TRUMP AND CLINTON: TWO ACTORS ON POLITICAL STAGES

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 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 a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and 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 spent part of the last two weeks watching actors on a stage. No, it was not at a live play or a movie screening. It was made-for-television political party presidential nomination conventions.

One week, Donald Trump accepted the Republican nomination and, according to some pollsters, got a bump that put him up by a few percentage points in the race.

The next week, Hillary Clinton accepted the Democrat nomination and, by the impressions of political commentators, “did what she needed to do” to offset Trump, though many also said she was not a speechmaker in the realm of the person she wants to succeed, President Barrack Obama.

Not surprisingly, these actors emphasized the positives about their personalities and their platforms. In that sense, it was acting, which means it was orchestrated and put on, not at all real.

As I watched Trump deliver his long speech in Cleveland, I couldn’t help thinking again about a past demagogue – Adolf Hitler. Like Hitler in 1930s Germany, Trump makes no apology for trying to capitalize on the fears of Americans to build a case for his own ability to help them rise and solve nearly every problem known to man.

To put a point on it, he says “he and he alone” has the ability to right all of the wrongs and he often says he will do so quickly on the first day he takes office – if, in fact, he takes office.

Hitler did the same in Germany as he motivated people to rise from the devastation of World War I – and all of us now know what damage Hitler did to an entire race of people, the Jews, as well as to the world.

Could Trump do the same? No one knows. But the question is whether Americans want to take that risk.

I like what the Washington Post said about Trump’s convention performance: “It was snarl and sneer, not substance.”

From columnist Steven Stromberg in the Post:

“Red-faced, angry, and — by the end — visibly sweating, Donald Trump delivered the most important speech of his life Thursday night when he accepted the Republican nomination for president. It was an address filled with extravagant emotion, hyperbole and plainly ridiculous promises. Trump has officially secured his place as one of the most capable demagogues the country has ever seen.

“Trumpism isn’t an ideology. It’s not an agenda. It’s not even a strategy. Trumpism is a formula. A formula that Donald Trump uses to manipulate people.

“First, Trump outlandishly indicates how bad things are without him in charge. The country is ‘a more dangerous environment than frankly I have ever seen and anybody in this room has ever watched or seen,’ he said Thursday, depicting the United States as a terrorized country overrun by Islamic radicals and crazed illegal immigrants committing crimes with impunity.

“Next Trump blames others in the simplest possible terms. At this stage, Trump is often at his most vulgar or bigoted. His Trump University lawsuit is not going well because the judge is Mexican, Muslims are a threat and should be kept out of the country. And so forth.

“Then, Trump assures people he — and only he — can solve all the problems, and fast. ‘Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it,’ he said. ‘The crime and violence that today afflicts our nation will soon — and I mean very soon — come to an end. Beginning on January 20th 2017, safety will be restored.’”

From a Post editorial:

“His politics are fundamentally personal, and not merely in the sense that he is compelled to make himself the center of attention. The businessman’s convictions on public matters are elusive; he is an unreliable guide to his own program, which can change from day to day; and to the extent he has a guiding ideology it is an invincible conviction in his own instincts, business ability and understanding of human nature.

“Mr. Trump sees the world as a series of zero-sum transactions that produce winners and pathetic losers. He calls it ‘the art of the deal,’ and the goal is to be the winner. Other than that, a Trump Administration is a plunge into the same unknown that Republicans dove into when they made him their nominee.”

On to Clinton.

The convention her staff organized in Philadelphia was far different than the Republican event. She and many other speakers emphasized positive traits about America and, in an emphasis designed to contrast directly with Trump, used the phrase “Stronger Together” as a motto.

No one alone; all together.

One commentator on Public Broadcasting Service, veteran political analyst Mark Shields, said Clinton’s speech hit every special interest mark. It was a “if you want it, you get it” type of speech, he aid, which, of course, is typical of many Democrats who want to dispense federal benefits to nearly imaginable group.

For me, the presidential race still boils down to a choice between evils. Trump says HE ALONE will solve all of our problems, with, if you think about it, is a statement from an egotist. Clinton, against a backdrop of alleged corruption during hear long public career, asks voters to be STRONGER TOGETHER.

If I had to pick between the two candidates, I would vote for Clinton, even if critics say she will just be “Obama 3.”  If I don’t – and it is possible to conceive of a personal ethical position being a vote for someone else – I may will find that additional position come November.

If that means I am throwing away my vote, call me guilty.

PROMISES TRUMP CAN’T KEEP

One measure of an effective politician – a real politician, not just an actor – is whether they can keep the promises they make. Or, perhaps whether they have an intention of doing so.

Consider Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for our country’s next President. In his speech accepting the Republican nomination and in previous venues, he has made numerous promises he can’t keep.

• He says he will build a wall between the United States and Mexico to keep immigrants out of this country – and that he will make Mexico pay for it. No way; building a wall would take millions, if not billions of dollars, and Mexico won’t ante up.

