Real Golf at the Irish Open

For those who seek relief from the likes of Manny Ramirez, what's-his-name-the-swimmer-who-is-so-stupid-as-to-smoke-dope-in-public, and their ilk, I suggest you turn to the Golf Channel on Saturday morning, and watch events like The Irish Open.

They normally play in conditions that American pros won't even leave the hotel suite for. Saturday's play was delayed when the winds were so high they threatened to pull the clubs from the hands of the players.

You haven't heard of most of these guys, like Robert Rock, Graeme MacDowell, and Shane Lowry, and Johan Edfors. You will soon enough, when the Ryder Cup rolls around again.

They are inspiring, with Lowry (the young amateur) finally taking the cup over Rock after four playoff holes played in the chill and the rain. The crowds were cheering their boy Lowry in Tiger-like decibel levels. His poor mother, standing in the gallery, couldn't bear to look. (Rock had to console himself with the 500,000 euro award for highest finish by a professional.)

Home-made swings, ugly rough, pot bunkers full of wet sand, gale-force winds, rain.

Real golf.

Last year, I met a kid at my local club, fresh from four years on his college team, who wouldn't go out to practice because conditions were wet and chilly. He stayed in the clubhouse and discussed his plans to go play the European Tour. He smirked when I suggested that the day's conditions were typical of what he would encounter across the pond. Now that kid has a real future...in some other line of work.

*****

And, what to my wondering eyes did appear, but John Daly, dressed head-to-toe, learning how to work for a living on links courses. If he survives this, we might see him on the senior tour, hopefully sober and with what remains of his brilliant abilities intact.

But he has to make cuts first, which he failed to achieve this weekend. He has to show up to tee times, which he seems unable to do as well.

Ethical Midgets with Ivy League Degrees

It isn't as if these people didn't know better....

Just because someone has an English surname, a long pedigree, Ivy League credentials, and a respectable job in the financial district doesn't mean they aren't actively participating in organized crime. The code of silence certainly has been in place for years.

How many family fortunes have been devastated while these guys were having Monday lunch, trading stock tips on the firms they were hired to regulate?

Last week, I visited a recently widowed family member at her retirement center. It appears her late husband had everything in cash before the crash arrived. One of her friends, in her eighties, also recently widowed, was not so fortunate. I could feel the worry in her heart. She was wondering if a lifetime of work and saving would be enough to allow her to live out her life in the modest dignity of this facility, where she had the basics of safety, food, and company.

This is the true impact of the hustlers on our culture.

Denninger provides one such example from today's odd-looking activities at Wall Street.

Wrestling Midgets

As Jeff Foxworthy regularly reminds his audiences: "I can't make this stuff up!"

Here in bucolic Burns, Tennessee, thirty-five miles west of Nashville (and light years removed from civil society), we have a mayoral campaign underway.

For years, it was never a problem. Ed 'Shot' Grove ran unopposed for years, serving as both mayor and police chief. If someone needed the police, they wouldn't say 'Call the police'; they'd say 'Give Shot a call.' He'd eventually turn up, and everybody would calm down. Think Sheriff Andy and Mayberry.

But Shot was forcibly retired, at age 78, following revelations that he had hired police officers with felony records, and the State of Tennessee revoked accreditation from his police department.

So now we have Mayor Bishop, now up for re-election, opposed by the police chief he fired last month, running as a write-in candidate. (Ya'll keeping track of all this?)

The town is littered with hand-lettered signs. The Mayor did have a big ole' sign sporting the University of Tennessee logo, proclaiming 'Go Vols, Go Bishop!' or words to that effect. UT took a dim view, and two cease-and-desist letters later, that sign disappeared.

So what's an incumbent to do, here in Burns, to endear the voters to himself?

Why, wrasslin' of course!! So, on May 21, Jerry 'The King' Lawler will be bringing his wrasslin' show, complete with MIDGETS(!!) to perform in Burns, featuring as referee the beloved Mayor Bishop.

Remember, OldSouth, mere mortal that he is, can't make this stuff up. He took this picture this afternoon, May 15, 2009.

Somebody call Shot. This could get ugly...

Nonmarital births, and a non-marital culture

The report on 'non-marital births' from the Center for Disease Control has garnered a lot of headlines this morning, but the summary and report itself deserve a bit more thoughtful consideration.

The really good news is that the birth rate for unmarried teen mothers has dropped, actually halving since 1970. The somewhat less-than-good news is that the bearing of children outside of marriage has become much more casually accepted, with little social sanction attached.

If, as is to be hoped, fewer abortions are undertaken year-over-year, then children born out of wedlock will have to be welcomed, life being preferred over death.

The biggest 'bump' in the charts appears to be in women 30-35, if I read the summary correctly.

This is more than somewhat less-than-good news. It speaks to our cultural problem with the institution of marriage. If half the kids born in the 70's and 80's grew up in circumstances that included a failed marriage of their parents, we should not be surprised to find that, as young adults, these young people hold a jaundiced view of marriage.

Suspicion abounds: Women wonder if this guy, attractive as he appears, is stable enough and of sufficient character to mate for life. Many, many are not. And with the increased acceptance of homosexuality, the available pool of men shrinks. Add in the closeted homosexual men who emerge from the closet a decade and two children down the road, and marriage looks like a high-risk wager for women. I'm not making this stuff up--I've seen it happen several times in my polite little buttoned-down world.

Men wonder if they are walking into a lifetime trap, given the draconian nature of divorce and child support law, which incentivize the less-than-scrupulous wife to bear a couple of kids, thus having husband and his family on the fiduciary hook for a couple of decades at least. They find out too late that they were really just generic heterosexual males capable of donating sperm and generating cash. I've seen this happen several times as well, and it devastates lives. Why take this risk?

The term 'nonmarital' itself is indicative; a fabricated word, a product of our brave new bureaucracy. It is academically cold, exact, and studiously avoids any emotional baggage attached to the term 'out-of-wedlock'. It is a Latin-derived fabrication, less evocative than the old Anglo-Saxon sound of 'wedlock'.

If we're going to thrive as a culture, and eventually as an economy again, we'll have to find a way to make marriage safe again. We'll have to teach our children the art and craft of living together as trustworthy people.

The Graduation Speech We All Need To Hear

In the flood of platitudes uttered every May to graduates across the country these words actually merit reading and consideration.

Penned by an anonymous community college dean, these few paragraphs are words to embrace.

Remember--culture leads, and the economy is the 'trailing indicator'.