive Tucker Carlson’s benediction.

Will also reported that Chris Stirewalt, in a new book, Broken News, deplores the kind of conduct Hawley exhibited.  Stirewalt knows whereof he speaks.

He was washed out of Fox News by a tsunami of viewer rage because, on election night 2020, he correctly said Donald Trump had lost Arizona.

Now, according to Will’s column, Stirewalt says “today’s journalism has a supply-side problem — that is, supplying synthetic controversies.”

Of this sort:  “What did Trump say?  What did Nancy Pelosi say about what Trump said?  What did Kevin McCarthy say about what Pelosi said about what Trump said?  What did Sean Hannity say about what Rachel Maddow said about what McCarthy said about what Pelosi said about what Trump said?”

But journalism, Will argues, also has a demand-side problem:  “Time was, he writes, “journalists assumed that news consumers demanded more information, faster and better.  Now, instantaneous communication via passive media — video and television — supplies what indolent consumers demand.”

More from Will:

• More than half of Americans between ages 16 and 74 read below the sixth-grade level.  Video, however, requires only eyes on screens.  But such passive media cannot communicate a civilization defined by ideas.  Our creedal nation, Stirewalt says, “requires written words and a common culture in which to understand them.”
• Technology — radio, television, the internet — turned journalism from reporting what had happened to reporting what was happening, and now to giving passive news consumers the emotional experience of having their political beliefs ratified.  “By 1983,” Stirewalt reports, “the percentage of Americans who got their news from television alone pulled ahead of all newspaper use by offering a passive, more emotionally engaged product.  Television news can be far more emotionally compelling than the written version, and does not come with the need for nearly as much cultural literacy or the challenge of … internalizing ideas.”
• Between 2004 and 2020, a quarter of U.S. newspapers disappeared. Today, it is much easier to get national rather than local news; this encourages the belief that the national government is all-important. Into this context came, Stirewalt says, national journalists’ embrace of the moral imperative ‘to go to war’ with a president:  “Bigtime news dove in the mud with Trump, where he had home field advantage.”

Technology, Wills continues, has produced a melding of journalism and politics, to the degradation of both, as illustrated by the seamlessness of Hawley’s Senate floor grandstanding and his cable news self-congratulation.  Small wonder that the news business treats politics like sports — entertaining, but with no meaning deeper than the score.

This, I add, is often called “horserace journalism.”  It is a trend I oppose.  Just knowing who might be winning is not enough.

Go deeper on issues.  Ask candidates to explain their views in something other than 30-second sound bites.  Dig for the rationale behind their positions.

This kind of quality journalism – the kind George Will practices and advocates – is one way to make the country better.  Not the only way – but one way.  And, goodness knows, we need to find ways to avoid, or at least limit, our descent into near civil war.

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Well, guess what?

Donald Trump and his acolytes in Congress reacted in an over-the-top and incendiary matter to the FBI’s search of Trump’s residence as officers looked, with the concurrence of a court-ordered warrant, for the possibility of classified records Trump took from Washington, D.C. – perhaps including records related to nuclear warfare, which, if proved to be true in court, would be a gross violation of classified record-keeping statutes.

You could almost predict what Trump and his acolytes said, claiming that the Biden Administration was out to get Trump.

Attorney General Merrick Garland, in an apparent response to the heated rhetoric from Trump and company, said he wanted to unseal the search warrant so all could see its basis.  In this, he called the Republican bluff – and the court agreed, unsealing the warrant, which served to answer most, but not all, of the questions about the rationale for search.

Two opinion writers from the Washington Post, Ruth Marcus and Jennifer Rubin, set the record straight in their columns.

From Marcus:  “Trump immediately denounced the search as “prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the Justice System, and an attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for President in 2024.”  No surprise there — it’s a trademark Trump move to accuse others of what he himself has done and to then try to transform his legal trouble into political advantage.

“And no surprise either, to anyone who’s watched his cringeworthy Trump sycophancy, that Trump’s message was dutifully amplified by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.  ‘I’ve seen enough,’ McCarthy tweeted. “The Department of Justice has reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization.  When Republicans take back the House, we will conduct immediate oversight of this department, follow the facts, and leave no stone unturned.

“Where was McCarthy on the department’s ‘intolerable state of weaponized politicization’ when Merrick Garland’s predecessor, William P. Barr, was busy overruling career prosecutors’ sentencing recommendation for Trump ally Roger Stone or dismissing the case against former national security adviser Michael Flynn, after Flynn’s guilty plea?  Or when Trump himself was trying to, yes, weaponize the Justice Department in his desperate effort to undo the election results?

“Other members of the lap dog brigade went further.  ‘At a minimum, Garland must resign or be impeached,’ tweeted Senator Josh Hawley, calling the search’ an unprecedented assault on democratic norms.”

