I don’t know about you but any chance, much less an entire day I can enjoy myself at Trump’s expense is a good day. And friends, today is a doozy of a day for mocking Trump. Over his much ballyhooed golf fetish.
Even if you don’t care a bit about golf, if you don’t like Trump there’s something to enjoy today, which is the final day of the Masters, always the first of golf’s four major championships. It’s also the only major to be held at the same course each year – the EXCLUSIVE and toney environs of the Augusta National Golf Club. I’ll get to the character of this particular Major golf Championship and the course which hosts it, but let’s have some fun with the fact that at arguably the classiest golf club in America Trump’s not welcome. In fact, as this week proves (yet again) when it comes to The Masters and the oh so exclusive club that created the event and still hosts it Trump is effectively CANCELED!
I happen to enjoy that. I also enjoy that Trumpty will be stewing in his juices down there at Marmalade A Go or over at his dump Doral Golf Club upset that he’s not strutting around in Augusta National in one of those iconic, signature Green Jackets on Augusta National Members and Masters Champions are allowed to wear. (And with the exception for the reigning Masters Champion who gets to take theirs home for the year the jackets have to REMAIN at the Club) Poor little Trumpty. As The i Paper reports Trump is as I said “cancelled” at Augusta. That’s got to be a MASSIVE blow to Trump’s massive yet fragile ego but that’s the reality for a President who’s infatuation with golf is arguable even greater than one of his predecessors, Dwight D. Eisenhower. I’ll get to that but for now consider this:
Given the club’s historic connection with the office of Potus, and Trump’s infatuation with the sport, you might have thought that The Donald and Augusta might be acquainted in some way, if not formally as a member then as a guest with an open invitation to play whenever he has a slot in the diary.
One of the more interesting features of this Master’s week, a period in which the turbo turmoil Trump unleashed wiped trillions from the bank accounts of America’s most wealthy, has been the emphatic serenity about Augusta National, not even a ripple of turbulence and nil mention of Trump, not even in passing. It’s like the very idea of Trump and his presidency is just not happening, or if it is, it will pass.
Trump has generated a lot of news lately, and all of it bad. He even created some bad GOLF news. He blew off flying over to Dover AFB to take part in the ceremony of receiving the remains of four U.S. Soldiers killed during a training mission in Lithuania. THAT country honored them, and in addition to a formal ceremony people lined the streets to watch their remains pass on their ride to the airport there. Trump DID take a trip on Air Force One that evening. He went down to FL to his dump golf club Doral to have a pre-LIV (the Saudi backed rival that’s trying to take down the PGA, USGA and Royal & Ancient that have ruled pro golf) dinner with his Saudi pals and turncoat, blood soaked pro golfers who joined the upstart Saudi league. Even if you don’t follow golf root for Northern Ireland’s Rory McIlory today over America’s “Bloody Bonesaw Bryson” DeChambeau. McIlroy famously rejected working for the Saudis. DeChambeau dove headfirst into their pool of blood, but I digress.
The linked article poses the question of how Trump views Augusta National and today’s (and this past week’s) goings on. While it suggests possible indifference I say otherwise. Trump CRAVES acceptance as an “elite”, to be the most powerful and admired among the powerful and admired. But he doesn’t have the proverbial goods to be one of them and never has.
By preference, background, habit and milieu, if not temperament, Trump is every bit as elite as those he disdains in the execution of power. Augusta membership would represent for him the ultimate validation, conferring upon him status a level above that of the Oval Office. But he is not elite enough for Augusta. Nope, and that has got to hurt.
“Hurt?” My bet is Trump is ENRAGED at never having been extended an invitation to Augusta. Not that he’d ever play a round there, even when he was younger. Carts aren’t forbidden but frowned upon. Those who play are expected to walk the course with a caddie absent some special circumstance. Being a lazy asshole doesn’t qualify one for a cart there. And, while it doesn’t show up on TV all that well Augusta National is a HILLY golf course. It’s a five mile hike over some steep terrain to play 18 holes there. Add in the fact that there’s not a chance in hell any playing partners would allow him to cheat, much less submit a fudged scorecard and it’s safe to say all Trump would want to do is stomp around and try to look important. Reports he visited a few times when he was young seem to be bogus. He’s personae non grata there and always has been. Allow me to explain why Trump’s not only not welcome there, he’s akin to Voldemort – “He who shall not be named!”
Augusta National, created by the great Bobby Jones (arguably the greatest golfer of all time – an amateur AND a “weekend” golfer he dominated his era a hundred years ago) has only three hundred members. All have always been rich and usually quite powerful, both in business and politics. Membership has always been by invitation only. These are people who make an effort not to call attention to their wealth and power. It’s no wonder they’d turn up their noses at a blowhard, incompetent asshole like Trump. Best of all, deep down inside Trump knows that!
I don’t know about you, but that gives ME warm fuzzies every time I think about the beautifully manicured grounds, and the understated yet stately clubhouse – and the fact these very rich and powerful and accomplished people don’t want Trump on their grounds. Hell, even in the same zip code. Trump was always butt-hurt about not being accepted as one of his native New York City’s “elites.” For all that given his obsession with golf, how he touts his ‘skill’ (he’s legendary for cheating, a huge no-no in golf) and feeds his egos by creating “tournaments” on HIS properties to win it has to kill him that he isn’t welcome at Augusta. NO MORE SO THAN TODAY. Today is the final day of the Masters when a new champion will be crowned.
