The USGA has Mucked it Up!

Our governing golf organization simply tries too hard!
by Charlie Leck

Father’s Day is always very special for me. For years I have made clear to my children what I would appreciate most on this day designed to honor fathers. That is, please leave me alone. I don’t want to be taken to brunch. I don’t want you all to come on over for a party. I don’t want gifts. Enough with the funny ties! No more framed photographs that I haven’t the space for anymore! Forget the ideas about a drive into the countryside.

It’s U.S. Open Day – the final day, if there is no tie! I want the house to myself so I can sit and watch quite as long and as much as I please.

There is a Stone Arch Festival in Minneapolis on Sunday. It sounds like great fun. There will be artists and great food and music and games! Enjoy it! But, leave me to the TV and I’ll grill a couple of brats and throw sauerkraut atop them with a large dollop of Stadium Mustard from Chicago. I will try not to miss a shot or a moment of this golf tournament that the USGA is trying so hard to ruin.

Yes, ruin!

Michael Campbell and Geoff Ogilvy and Angel Cabrera? Yes, that’s a question mark!

It seems the silly kings and queens of golf, out there in New Jersey, have boasted for years that they want their crown jewel golf championship to identify the best golfer in the world. Give me a break! These conceited, self-deceiving rubes have virtually ruined the championship event by trying too hard. Too much length! Too much grass! Too much speed! Too many silly shots!

These jerks have created monster courses – not good courses – and, in competition, they forced the equally foolish ruling idiots at Augusta to do the same.

The worm is turning and they don’t even see it! The PGA Championship and The Open (played in the UK) are storming past them to become the tournaments that truly identify the world’s finest – Woods, Woods, Mickelson and Singh at the PGA – Harrington, Woods, Woods and Todd Hamilton at the British championship.

The winners at the U.S. Open have become the guys who can, frequently by luck, most often avoid the phony bear-traps that the USGA lame-brains have laid out for the players. Mickelson calls the changes at the 13th tee “the biggest waste of money that I’ve ever seen.” The 6th hole will be a par 4 that measures up to 515 yards. Depending on the winds, some guys may not reach it in two. Grass around the greens will be stupefying length. The Open organizers say this brings out the great short games, but, in fact, it often brings in, too much, the element of luck. The speed on the greens will be fun to watch, but the health of the greens will suffer greatly unless there is some blessed rain.

I hate to watch the golf-snobs bobbing around the golf course with their great looks of importance glued to their faces. They think they’re showing the PGA how to run a ‘real’ championship. And, all the while, their event slides away into unimportance when it comes to highlighting the greatest players in the game. It seems, instead, the organization thrives on foment. It’s of no importance, but I’ve decided, after 40+ years of faithfulness, to give up my membership in the hoidy-poidy organization.

Jay Flemma writes that there is some hope for Torrey Pines and the viewers.

“Ironically, the flat greens, familiarity and lack of strategy may mean more birdies, more excitement and more roars from the gallery. The "restrictor plate" the USGA puts on a golf course is lessened this year, so this will be the true test of how good Davis is at set-up and whether he will avoid the mistakes of his predecessor, Tom Meeks.”

The NY Times story yesterday said that Mickelson’s criticism of the 13th tee placement is about the only criticism of the golf course that’s been offered this week. Nonsense! That’s because they only talk to USGA puppets and the players who feel they need to be politically correct. Most of the guys know they’re about to go to war and they’re just keeping their mouths shut.

Well, here’s hoping I’m all wrong because I’ll watch nearly every second of the TV production. I promised my wife I’d man her booth at the Farmers Market for her today, so I’ll miss the play this afternoon. However, I’ll have the video tape rolling.

I just don’t want luck to determine the winner – as it so often does in this event – and I want to sense that a truly great player has won the championship. Campbell, Ogilvy and Cabrera are wonderful players, but, sorry guys, I can't include them on my list of the best in the game.

To Die: to Sleep; No More!

The end-times are so much on my mind!
by Charlie Leck

"Dying is fine, but Death, oh baby, I wouldn't like Death if Death were good!"
[e.e. cummings]

Strange!