• He says he will make America safer again soon after taking the oath of office if he wins in November. No way, though the promise could be compelling. As President, he cannot compel action by independent, local police forces around the country, nor can he stop the violence those forces face.

• He says he will deport millions of “undocumented immigrants.” No way; he cannot afford the cost, nor the manpower to perform such a feat. The Wall Street Journal puts it this way: “executing on this promise would require at least $400 billion in new federal spending and reduce U.S. GDP by about $1 trillion. It also would require 90,000 federal agents, up from today’s 4,000.

• He says he will abandon NATO. No way. Congress won’t let him exercise this super power.

• He says he will constrict an independent press. No way. The Supreme Court won’t tolerate it.

• He says he wants to scrap all multi-national trade deals. No way. Perhaps those deals should have been developed with more of an “America first” stance, but scrapping them overnight can’t be done.

Make your own list. It would be a long one.

Trump’s Republican Convention performance, according to the Washington Post, was “more snarl and sneer, than substance.”

A good line to indicate, if nothing else, the wide range of Trump promises that he can’t keep unless he was a dictator, which, some say, is what he wants to be anyway.

WHERE IS THE MIDDLE GROUND? NOWHERE

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 a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and 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.

One of the aspirations that motivated me in my life as a lobbyist was to find what I called “the smart middle ground.”

What I meant was the ability – potentially resident in both public officials and lobbyists – to work toward the art of compromise. That is the definition of politics in the first place.

To say that’s missing from today’s political discourse is an understatement.

Consider a development earlier this year, the nomination by President Barack Obama of D.C. Court of Appeals Judge Merrick Garland to fill the U.S. Supreme Court vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia.

Whatever you think of Obama and his Administration, the choice merits consideration, given Garland’s legal jurisprudence record, including as the chief judge of the D.C. Court of Appeals and the fact that he has been confirmed two previous times by bi-partisan majorities in the Senate.

Many Republicans have stuck to their position that the Senate should not grant Garland a hearing, much less an up or down vote, because they want the next President to nominate someone to fill the vacancy. Of course, they also hope that the President will be a Republican.

A reading of Garland’s record as a jurist indicates that, for Republican tastes, he may have sided too often with the bureaucracy, especially in Washington, D.C. where the Court on which he now sits handles many administrative matters. But, rather than just say “no” to him, why not give him a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee and probe the rationale for his decisions?

One reason is that Senate Republican leaders are retaliating for the behavior of Democrats when Democrats ran the Senate. So, the axiom appears to be “one bad turn deserves another.”

Where is the middle ground? Nowhere.

It’s just the latest in a series of all-or-nothing positions held by politicians in Washington, D.C., as well as in Salem.

Consider the February short session of the Oregon Legislature.

Democrats used their near super-majority status to push through major issues that many observers said didn’t belong in a short, 35-day legislative session that, as originally proposed, was supposed to deal only with emergency issues, such as new problems with the state budget.

Rather than negotiate with minority Republicans on so-called environmental legislation, Democrats pushed through a bill making Oregon, as the Associated Press put it, “the first state to eradicate coal from its power supply through legislation and boast some of the most stringent demands for renewable energy among its state peers.”

The new law will wipe out coal-generated energy in phases through 2030 and requires utilities to provide half of customers’ power with renewable sources by 2040, doubling the state’s previous standard.

Senate Republican leader Ted Ferrioli said this, again according to the AP: “Today, Governor Brown gave her stamp of approval to a new renewable energy mandate that will cost residential electricity customers in Oregon $190 more each year until 2040.” He also argued the law “lines the pockets of the green energy industry at the expense of working Oregonians who get nothing in return.”

Again, where is the middle ground? Nowhere.

It also didn’t show up in Democrats’ action in the short legislative session to adopt the highest minimum wage in the country, again over Republican objections.

At one point, it appeared Democrats, including Governor Kate Brown, were open to working on a compromise. In the end, compromise didn’t fly, though Democrats may say they recognized differences between urban and rural Oregon by approving a lower minimum wage in rural areas.

Republicans didn’t buy it. According to the Oregonian, Senator Alan Olsen, R-Canby, said this: “We turn around and hurt everybody — everybody — by doing this. As you say on the left, we want progress. This isn’t progression. This is the government intruding into our businesses and saying ‘you will pay.'”

Jason Brandt, president and CEO of the Oregon Restaurant and Lodging Association, added that the increase “will kill jobs, harm consumers, force school and government service cuts and hurt Oregon farms and small businesses.”

Labor leader Tom Chamberlain, wasn’t impressed by Republican opposition, contending that the increase “marks a recognition that no matter where you live, Oregon’s current minimum wage is not enough to live on.” Several Democrat legislators also recognized the price small businesses might pay for the increase and said they didn’t care.

