A Good Walk Spoiled

A Japanese Golf Course

I better be careful here for my son is a golf aficionado and I myself have played a few rounds in my salad days. But Mark Twain was on to something when he called this links game "a good walk spoiled." I guess I didn't mind President Eisenhower playing so much golf as he seemed to get his other work done. But for some strange reason President Obama's obsession with golf gets under my skin. And President Clinton's constant use of Mulligans while on the golf course bothered my sense of fair play ... as did the man himself.

Now the Chinese leadership seems to feel the same way about golf as they do about prostitution, gambling, bribery, drugs and gluttony. Dozens of golf courses have been shut down for excessive use of natural resources ... and government officials in one province have had restrictions placed on their playing times. Golf is increasingly viewed as a "capitalist pastime" (shh ... don't tell Obama) ... see: CNBC Story.

The General Secretary of the Communist Party, Xi Jinping, seems to be behind much of this crackdown ... as he is against the other mentioned excesses in China ... even having some government officials executed for corruption. I don't know but I  have a sense that golf handicaps can be much better trusted in Beijing.