My sister, Jean of blessed memory, who died recently, was much more a mother to me than sibling. That's how I thought of her. It must be natural that the death of a sibling, especially such a close one, causes one to think much more of the approaching end of life and to 'work out' philosophically where one is at with these final moments; for I indeed find myself thinking of these things more than occasionally. I have begun to prepare my papers and possessions and I am writing out my wishes. Is this too mawkish? If you think it is, you are young reader.

Tonight I saw off a cousin, dear, beautiful Mary Ann, who came to visit us here in Minnesota for a couple of days, and I realized, as I kissed her goodbye, that she was much more a sister to me than a cousin.

Who have I ever loved more? Only my children, my step-children and my wife. Otherwise, I have loved this cousin as family – as a part of me – as I would love a dear, close, wonderful, favorite sister.

Tonight I took her and her husband to the airport, so they could catch a plane to L.A. to spend time with a son. She is a loyal Parisian now, having lived there for 45 years. I held her and kissed her and thought to myself that this might be the very last time that I would ever see her.

She is such a devout Christian. She left a message for me, in our guestbook, that she would pray for us each and every day. That's sweet. She thinks we'll be reunited in heaven. I don't have that faith. I see death as a wonderful period of eternal, beautiful rest. These moments of life, on earth, are much more important to me – when I can feel the softness of her skin and smell the aliveness of her body and listen to her astonishing laughter.

Edna St. Vincent Mallay said of death: "I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned."

I took no consolation tonight, when I held my cousin and said goodbye, that we would meet again in heaven. I had the heavy feeling that this was the last time I would hold her; for the years had slid by so quickly and they slide by now with ever increasing speed.

As I drove away from the airport, I bawled like a baby.

"I'm okay," I assured my wife, "I'm just frightened that I'll never see her again."

"Why do you feel like that?"

I was amazed at the simplicity of the question. Didn't she understand?

"Because, I'm so f…….ing' old," I shouted painfully.

Too many of my friends are dying around me. Too quickly do people fade away. A sister is gone!

My lovely cousin lives in Paris. I live nearly 6,000 miles away. Yet, it is more than miles that separate us. We are separated by the rapidly rising and falling tides of life. We are caught in them and cannot escape them.

She believes, so firmly, that we will be reunited in heaven. I believe that I will close my eyes and rest so peacefully – so extraordinarily peacefully – for all eternity.

Dear, sweet Mary Ann, I have never loved so sweetly – so innocently – as I love you. I am your big brother and I want to reach out and take every little, insignificant pain away. Where there is any sadness in your life, I want to take it away. I want to be with you often and I want to hear your lovely voice singing little bird songs in my ear.

When I finally lie down and go to sleep, eternally, remember that you, with my children and my wife, were on my mind and in my eye – and I brought back to memory those moments when we were such tiny ones and we loved each other so perfectly.

To use e.e. cummings, "i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart)."

I should like to write a book about you or poems like that about you – about the fierce love we had for each other, but I know that I couldn't explain your complex mind nor the depth of faith you have.

St. Paul told us that love is stronger than death. I'm not sure; for, you see, unlike you I do not believe the gospels are a perfect expression of truth, but only another attempt to grapple with questions! Death is certainly not to be feared because it is so positively and perfectly peaceful – a poor trade-off, I guess, for the wonder of being loved.

To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd.
[Shakespeare: Hamlet]

John Paul Caponigro

A blog for photographers!
by Charlie Leck

This particular blog departs from politics and the biographical memoir and concentrates on another of my significant interests – photography! If that's a subject that doesn't interest you, come back soon.

My intention here is to recommend a very significant blog to those of you who enjoy photography. It's a serious blog, called Illuminating Creativity, by John Paul Caponigro and I promise you that an enormous amount of information will be provided and posts are almost daily. There's a great deal of significant comment added by Caponigro's very talented readers.