Where is the middle ground? Nowhere.

My perspective on government action may not fly in today’s politics where criticizing opponents is the order of the day. My wish is two-fold: (1) That we elect officials with the ability to lead disparate interests toward the smart middle ground, and (2) that, as those who watch or participate in public policy, we have the courage to follow smart leaders toward that middle ground.

FOR CLINTON, THE “COMEY STANDARD”

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 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 a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and 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’ll let the national commentators write about the predictable development – the FBI and its national director, James Comey, recommend no indictment of Hillary Clinton for her use of a private e-mail system while she was Secretary of State.

The decision has set off a huge controversy as Clinton continues to run for President while evidencing at least a “careless disregard” for policy and protocol, not to mention dishonesty that should, to some (me included), disqualifor her to be President.

For now, just consider this quote from Comey which ran in the Wall Street Journal’s lead editorial (including the Wall Street Journal’s words):

“For our money, the most revealing words in FBI Director James Comey’s statement Tuesday explaining his decision not to recommend prosecuting Hillary Clinton for mishandling classified information were these: ‘This is not to suggest that in similar circumstances, a person who engaged in this activity would face no consequences. To the contrary, those individuals are often subject to security or administrative sanctions.’”

How’s that for candor?

According to Comey, Clinton gets off. Others face sanctions. Which means there is a new standard, the “Clinton Standard.”

A (THE?) PROBLEM WITH POLITICS

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 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 a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and 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.

With that headline, you could cite a number of factors these days.

But let me list just one.

If you cannot believe what political candidates say, how can you have any faith they will act properly when they get into office. The answer? You cannot.

Consider one Donald Trump. Nearly every day a new fact emerges that gives the lie to what he said yesterday – or the day before. This is either because, (a) he says what he thinks off the cuff and, thus, engages mostly in bluster without any regard for accuracy or context, or (b) because he is innately dishonest.

Probably both.

Or, consider Hillary Clinton.

Here’s what Wall Street Journal columnist Kimberley Strassel wrote the other day:

“Hillary Clinton’s campaign has been forced to acknowledge over the past week that the former secretary of state did not, as she had claimed, turn over all her work-related email to the State Department. The new story is that her deletion of these emails was an oversight. Team Clinton is hoping therefore that you won’t hear the story of Rajiv K. Fernando, which would suggest the oversight tale to be yet another untruth.” [Fernando had no qualifications for the position he was given, other than that he was a large giver to the Clinton Foundation.]

Again, here’s what Strassel wrote:

“This is how Hillary Clinton operates. Donald Trump, for all the trouble his out-loud musings cause him, can nonetheless take credit for perfectly distilling, in five short words, what would be the defining nature of another Clinton presidency: The politics of personal profit. Give money to the Clinton Foundation; get special favors. Figure out a way to slip the Clintons some speech money, or cattle-futures trades, or donations; get rewarded in the political arena.”

For me, a problem with both candidates is that you cannot believe what they say because they could be – or probably are – lying. So, how can you apply any credence to what they will once in office.

And, be clear about this: One of the two serial liars, Trump or Clinton, will be the next President of United States.

The choice has been called one between evils. I don’t intent to choose either, which means, some will say, that I will throw away my vote. To which I say, so be it.

THE DEPARTMENT OF PET PEEVES IS OPEN AGAIN

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 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 a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and 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.

The department is open again. I am its director. That means I get to issue orders and edicts without regard to anyone else’s perspectives.

If that sounds a little like Donald Trump, so be it. I won’t be reading from a teleprompter; I’ll just be issuing opinions as if they are facts and letting the chips fall where they may.

This time, “MY” department is posing three examples of cases where originally good words lose their meaning when those involved in politics corrupt them. Here are the examples:

PROGRESSIVE: This word, at least in political circles, has come to connote adopting a so-called “progressive left leaning agenda.” But, the basic word means progress and, sometimes, progress is achieved best by leaving things as they are, not taking some of action, as long as doing nothing is an intentional decision.

This reminds of my time serving in the last Republican gubernatorial administration in Oregon, the one led by the late Victor Atiyeh. One of his pet phrases illustrates the point: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

I wish this were so as Democrats favor ever-expanded government – the so-called “progressive” movement.

DEMOCRATIC: Persons who are registered as Democrats are often called “Democratic,” but, in my 25 years as a lobbyist, I have seen Democrats become far less democratic.

In fact, once in charge, they often become autocratic. They are in charge, so they don’t consider the views of the minority – in this case, in Oregon, Republicans.

So, when referring to Democrats I always leave off the last two letters of the larger word – ic.

 

COMPROMISE: This word, which actually is part of the definition of politics – the art of compromise – has come to mean something akin to giving up your principles. Better to leave the word as it was – compromise is the art of finding the middle ground in pressing public policy problems, which is where the best solutions are found anyway.