I dunno, Z-man. These guys are pretty deeply entrenched and they have enough money to fight back against the politically correct idiocy assailing their own insulated private feifdom. With the exception of the CBS executive who turned tail and resigned, they are pretty well united in their opposition to this assault on their freedom of association. In its entire history, the Augusta National Golf Course has refused even a single penny of government funding. They are immune to the whole government camel-already-all-the-way-inside-the-tent argument that has been used to browbeat other such groups. The Supreme Sillies under Earl Warren used the strained logic that any facility or organization receiving the benefit of even a single government dollar became subject to the imposition of the "interstate commerce" clause of the Constitution. This allowed the feds to shove social engineering programs down the throats of even the smallest group. These guys are exempt from that perversion of reality and common sense, much to the chagrin and anger of the politically correct.

These guys have enough money and legal firepower to stand their own in any court of law and they have a lot of will. When the detractors went after the firms who had traditionally been sponsors of the Masters Tournament event, they voted unamiously to forego ALL sponsorships for the upcoming tournament. They even told CBS, when those spineless liberal idiots made threatening noises, that they would cancel the network's broadcast rights and shop those rights to two very interested bidders, the cable Golf Network and Fox Sports. CBS may be so left wing that they make Lenin look like a candidate for membership in the Sons of the Confederacy, but they know that the Masters Golf Tournament delivers millions upon millions of sets of eyeballs connected to fairly affluent checkbooks to the annual broadcast and they are all the exact demographics the advertisers for the tournament broadcat beg to reach.

The real powers-that-are at CBS Television Network have an abacus for a soul. Except for the first year of the televised tournament, there has never been an unsold commercial second for the annual broadcast and all "adjacencies" (commercials before and after the telecast)> They reached that "sold out" status many months before the tournament broadcast. The same goes for local "availabilities" (the commmercials local stations insert into the program at assigned positions); I know because I was once forced onto a three year waiting list for a local availability for one of my advertising clients. I wound up having to offer to have my client pay another advertiser to yield one of his long-standing positions for just one placement within the broadcast. The client saw measurable results from that appearance and still advertises in the tournament in that market every year.

The bean counters at Black Rock won't let the leftists at the programming helm of CBS kill that golden goose very easily. Even if they did, the membership of the Augusta National Course would simply shop the broadcast to another television or cable network. If you've ever been in the headquarters of CBS, you know that the omnipresent CBS "EYE" logo is woven into the carpets, embossed on elevator walls, embedded in the terrazo of the lobby and may even be watermarked on the toilet paper in the restrooms. Those who control the real power at CBS, the checkbooks, won't allow those folks to blacken that eye.

You may wind up being right and the membership may cave in rather than deal with homefront hassles, but I don't think so. Their wives and families kind of like being allowed to play the course as members of an ultra-exclusive club of people who, like themselves, have the wherewithal to pay the freight for that exclusivity and pack the political, legal and financial clout to withstand the attacks. These guys don't just have political "pull." They pack political "yank." If for no other reason, I admire them for refusing to issue an invitation to Bubba the Lech to play the course, even when he was President. Many highly monied men have attempted to buy their way into a membership there and have been rejected. It's not just about wealth for these guys. It is all about being with people with whom they wish to associate and they have strong principles and character as well as the will to withstand all attacks on those freedoms. They are serious about it, too.

I pass directly in front of the entrance to that course every time I have to go for medical treatment. At one edge of the course is a power substation that the membership paid to install. They do not accept power from the government utility firm at all but purchase it directly from the private firm that generates and distributes power for them and other customers. They built and maintain all roadways on the property and do not accept roadwork provided by any government agency. They have their own water wells, sewage and waste water treatment facilities as well.

They are the worse nightmare of the politically correct social engineers. They are unassailable and intend to stay that way. One thing I did enjoy recently was a comment on an Augusta radio station I heard while in that city 125 miles away from my home. It seems the membership committee that oversees press credentials for media outlets who flock to cover the Masters event is pondering what to do with the requests for credentials from the New York Times sports reporters and editorial people who also want press passes. Just perhaps I can, as publisher of LAF LIONS via the Internet, request a press pass to the upcoming 2003 Masters Tournament. Who knows? There may be a few folks who won't get credentials this year even though they have had such passes at every Tournament since its inception. You should see the spreads and goodies those few dreadfully hardheaded men lay out for their media guests each year. Can you say "filet mignon sandwiches" and "eggs Benedict?" By the way, many of those sporting those press credentials each year could not write a simple constructive English sentence worth reading. They have no concept of a squeeze play or a wide-out pass pattern. They occupy corner offices in the executive suites of print, broadcast and cable media outlets.

Perhaps the New York Times bleeding hearts leftists and the NOW anti-male harridans have finally met their "Waterloo" in a town in eastern Georgia. Just for the record, most members of the Augusta National Club don't even live in Georgia. Rumor has it that a couple of members have been quietly purchasing stock equities in the parent company that owns the New York Times. Stay tuned, kiddies, this could get interesting. Some of those folks could find their "golden parachutes" got to be that color the same way snow gets to be yellow.