"John Paul Caponigro, author of Adobe Photoshop Master Class and the DVD series R/Evolution, is an internationally renowned artist. A contributing editor for Digital Photo Pro and Camera Arts and a columnist for Photoshop User and apple.com, he teaches workshops both privately in his studio and at select public venues. A member of the Photoshop Hall of Fame, a Canon Explorer of Light, and an Epson Stylus Pro, his clients include Adobe, Apple, Kodak, and X-Rite. Learn more by visiting www.johnpaulcaponigro.com and get over 100 free downloads plus a free subscription to his enews Insights." [quote source]

Caponigro's links are alone worth the effort of going to the blog. He'll send you off to all kinds of fun, interesting and helpful places. Then check out the free downloads you can get that will be very helpful to your photography work.

If your photographic activities are important to you, get to know Caponigro!

The Great Love of My Life

This Svejda girl is so delectable!
by Charlie Leck

I believe I was 8 years old when I fell madly in love with her. She was a mere child of 6 years and I had no business feeling such affection for one so young; but, had it been you, and had you the opportunity, as did I, to look into her eyes and watch that magical smile spread across her face, you, too, would have fallen madly in love with her.

What can I say? Until I married Anne, I never felt such an attachment – no love had ever been stronger!

She came often to visit us – out in the countryside – from the big city of New York! We were just wee ones, so we were put to bed together and I found it difficult to sleep because I wanted to hear her talk on and on about her life in the big city.

I cannot paint a picture that would do her beauty justice – no description typed out here could make you understand how beautiful she was and still is. I care for her so much that I would have done anything to spend every day, for the rest of my life, in her presence.

She is here now – in this year of 2008 – and she slumbers at the moment like Sleepy Beauty herself in our little guest cottage. At 65 she is a beautiful now as that little, cute, wondrous girl was at 6. Her smile is still radiant. Her eyes glow with excitement and anticipation. Her mind swirls into thousands of possibilities.

I love her as madly now as I did then – when I did not understand the complexities of love and… and… and… all the rest!

I am so excited that she is here – in my town – on my farm – in my home – slumbering in our little tree-house accommodation.

She is my cousin. My mother and her father were siblings. Her dad died within hours of her birth. Her mom was heartbroken and devastated. My cousin spent a considerable amount of time with us, as her mother gathered herself and grew steady again.

So, we occasionally shared a room. We giggled and chatted into the night. I fell asleep beside her and awoke with her breathing softly next to me. We were wee ones; yet, I felt the excitement of slumbering beside one whom one loved so much.

As she drifted into sleep, I kept whispering to her.

"I love you," I said, again and again.

Two years younger, she was so much more mature than I.

"Yes," she said, "I love you, too. Now go to sleep!"

Now, she sleeps here. A husband lies beside her. He whispers to her that he loves her madly.

"Yes," she says, "I love you, too. Now go to sleep."

She lives in Paris now and has since before she reached legal adulthood. She's raised a large number of children – mostly boys – and they are each and all lovely creatures and intensely intelligent and kind. She owns a translation service. Her husband is an artist and artisan craftsman. We'll get to spend a couple of precious days together, looking at this place to which I have devoted my love and faithfulness – touring the countryside and visiting Minneapolis.

Most days are very good. I expect the next two to be spectacular.

Measuring Character

Golf will take a measure of the character of a person!
by Charlie Leck

"It is a question of fact whether a ball that has not been found after having been struck toward a water hazard is in the hazard. In order to apply this Rule, it must be known or virtually certain that the ball is in the hazard. In the absence of such knowledge or certainty, the player must proceed under Rule 27-1." [USGA Rules of Golf]

Somewhere I read once that golf will reveal the character of a person more clearly than any other sport. I believe that to be true and have had many occasions both as a player and as a rules official where I have witnessed one's character being revealed.

I was officiating at a boy's and girl's state championship tournament over the last couple of days. I thoroughly enjoy committing my time as a volunteer for these high school events. Working with kids is great. It's enjoyable to teach them. Most of them come to these events with a basic grounding in the rules, but few have been able to fine tune their knowledge of golf's complicated rules and decision books. I'm pleased when I can add to their knowledge.