The stock slogan about the Masters is that it’s “A tradition unlike any other” and there’s a ton of truth to that. Most of that tradition is even good. There are strict rules for how both members and “patrons” (fans – the Masters has it’s own vocabulary) both written and unwritten. One of the unwritten ones is ‘thou shalt not talk about Donald Trump’ that members strictly adhere to, especially this week. It’s so well understood the patrons won’t talk about him either.
It is reasonable to assume that the economic profile of ticket holders here differs significantly from the 55 million Americans, half the private sector workforce, who have no retirement provision, according to the American Society of Retired Persons policy institute.
They are not Trump people in other words, or if they are, they keep their Maga tendencies to themselves. In 2012 golf commentator and writer Geoff Shackelford ran a story about Trump joining the membership of Augusta National. It was 1 April. That idea is so off the scale only an April Fool would believe it.
Nope, it’s all about the tournament, the grounds (arguably the most beautiful course in the world although I’d put Pebble Beach on equal footing) and great golfers both past and present. But NO talking about Trump and golf. The entire event is about celebrating the greatest players, including and especially Masters champions.
If you watch Masters week you will in fact see some famous and powerful people starting with the fairly new Women’s August Amateur on Saturday and the Drive, Chip and Putt contest for kids on Sunday. Members, like Condoleeza Rice for example like to hand out trophies to the winners. As do some past Masters champions! Rice is far from the only prominent politician to have been a member. President Eisenhower was one. In fact he went down there a couple of times a week to play while in office. (It was a lot cheaper to fly a President around in the 1950s and Ike could afford to reimburse the Air Force) He even received a special top-secret briefing in the Chairman’s office when the first H-bomb test took place!
Until recently one of the most, if not THE most famous tree in golf stood on Augusta National’s 17th hole. Loblolly pines are everywhere but this one jutted out a bit towards the left edge of the fairway. Due to a knee injury from his youth Eisenhower had a wicked slice when he played his shots and had to allow for it. He grew tired of his tee shots on 17 clipping or getting swallowed up by that pine tree and crashed a board meeting to “ask” (demand it more like it) it be removed. Rather than embarrass the President Chairman Clifford Roberts called for an adjournment. And quietly told Ike he was out of line – members don’t crash board meetings and make those kinds of demands! The matter was quietly dropped and the tree Eisenhower had grown to hate remained. It would by the time I was old enough to remember watching the Masters on TV as “The Eisenhower Pine.” Sadly a lightning strike was severe enough a few years back that the tree couldn’t be saved. It’s loss is still mourned. Cuttings were taken to try and grow a new one from it but no word on if that might ever happen.
The point is that not even a President, even a POPULAR, accomplished (he did after all lead us to victory in Europe in WWII) President wasn’t someone who could go bossing around those who ran the Augusta National! No, if some of their old attitudes and traditions took too long to change (minorities and women finally began being invited to become members) this is a group that has always maintained a standard of proper, understated behavior both in work/life and in their golf. In other words the OPPOSITE of Donald Trump, who lest anyone forgets PAINTS HIS FACE ORANGE! (My god how that awful color would clash with that venerable Green Jacket!)
The i Paper concludes it’s assessment noting that Augusta represents ‘old money’, an America with at least some caretakers who want a more genteel country than what has so often existed. And no more so than now. And The Augusta National epitomizes this and puts it on display every spring. (And spends a fortune in helping others through charities – including immediately coughing up five million dollars and other assistance in the wake of Helene which did a lot of damage to the Augusta National itself):
Outwardly, it wears its wealth and power responsibly, it values honesty, integrity, manners. Yes, there are all sorts of contradictions associated with great wealth, secrecy and altruism, but the benevolence is real for those who benefit from the club’s many charitable, educational and community investments.
And, importantly, in this era of era of wild instability, Augusta National stands as a bulwark against Trump’s economic and cultural vandalism. The club is not only saying no to him, it has cancelled him. In this arcadian corner of America, at least, Trump does not exist.
For one priceless week the golf-obsessed Trump is being uniquely ignored a unique place. By both the rich and powerful and the more regular folks, the patrons roaming around The Augusta National. And Trump knows it! His ego is being roasted over an open spit today even more than it has all week when he thinks about golf. I’ll enjoy the hell out of thinking about that. If you’re in a mood to take some pleasure of your own from the pain Trump is surely feeling today I can assure you you’ve got company. Hell, revel in it like I will! Don’t feel the least bit guilty about feeling the same way I do.
As with him not being able to resist watching news coverage from outlets he know tell the truth on him and make him look bad Trump won’t be able resist tuning in CBS later. To that simple, understated few minutes where by tradition the Chairman of August National has a chat with the Champion and Low Amateur and the outgoing Champion slips that coveted Green Jacket on today’s winner. It’s a place Trump will never, ever see in person. Nor will he ever get to be part of that ceremony, or the larger repeat of it shown in the title picture where you see the various trophies about to be handed out. And not one ORAGE face in the crowed of August National members sitting there waiting. Nope. No Trump!
****** Zoomers, we would happily accept a small donation to defray expenses as we trek through cyberspace. It’s going to get a lot crazier, that much we can guarantee you. Thanks. Ursula ******
I. LOVE. THIS. I was chortling all the way through as I read it. tRump and his golf obsession are just TOASTY. I’m not a big golf fan (my brother is – I don’t understand why), but oh, goodness gracious, what a lovely thing to read and know!!! THANK. YOU.