You're not supposed to use them to promote your commercial enterprise.
A Wisconsin golf course — Tumbledown Trails — advertised a $9.11 special for 9/11. It was, understandably, not well received. It was, in fact, so poorly received that they're considering closing the place on 9/11 to protect employees from the unpleasant things people might say.
Considering war and death, we should object to Washington's Birthday/Lincoln's Birthday advertising. There is some criticism of that now and then, but not much, perhaps because they're from the somewhat distant past, perhaps because we commemorate them on their birthdays — or a day around their birthdays — and not on an anniversary of their suffering.
And then, there's just something about golf. That golf should be played when anything serious is happening!
I was just listening to the podcast of yesterday's Rush Limbaugh show, and he was going on about "Obama on Syria: Incoherent Incompetence -- or the Decline of America by Design?," riffing on a WSJ piece by Norman Podhoretz called "Obama's Successful Foreign Failure."
Podhoretz noted the puzzle of how "to characterize a president who declares war against what he calls a great evil demanding immediate extirpation and in the next breath announces that he will postpone taking action for at least 10 days -- and then goes off to play golf before embarking on a trip to another part of the world?"
Rush restates it, double stressing the role of golf: "Then he goes out and plays golf and plans another trip, then comes back, and then says, 'By the way, I'm not gonna do this unless Congress goes along with me,' and then goes and plays golf."
After a commercial break, Rush is back rereading Podhoretz, replete with "then goes off to play golf."
The same golf-is-disrespectful game was played against Bush, who allowed video like this to be captured...
... and of course it was used against him. He compensated for media hostility by giving up golf entirely, and even his giving up of golf was used against him.
September 10, 2013
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17 comments:
I can't remember, back when Pearl Harbor Day was noted, anybody doing anything like that.
Of course, the was Our Fathers' America.
What must be remembered is that GW Bush gave up golf in 2003 supposedly in respect for the military that he put in harms way. (His detractors claIm that it was because of his knee). And, that probably is why Rush, et al think that it is such a big thing that Obama is setting a Presidential record for golfing while he has people dying in foreign countries under his watch, and, in this case, was talking about bombing or otherwise attacking still another country.
Of course, this is just par for the course for Obama, whom we all know, went to bed early on the night of 9/11/12 after hearing that our consulllate was on fire in Benghazi, in order to be fresh for his fund raising trip out west the next day. After all, what is the importance of those four lives in comparison to the importance of being reeected so he doesnt have to move out of the White House and give up all the perks of the office?
On September 11th,
Muslims celebrate.
We mourn.
If Mitt Romney played golf, he might be President today. Likewise, John Kerry and Al Gore lost their chance as did Jimmy Carter for his second term. Imagine if Carter instead of holing up in the Rose Garden had gotten out on the golf course.
Golfing may project laziness to some but it projects a relaxed confidence to many. Nixon would never have been forced from office if he had spent more time on the golf course.
His foreign policy, far from a dismal failure, is a brilliant success as measured by what he intended all along to accomplish. The accomplishment would not have been possible if the intention had been too obvious. The skill lies in how effectively he has used rhetorical tricks to disguise it.
If Limbaugh, Podhoretz et al. are correct, is it any wonder Putin would want to bail Obama out of his box, lest Obama's bluff be called and his "success" on the world stage stopped?
Does Putin like what he sees in Obama as far as his contribution to declining US influence?
There was a program on Maryland Public Television that included a sketch advertising a Martin Luther King Day White Sale.
EDH if I were a tinfoil paranoid I would swear Obama is a secret Soviet sleeper agent and Putin is his handler.
Did they get their marketing idea from The Onion?
They should consider a Pearl Harbor Day promotion:
One day only! 12 players can go 7 rounds for $19.41! As a surprise twist, we won't call with your tee time until 7:48 AM (HA time). Sign up now to avoid an unpleasant surprise!
EDH,
To ask that question is to answer it.
Nailed it gspencer.
Trey
El País--the highest-circulation daily newspaper in Spain--already used the fall of the Twin Towers to advertize an offer of a free week of their newspaper. The text said if you can do so much in a day, just think what you can do in a week. That was around 2002 or 2003. Enemies of this country--like the Left--should do it here. Perhaps the Democratic Party can start.
Proper damage control would be to offer free golf on 9/11 for active duty military and retirees as well as firefighters and police officers.
Hey! Betcha Barry's gonna play!
edutcher and Strelnikov already beat me to the punchline, but perhaps the golf course should have free sushi in clubhouse for Pearl Harbor Day as well.
Ike was the first golfing president I remember. I don't think he got a lot of criticism for his golfing, but when the Birch Society accused him of being "a conscious agent of the Communist conspiracy", one of Ike's semi-defenders on the right fringe said something to the effect that Ike's not a Communist, he's a golfer.
Ike was heavily criticized for spending too much time on the golf course. Adlai Stevenson tried to use that against him in the campaign. Castro and Khrushchev joined the fun.
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