As I watched, I noticed that one young man was struggling with both his game and with his temper. He was howling after every bad or poor decision that he made. His fellow competitors (as the rules book calls them) were showing some signs of embarrassment about the displays of anger. A bit later, after watching the young man slam one of his golf clubs deeply into the turf, I decided to chat with him. I explained to him why there was an etiquette section in the official book of the rules of golf. And, I told him that I could tolerate the testing of those etiquette standards quite a lot, but I couldn't abide attacking the golf course owned by our courteous and generous host. He listened to me with concentration and he politely apologized for his behavior. I was pleased that the young man's character had been challenged and tested and that the boy had passed the test. He would be better in the future as a result of it.

Later in the day I was called to the 4^th tee of the golf course to chat about a rules problem. A young man, showing some embarrassment, explained to me that he was pretty sure he had struck a ball twice with his putter on the previous green. I asked him to explain and describe the incident. When he struck the ball with his putter, it had popped up a little bit instead of rolling straight away and he was pretty sure he heard and felt the putter strike the ball again.

I looked to the other players in his group (fellow competitors) and they shrugged, indicating they knew nothing of it. They had not seen a double strike nor heard a double hit. I looked back to the young man.

"Pretty sure?" I asked.

"Sure!" He answered.

"Under Rule 14-4, you'll have to add another stroke."

"Thank you," he replied, and I walked off the tee.

His mother was in his gallery and asked me what had happened. I asked her if that was her son I'd been chatting with.

"Yes," she said nervously.

"You can be very proud," I told her. "He's quite a good young man."

In another incident, a young man drove a ball far down the left side of the fairway. It struck a blacktop cart path and bounded high and forward toward a bridge that crossed a water hazard. Because I had been off, tending to a ruling elsewhere on the course, I had arrived back on the tee and saw the result of the young man's tee shot. We all spent the next five minutes searching for the ball near and in the water hazard. There was a relatively good chance the ball had entered the hazard somewhere, but there was not hard evidence. No one had seen the ball enter. I had queried the spectators about this. There were clearly other places, not in the hazard, where the ball could have been lost. The young man wanted to take a drop, under rule 26-1 (Relief for a ball in a water hazard). In good conscience, I couldn't allow it. The standard for such a thing is the quotation that begins this blog. We did not "know" nor were we "virtually certain that the ball [was] in the hazard."

The young man was not pleased, but he seemed to resign himself to my ruling. I drove him back to the tee to hit again. During the drive, I tried to explain the rule and my ruling.

It turns out his coach was very displeased and lodged a complaint about me and even indicated that I had said things that I certainly had not or ever would say (like, that the ball had to be found and identified within the hazard in order for me to rule it was in the hazard). No, I know full-well that that is not the standard by which one judges this matter. In fact, anyone who has officiated even a few tournaments on courses where there are water hazards, has had to deal with this question of an unwitnessed entrance of a ball into a water hazard. The basic question becomes this: Could the ball be lost anywhere else? In this particular case, there was no question in my mind but that there were other places it could be lost.

In fact, another rules official later did indeed find the ball in question, with the player's identifying mark, in play, with a very open shot to the green, and actually in an area where we had not been searching. The player was later told by the supervising official that his ball had been found in play. The young man, upset even 24 hours later, was still saying I could have handled it better. If that is true, I apologize, and I will search for ways to explain this ruling more clearly in the future. Nevertheless, I expected I might receive an apology from the coach, or player, or both. None was forthcoming.

Indeed, golf takes the measure of a person.

An Appeal to Your Generosity

Help Send Civil Rights Veterans Back to Mississippi
by Charlie Leck

As you may remember, if you are a regular reader of this blog, I'm returning to Mississippi in a few weeks for a reunion of Veterans of the Mississippi Civil Rights Movement. There are a number of the Civil Rights Vets who can't afford the trip or the costs while they're there. While there, we'll have a memorial service for the three civil rights workers who were murdered by the klan in 1964.

