Posted on 04/11/2016 9:17:02 AM PDT by DeathBeforeDishonor1
This year has been a series of “lasts” for the Obama Administration. In March, President Obama filled out his last NCAA tournament bracket in the Oval Office. Two weeks ago, he and the First Lady hosted their last White House Easter Egg Roll. And this past weekend he likely enjoyed one of his favorite sporting events, The Masters, for the last time as Commander, or as some would say, Duffer-in-Chief.
One would think the President’s devotion to the links, coupled with Mrs. Obama’s dedication to fitness and active lifestyles, would produce an ideal public forum for an industry like golf to tell its story of the game’s many benefits – mental, physical and even its positive impact in America’s communities. Only in Washington can such potential get turned upside down.
Despite a steep reduction in the number of golfers and abysmal interest among millenials, the leading golf organizations representing the game in the U.S. completely whiffed on a three-foot putt to promote themselves over the past eight years.
The current problems confronting participation in golf are not going away. According to recent data from the National Golf Foundation, fewer individuals tried the game in 2015 than in the previous year, with a total of 24.1 million. When you consider over 30 million people participated in 2005, the decline is alarming.
In light of these crosscurrents, a golf-obsessed weekend warrior of a President should have been a standard-bearer worth embracing – a gift from the golf gods – and a platform to tell the story of who plays golf in the 21st century amidst all the demands on our time. Hey, if the President can sneak away and play nine holes, you can too!
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
Does anyone know is obama’s golf score is any better than it was 200 rounds ago?
This article is stupid. It is more likely that people with the time and energy to do something useful or frivolous, don’t want to be seen doing ANYTHING similar to what ubama and michelle spend their time doing.
If ubama had been a big baseball fan, MLB attendance and interest would have plummeted. It is unclear whether their lavish White House parties for the Mo-Town crowd had any impact on that genre, because of its limited appeal these days anyway.
Oldplayer
Calling an event “The Masters” sounds kind of racist to me. At least a micro-agression.
it's the economy stupid!
The people from the Bureau of Labor Statistics are responsible for keeping track of Obama’s golf scores, so yes Obama has seen a fantastic improvement in his golf scores. Why, every quarter Obama’s golf scores have gone down and gotten better and better.
People are working longer hours and more days just to keep up. No time for golf for many. Me included.
Golf courses are getting paved over in my neighborhood for more housing development. And I live next to World GOLF Village. Seems golf is going the way of the dodo bird.
... but unfortunately he was Obama.
Our foursome used to play at least three rounds a week. Now it is more like three rounds a year. All of us are now having to work Friday afternoons and Saturdays just to keep up financially. Local golf course has dropped the cost to $29 for 18 holes which includes lunch, a cart and small bucket of practice balls so it’s as much the time as it is the cost. Unfortunately do not see it getting better any time soon.
The same people that calculate his score also calculate unemployment figures and Barry Care stats.
No, the WRITER and like-minded leftists would like to think it.
But the problem, as usual, is that the Obamas are frauds, phonies and hypocrites and everyone apart from those inhaling the noxious DC air knows it.
Obama's golf obsession is more accurately termed an obsession with not working. His daily schedule has been an unfunny joke since he assumed office, rarely commencing before 10 or 11 AM daily. He is legendary (in a bad way) for having ESPN displayed on flat screens everywhere, including the Oval Office.
Presidents have played golf but in small amounts and often as politics-by-other-means. Obama is simply goldbricking, as his choice of playing partners (often ESPN hosts) and as his insistence on a press blackout demonstrates.
Michelle's interest in 'fitness and active lifestyles,' is simply a vanity project meant to project an air of caring where none really exists. This is a First Lady with a staff of roundabout 50 people who, despite years of prep, years on the job and a sycophantic press, cannot overcome the reality that she is a humorless, resentful harridan who nags everyone including her husband.
Speaking of fitness and health, reports of Obama's smoking cessation are greatly exaggerated. His wife's claims of a successful campaign to get him to stop are simply false. He has been seen and inadvertently photographed smoking quite often during his presidency. His addiction is so complete that he chomped on nicotine gum to get him through a few scant hours at a WWII memorial ceremony. In fact, his 'loving' wife insists on separate bedrooms during their many vacations because of his smoking habit and penchant for lying in bed for hours, including taking meals there.
So tightknit is their family that Michelle and the girls have jetted off to Europe the last two successive Father's Days. As you do.
Her school lunch project has been an abject failure. Not even the most propaganda-minded press and TV airheads can make the meals or her look palatable.
Laura Ingraham, among others, has documented the ruse of burying whole ripe fruits and vegetables purchased elsewhere in the so-called White House garden to have them dug up and displayed for the cameras.
'Eat your spinach' was always going to be a hard sell but never more so than when it was delivered by the hard-faced Michelle Obama. Her sourpuss daughters didn't help the effort either. In true leftist fashion, good advice turned into draconian regulation overnight and eventually resulted in literal hunger among many students even in the agriculturally blessed USA.
Back to golf: those most heavily involved with the sport would never vote for Obama and wanted nothing to do with him. The 'golf is racist' meme largely went out the window with the dominance of Tiger Woods, fatuous Nike commercials notwithstanding.
Obama cannot stand to share the spotlight so the likelihood of him promoting things like the First Tee program was always small.
The restrictions and resentments for which he has designated himself an avenger, including the systematic destruction of things like posh suburbs and private country clubs, mean that to embrace the golf lifestyle would mean abandoning or opposing his own hardcore radical ideology. In other words, it would never happen.
I don’t think Obama would have played along because I’m sure he doesn’t want to draw attention to the fact he spends more time on the links than in the Oval Office.
It will take golf a while to recover from the twin curses of Barry and Tiger.
I think that obama’s interest in golf actually hurt the golf business. He is constantly playing golf, on the taxpayers dime, and during times (terrorists attacks, international incidents, major news, etc.) when others, with some degree of decency, would not play the game.
obama stigmatized the golf; it is now a game for the lazy who don’t pay their way and should really be doing their real jobs. It will take a while for golf to recover....maybe not if zero insists on playing golf and forcing courses to close a day’s revenue so the jerk can play by himself.
I’ve never understood the fascination with hitting a little ball with a club by so many.
Some of the scenery is pretty to look at for a while.
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