The Affordable Golf Club Act

Lots of strange notions get started on the internet, and The Affordable Golf Club Act is one of the strangest. Even stranger is that there are people who believe it. Enough, it seems, that the internet rumor site, Snopes, has dedicated a page to debunking the Affordable Golf Club Act.

Upon some reflection, the worst part of all is that we have a government whose day-to-day behavior makes something like this seem plausible.

Here’s the text, as it’s been making the rounds:

The Obama administration has passed a new law titled: “The Affordable Golf Club Act,” declaring that every citizen must purchase a new set of golf clubs before April 2014.

This law has been passed, because until now, typically only the wealthy or financially responsible have been able to purchase new golf clubs without the assistance of their government.

This new law ensures that every American can now have “affordable” golf clubs of their own, because everyone is equally entitled to new golf clubs. And if you want to keep the golf clubs you already have, you can do that, until April 2014.

These affordable golf clubs will cost from $1,000 to $3,000 each, depending on your income level. This does not include taxes, pull cart, electric cart fees, green fees, membership fees, balls, tees, gloves, range finders, storage fees, maintenance, or repair costs.

In order to make sure everyone participates and purchases their affordable golf clubs, the costs of owning golf clubs will increase 50% each year up to 400% by year 2018. This way, wealthy people will pay more for something that other people don’t want or can’t afford to maintain. People who can’t afford or refuse to maintain their golf clubs will be fined. However, children under the age of 26 can use their parents’ golf clubs until they turn 27, at which time they must purchase their own golf clubs.

If you don’t want or think you don’t need golf clubs, you are still required to buy them. If you refuse to buy a set or make claims that you can’t afford them, you will be fined $800 until you purchase a set or face imprisonment.

People living in farming areas, ghettos, inner cities, Wyoming, or areas with no access to golf courses are not exempt. Age, health, prior experience, or no experience are not acceptable excuses for not buying, maintaining, and using your golf clubs.

A government review board that doesn’t know the difference between a hook and a slice will decide everything. This includes when, where, how often, and for what purposes you can use your golf clubs, along with how many people can ride in your golf cart. The board will also determine if participants are too old or not healthy enough to be able to use their golf clubs.

They will also decide if your golf clubs have outlived their usefulness or if you must purchase specific accessories, like a range finder with slope adjustment, or a newer and more expensive set of golf clubs.

Those who can afford memberships at expensive golf country clubs will be required to buy memberships. If you are already a member and you like your membership, you can keep your membership. After April 2014, a different country club will be assigned for you to purchase a membership at.

Government officials are exempt from this new law, as they and their families and some of their friends and a few of their friends’ friends can obtain golf clubs at taxpayers’ expense.

5 thoughts on “The Affordable Golf Club Act”

  1. “Even stranger is that there are people who believe it…worst part of all is that we have a government whose day-to-day behavior makes something like this seem plausible.”  Strangest of all is that you don’t review your comments before you post them, and that a golf blogger feels compelled to make a political statement in this way.  People are stupid for believing an Affordable Golf Club Act but it’s plausible?  The Golf Club Act was obviously someone’s idea of satire, but the joke appears to be on you.  Turn off FOX News while you write these things, will ya?

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  2. It’s not plausible to me; indeed, it is ridiculous on its face. But it apparently is plausible to enough people that Snopes had to debunk it. At that point, I have to ask: Why do they think it might be real? The answer, of course, is that the government has done something in the past that makes the Golf Club Act plausible to them.

    I think it is a bit like UFOs and Bigfoot. People believe in those because something has happened that makes them do so: They saw it, or a friend saw it. The rest of us know it is ridiculous, but to the believers, it is very real indeed, and they have “evidence.”

    For the record, I get my news from NPR.

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  3. GB, Snopes debunks all sorts of stuff that rational people would never believe.  They have slow news days too.  The Affordable Golf Club Act is clearly a spoof; my issue is with your contention that people are stupid because the government makes them so. Actually, I think you make a persuasive argument that government’s purpose is to protect some people (and the rest of us) from their stupid selves…

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  4. I don’t think government makes them stupid. They accomplish that all by themselves but …

    I know a guy who believes that Bush put secret satellites in space and that they’re reading his mind (it’s Ann Arbor after all). Irrational … up to a point. The government denies this, but they have lied in the past. It would be a violation of civil liberties, but the government has done that in the very recent past. It is too advanced technologically, but government has hidden secret technology in the past. It would take a vast conspiracy, but there have been conspiracies in the past.

    That’s what makes me think that the worst problem of all is that our government does things that encourage these sloppy thinkers. To the less rational, that the government could force people to buy golf clubs is made plausible only if they have already made us buy certain other products—which they have (air bags on cars as well as dozens of other environmental and safety devices that we would not otherwise pay for, auto insurance and, of course, health insurance)

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  5. No, not “irrational up to a point.”  Just plain irrational—the reading his mind part, at least.  And not “sloppy” thinking, which gives it way too much credit.  I’m not Pollyanna about the government and lying; we need go no farther back than the pretense for the Iraq war (and, okay, for equal time, it does appear Obama lied about keeping your health plan).  But, sorry, it is too big a leap from air bags to satellite mind probes and the Affordable Golf Club Act. Please don’t encourage them.

    Reply

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