You could help out a great deal by making a contribution to (check payable to): Annual Mississippi Civil Rights Martyrs Memorial Service. That organization will use your contribution in a variety of ways – food costs, table rentals, porta potties, and housing and/or travel for veterans." I sent off $300 today. Anything you could send would be appreciated. Mail to:

c/o John Gibson
1028 CR 793
Brookland, AR 72417

Thanks so much!
Charlie

Campaign for America’s Future

I found this new web site and you simply need to know about it!
And a few other remarkable items are listed for you also!
by Charlie Leck

I probably should have known about them, but I didn't. Mea culpa! Here's how the Campaign for America's Future describes itself:

We live in a remarkable political moment: precarious, yet potentially transforming. At the Campaign for America's Future, our daily work is to bring about the progressive transformation.

After three decades of conservative dominance in American politics, we Americans are threatened with economic disintegration, environmental devastation and international isolation.

The list of failure is simply exhausting: a disastrous Iraq occupation, a destabilized Middle East and Asia, the persistent threat of terrorism, a menacing climate crisis, an insecure and dwindling energy supply, unprecedented trade deficits, unchecked global corporate power, our broken health care system, a weakened pension system and an increasingly inaccessible higher education system.

But out of the ashes of this era of conservative failure comes an historic opportunity for progressives to salvage the American Ideal and shape this young century.

That's where we come in.

The Campaign for America's Future is the strategy center for the progressive movement. Our goal is to forge the enduring progressive majority needed to realize the America of shared prosperity and equal opportunity that our country was meant to be.

[read more]

I pride myself too much for being politically alert on the progressive side of the scale. Wrong! This extraordinary organization has been out there for quite some time and they do great work and have a fine staff. And, only now am I finding out about them.

If you're in the same boat, get on over to this web site, become a part of this organization and pay attention for heaven's sake!

Here are a few other items y'all should know about.

If you're a political junky, as I am, you should know all about Real Clear Politics, which is the most unbiased source of political information I have found. They refuse to take positions or sides and just give you the facts about campaigns as best they can figure them out. As the campaign for the presidency takes off, you'll want to know about this site.

Outstanding news sources, rather than "Corporate Newspapers," are difficult to find. I've promoted AlterNet to you quite a bit. It's a daily read for me. I also, when I have time, go to Slate and to Salon. Now I'll add truthout.

Slate runs reaction from women this morning to "Hillary's bizarro nonconcession speech." I think Mrs. Clinton is treading on very dangerous ground and putting her party in peril. She has some kind of strategy in mind, however, and I can only guess that she is receiving some counsel from her husband. The second part of the James Baldwin quote, to which Kim McLarin refers, is:

"I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually."

Congressman Sam Wexler has a book coming out in a few days: Fire Breathing Liberal! You think I won't buy this one? I've already pre-ordered it at Barnes and Noble. Go to Amazon or Barnes and Noble and do the same. This will be a rock 'em and sock 'em work and an important book. Wexler is angry and he wants to see heads roll! Here are the publisher's comments about the book.

Publisher Comments
"There's a reason The Nation, America's leading progressive magazine, named Robert Wexler the country's Most Valuable Congressman. It's the same reason right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh refers to him as disgusting. It's because for the last twelve years Wexler has been Congress's most outspoken liberal — taking on George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Alberto Gonzales, General David Petraeus, and, when necessary, even his own party.

In Fire-Breathing Liberal, Wexler brings readers onto the floor of the House and puts them at the center of some of the last decade's biggest controversies. He passionately describes how he defended Bill Clinton from impeachment and how he stood up against the Bush brothers when the butterfly ballots in his Florida district wrongly decided the 2000 presidential election. He also offers an honest and brutal assessment of the Iraq war and explains why he has become a leader in the movement to impeach Vice President Cheney. And, with warmth and wit, Wexler shares some of the funniest stories from the corridors of Congress, including how he became The Colbert Report's most talked-about guest.

This is a remarkably candid first-person account of recent political history that shows government as it has rarely been seen — by a Democrat in the middle of the storms."

I sent the following recommendation to members of my family and to a few of my best friends, so I thought I should share it with the rest of you:
Six Reasons Why Women are the Most Important Audience for Changing the World by Lisa Witter and LisaChen – an article republished by Truthout and originally published as a part of their new book, The She-Spot: Why Women are the Market for Changing the World – and How to Reach Them (published by Berrett Koheler). The article was originally published on AlterNet. Here's a review of the book by Powell's Books.

Come back again!