Columnist Michael Gerson added this:

“While other Republicans have accused the Biden Administration of making the United States a banana republic, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy has pledged his fealty to a disgraced authoritarian wannabe, who actually attempted a coup and now rages against his fate in gold-plated, palm-tree-shaded grandeur, when not giving Castro-length speeches to worshipful crowds that have a history of engaging in political violence at his command.”

From Rubin:  “Republicans are using the incendiary claim — including comparisons of the FBI’s lawfully executed warrant to Nazi violence — to rile up their base and undermine the rule of law.  They risk inciting violence from the same unhinged forces that stormed the U.S. Capitol.”

Commentary from Marcus and Rubin need no amplification other than this:  No one should be above the law – and that’s not just some kind of tired phrase as suggested by the Wall Street Journal – it is a key FACT.  No one being above the law includes Trump.

And The Atlantic Magazine wrote an even more scathing paragraph:  “Nothing can ever be ruled out where Donald Trump is concerned (a reference to comments from Trump critics that he might even set out to sell nuclear secrets to other countries) and it’s certainly possible that Trump — whose history suggests that he never does anything for reasons other than profit or to service his debilitating narcissism — thought he could use America’s secrets for his own financial or political gain.”

If Trump squired records out of the Oval Office based on narcissistic impulses, no one would be surprised.

Finally, Washington Post writer Matt Bai added this appropriate coda:

“The larger point here is that the whole fiasco underscores the most disturbing thing about Trump’s term in the White House.  Trump functioned as a president, more or less, but the underlying concept of the presidency somehow always eluded him.

“Everyone who preceded Trump accepted the idea that the office is held in a sacred and temporary trust.  The White House and everything that comes with it — the salutes and the planes, the couches and carpets, the weird things people gift you in foreign countries — belong to the country and its history, not to you.  You’re just hired to manage the place for a while.”

This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Have you ever wondered why one political poll can produce one result and another poll, even done on the same day, can produce another result?

I have.

And, I say that even after being involved in politics for about 40 years or so, including over many years when I was involved in analyzing polls related to statewide ballot measures or local bond proposals.

KGW-TV, the NBC affiliate based in Portland, took a look at the question the other day as it applied to the governor’s race in Oregon, one where three candidates – a Democrat, a Republican, and an Independent – are believed to have a chance to win next fall.

Specifically, KGW-TV said this on-line:  “We wanted to find out why three different polls showed such different results for the top candidates.”

Three recent polls produced different results.

• A poll conducted by Nelson Research in late May showed Republican Christine Drazan leading the way with 30 per cent of likely voters saying they would pick her.  Democrat Tina Kotek came in second with roughly 28 per cent and unaffiliated candidate Betsy Johnson came in third with roughly 22 per cent. 
• Another poll — paid for by Johnson’s campaign — was conducted July 23-25.  It showed Kotek in the lead with 33 per cent, Johnson in second with 30 per cent, and Drazen in third with 23 per cent. 
• A third poll, paid for by Republicans and conducted July 28-30, showed Drazan leading with 32.4 per cent, Kotek in second with 31.4 per cent and Johnson in third again with 24.4 per cent. 

One of Oregon’s best pollsters, John Horvick, put it this way:

“It’s natural for folks to say, ‘Hey, what’s going on here?  Is this real?  Is there a thumb on the scale from the individual candidates?’  And there is reason for some skepticism.  But I think if we sort of look at the different pieces, there’s also some consistency, and that’s, ‘Who’s at the top right now?”

There are several reasons produce different results.

1. Sometimes there are bad pollsters just as there are in every profession.  You can’t trust the results.
2. Sometimes there are poorly worded-questions which confuse respondents, as well as analysts.
3. Sometimes polls are done by one side to show it has a chance to win – and, again, the results may not be trustworthy.
4. Sometimes it is difficult for polling firms to find respondents who will answer accurately – or, for that matter, when polling by telephone doesn’t work as well as it used to, given that so many people only have cell phones.
5. Often, it is difficult for a pollster to predict election turnout, an understandable challenge when polls are done so far in advance of the election.

Horvick when on to say that transparency is key for any poll to be taken credibly.  Without transparency, he added, it’s easy for voters to get the impression that a candidate is trying to use the results to form their own narrative. 

KGW asked Horvick about the poll paid for by Betsy Johnson’s gubernatorial campaign. 

His response:  “One of the questions on the poll asked participants how favorably they viewed a candidate.  It asked if they would rather vote for a progressive Democrat, a qualified common sense Independent, or a devout Trump Republican — which does not exactly define Christine Drazan.  But she is a Republican, and it does seem to slant the question against her. 

“There’s nothing wrong with the candidate testing a description of their opponent, and to see if that’s going to resonate with voters,” Horvick said. “Now, if they then use that information to then talk about their opponent or talk about themselves, trying to pass that off as a neutral description, voters should look at that and be real critical.”

So, if there is an appropriate conclusion, it is to pay attention to polls, but don’t take them as gospel.  And don’t let results dissuade you from doing your citizenship duty, which is to vote.

Make the last “poll,” the election one, count.