(Parting shots) The politics of golf

Golf is perhaps the most politicized of all sports. Google “golf and politics,” and you’ll get 24.5 million hits. Google “golf and Palmer,” and you get only 2.5 million pages. Google “politics and bowling,” and you’ll find a couple of strange pages involving Richard Nixon.

Face it: Golf and politics are inexorably intertwined. So, let’s take a quick look at the history of this symbiotic syllogism of sport and statesmanship.

The love-hate relationship between government and golf goes back to at least 1457 when King James II (clearly a frustrated high handicapper) officially banned the activity because it was interfering with the training of his famed longbow archers. This forced Scottish 15th-century golf junkies to resort to the earliest golf-related lies: “Hey McDuff, let’s sneak out for a wee round of archery (wink, wink) practice.”

Another famed political figure, Mary Queen of Scots, is said to have coined the word “caddie” to refer to the French army cadets who escorted her around the course during her rounds while in exile in Normandy. This seems appropriate because Mary was later beheaded for being a lousy tipper.

(As a historical aside, this seems like the right time to address the recent claim by a Chinese professor that golf was invented in China more than 1,000 years ago. He says his ancestors played a game called “chuiwan” that involved hitting a ball with a driver-like stick back in the 9th century. I’m sorry, but with all due respect to our friends in China, I’m not buying it.)

Let’s skip forward to the New World, where the first published reference to golf in America was, not surprisingly, some weenies in local government bitching about it. In a 1659 colonial newspaper article, it was reported: “The Honourable Commissary and Magistrates of Fort Orange and the village of Bererwyck, having heard divers (diverse) complaints from burghers of this place against the practice of playing golf along the streets, which causes great damage to the windows of the houses, and also exposes people to the danger of being injured. Therefore (we) hereby forbid all persons to play golf in the streets.”

Actually, when you think about it, every superintendent in America owes a debt of gratitude to the anal-retentive bureaucrats running this podunk New York village for kicking the game out of the streets and into the green grass and open spaces of the country. Window manufacturers and personal injury attorneys are, however, probably still pissed.

Let’s hit the fast-forward button again and skip through a bunch of arguments about which U.S. golf club came first (Do we really care?) and a gaggle of chubby presidents with goofy mustaches and jump right to the modern hero of golf and politics, Dwight D. Eisenhower.

During his presidency, Eisenhower reportedly played an average of 150 rounds of golf per year. Presidents are supposed to be role models, but this was truly conduct above and beyond the call of duty. Ike’s slavish commitment to the game makes one ponder how much better shape the country might be in if some of his successors – particularly Clinton and Bush II – would have followed suit? History might have been different.

Clinton: “Thanks for the offer Miss Lewinsky, but I have a tee time in 15 minutes, and I’ll need that cigar during my round. You look very nice in that blue dress by the way.”

Dubya: “OK, Saddam, let’s settle this whole mess over at my club. How about $10 Nassau plus loser bails out of Iraq? Heh, heh, heh.”

The sunny post-Eisenhower days of golf and politics in America were darkened by the carbon-colored clouds of scandal again in 1990 when Hall Thompson, the chairman of Shoal Creek Golf Club, shot us in our collective foot right before hosting the PGA Championship at the club. Basically he said, “We’all don’t have a problem with black people. We’all just don’t want them doing anything hereabouts besides shining our FootJoys or bringing us mint juleps after the round.”

Doh! Fortunately, by inserting his apparently well-shined shoe directly into his mouth, the remaining few restricted golf clubs were prodded into opening their doors to minorities. Enter Tiger and a few million of his closest friends.

Also in the ’80s, golf came under fire for political crimes against nature. No, we weren’t molesting sheep. Instead, we were accused of randomly dumping toxic poisons on the ground to kill defenseless insects and weeds that somehow spoiled the perfection of gated playgrounds for ultrawealthy bigots. Or at least that’s according to Greenpeace. Anyway, we were once again branded with the label of political incorrectness and had to pay penance for our perceived sins.

This also turned out to be a pretty good thing. Anyone who’s selling “Bio-This” or “Organic-That” should thank their lucky stars politics screwed golf once again.

Then came Martha Burk and the great debate about Augusta National and its policies toward female members. Ms. Burk proved that Andy Warhol was absolutely right about fame when this critical discussion lasted all of 15 minutes.
Golf, as a whole, had long before said, “Hey ladies, welcome to the club. Got some money? Come on in.”

(Another aside: We should adopt a new phrase, “to pull a Burk,” meaning “to show up very late at a party and drunkenly start a lame argument about some issue that’s already been decided.”)

Presently, golf faces its latest politically scandalous moment thanks to Jack Abramoff. Unless you’ve been under a large rock (with no cable TV), you might be aware one of the primary tools the disgraced lobbyist used to coerce and cajole congressmen was golf. Trips to St. Andrews, junkets to Florida resort courses and access to the Beltway’s best private clubs were primary weapons in his influence-peddling arsenal. As a result of the ensuing tempest, The Washington Post noted that our distinguished senators and representatives now run away screaming like scared little girls anytime the word “golf” is mentioned.

To steal a thought from Laurel and Hardy, “This is another fine mess politics has gotten us into.”

But, you know what? During 600 years of golf’s continuing conjugal relations with government, we’ve overcome bans, beheadings, bureaucrats, bigotry, Burk and baseless biobashing. We certainly can survive our one-night stand with this idiot.

That’s all for now folks … I’m off for some archery practice. GCN

Pat Jones is president of Flagstick LLC, a consulting firm that provides sales and marketing intelligence to green-industry businesses. He can be reached at psjhawk@cox.net or 440-478-4763.