A perp walk spoiled (includes new definition of Clinton golf cheating maneuver)

This month's Golf Digest contains remarkable statistics on 270 leading CEO golfers. The amazing thing is not their handicaps, or that better golfers seem to run better-performing companies. It's that so far none of them have been dragged off the course by the U.S. Justice Department under a barrage of flashbulbs.

Given the circus atmosphere surrounding alleged corporate malfeasance, Justice officials would surely love to take down a chief executive on the eighteenth, no, make that seventeenth, green. From five irons to leg-irons in one fell swoop. In fact, they had an opportunity with John Rigas, the 78-year-old head of Adelphia Communications. Mr. Rigas and his family allegedly used the company as a piggy bank, including financing a fancy golf course on the patriarch's property. However, the Feds couldn't wait for Mr. Rigas to totter out to the first tee and instead hauled him off from his New York apartment. The handicaps of others recently forced to do the executive "perp walk" -- such as ImClone CEO Sam Waksal and WorldCom financial executives Scott D. Sullivan and David E. Myers -- are unknown. Except for the handcuffs, of course.

The innocence -- only alleged, of course -- of the Golf Digest's 270 could mean one of two things: Either golf promotes honesty; or current problems have been blown out of proportion. P.G. Wodehouse noted that you could only discover a man's true character by playing golf with him. "In no other walk of life," he wrote, "does the cloven hoof so quickly display itself."

Among Wodehouse's golfing menagerie were obvious candidates for the Justice Department's attentions. Take Bradbury Fisher, who "had done things to the small investor which would have caused raised eyebrows on the fo'c'sle of a pirate sloop ..."

Suspicions of corporate golf probably go back to Adam Smith's allegation that "People of the same trade seldom meet together ... but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public ..." Indeed, it's surprising that the Justice Department or Canada's Competition Bureau hasn't stepped in before now to insist on an anti-trust official being part of any executive foursome.

But the dark side of golf lies not in corporate conspiracy but in the deep fescue in which businessmen and politicians get together. Just think back to Wodehouse's cloven hoof and then think of Bill Clinton. The former president was such a notorious cheat that Jean Chrétien named a new golf term after him: a "Clinton" is reportedly where you hit a Mulligan (an illegal second shot off the tee) so badly that you play your first shot anyway.

As for the conspiracy angle, what about the 150-plus Ontario businessmen who forked out (or, more likely, whose shareholders forked out) $10,000 a foursome this week to hit the links and schmooze with former finance minister and Liberal leadership hopeful Paul Martin. The corporate executives also got the opportunity to submit three written ideas to "the man they want as leader." Presumably these wouldn't be "Eye on the ball. Hands loose. Left arm straight."

This blatant purchase of political access and influence, according to a beaming Mr. Martin, is what democracy is all about. (Mr. Martin is beaming, by the way, because he has left his successor, John Manley, in a deep, deep bunker. The surplus having disappeared, Mr. Manley now has to explain to Mr. Chrétien why there is no money for his "legacy": clearing up the aboriginal mess he helped create/solving Africa's problems/widening the Trans-Canada Highway to 64 lanes/whatever. Mr. Martin can also smile because there are no penalties for screwing up the books in government. Indeed, it's expected.)

Even more politically gruesome is the prospect of over 200 big company lobbyists descending in 10 days' time upon Chicoutimi, Quebec, for a round of golf to kick off the Liberals' annual national caucus meeting. Two-and-a-half grand buys you a round with a Cabinet minister, MP or Senator; $1,250 gets a political staffer on your team, and for $500 you can sponsor a special prize such as the longest drive. The tallest-tale prize has already been awarded to Robert Lea, Ottawa lobbyist for the Royal Bank of Canada, which is co-sponsoring the tournament. "This is not about buying access," declared Mr. Lea. "This is all about helping charities in the riding." Mr. Lea noted that the politicians would be drawn at random, which he declared should remove any perception of buying access. Just to confirm that such affairs smell, Howard Wilson, federal "Ethics Counsellor" (sorry, I have to put quotation marks there, complete with Austin Powers-type gestures) says that he has no problems with the tournament. "I don't see that there's anything wrong in terms of people socializing a bit as they go around the golf course." Any more, presumably, than he saw anything wrong with twisting a few arms to get a loan approved to a hotel next door to a golf course from the sale of which the twister was still owed money.

That last paragraph refers to a scandal that emerged during the last Canadian federal election. Some readers may be surprised to learn that the corruption of the Canadian federal government makes Washington, D.C. look positively goo-goo, but it's a reality.

Please explain what you mean more fully please. What is goo-goo? Worse or better.
But what gets me is that this writer, by his characterization of the Justice Dept. as being gleeful at arresting CEO's, is somewhat dismissive of the severity of what has happened in the business community. These guys are thieves. They used private, secret information to manipulate the stock market and lie to the public. They should be in stocks and pilloried. It is about time that these kind of shenanigans are punished severely.

"What is goo-goo? Worse or better."

I believe that goo-goo is a Chicago term. It is short for goody good.

I was referring to "good government" as recommended by PBS, Warren Rudman, Bill Moyers, Ralph Nader, et cetera. Their utopian efforts to 'clean up' a political system that isn't actually that corrupt generally make things worse. The fetish for "campaign finance reform" is a recent example.

Sorry I took a while getting back to you. I went to bed after posting the story, which I thought might appeal to golfers and Clinton-joke aficionados.

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