Now Watch This Drive

Even the President takes a mulligan.

The last days of summer had come.

The tall trees overhead began to show signs of the oncoming autumn—a browning leaf falling here, a gust of gentle wind there, then a few more leaves knuckling down into the long shadow of the dawn’s deep orange glow. With the last breath of warmth came that familiar feeling: oncoming responsibility, sweaters coming out the closet, and memories made that would act as rations against the oncoming cold until the warmth broke through again.

It was a Sunday morning, quiet and serene near America’s eastern most edge. Quiet and serene, that is, save for the throngs of angsty cameramen snapping photos, elbowing reporters shouting questions, and men in polarized sunglasses holding automatic weapons at the ready.

This particular Sunday, the President of the United States was golfing.

The President had also played 18 holes the day prior, on Saturday. It was the same routine he had as the weekend before. 18 on Saturday, 18 on Sunday. The President was working on a lot of things, and one of them was his game. First in war, first in peace and more often these days—first on the tee.

It also so happened that the world—that realm a President is often mistakenly thought to be in control of—was on fire at the time. It was August 5, 2002. It had not been a year since the September 11 attacks and although the night-vision glow of Shock and Awe that kicked off the Iraq War was seven months away, the War in Afghanistan was in full swing, as the United States sought a global coalition to both wage full scale war and nation-build in the Middle East at the same time.

At the center of it all was the man on the tee, George W. Bush, 56 years old, just over a year and half into his presidency. In the 2000 election, Bush had been given a second chance. A mulligan, if you will. At the end of Election Day, it appeared his opponent, Vice President Al Gore, would win. But the election became too close to call and after weeks of recounts, it was passed along to the Supreme Court. The Court, which included a member appointed by his father and several more appointed when his father was Vice President, sided with Bush.

George W. Bush’s life had been full of second chances. While others from his generation fought in Vietnam, he served in the Texas Air National Guard. When he was pulled over for a DUI in 1976, he was not arrested, nor was the story reported for another 24 years. When in 1978 he ran for the House of Representatives, he lost but quickly regained his footing. Later, during his presidency, when he failed to get Osama Bin Laden after September 11, he turned to a wider war with Afghanistan. When the war with Afghanistan was not yielding results, he turned to a wider war with Iraq. When running for a second term after both wars became unpopular, Bush still won. In the end, it all seemed to work out for the Yale and Harvard educated son of a President who made his political gains by being an “everyman.” The mulligans always came.

Bush was far from the first golfing president. In fact, he wasn’t even the first golfing President Bush. His father, the 41^st President, was known for his lightning-fast rounds, reportedly playing 18 holes in under 2 hours. The man who occupied the office in between the Bush years, Bill Clinton, was a golfer too. He would regularly produce scorecards in the high 70s and low 80s—which, of course, is different than shooting in the high 70s or low 80s. Often if Clinton didn’t like his drive, he’d take another. If he didn’t like his approach, or his chip, or his putt, he’d take another and he’d choose whichever shot he liked best. Clinton was a man who liked having options.

Clinton wanted to show that he had game like his hero, John F. Kennedy. Kennedy was arguably the best golfer ever to hold the office, a single-digit handicap despite his bad back. Prior to accepting the Democratic nomination in the Summer of 1960, Kennedy stood over a par 3 at Cypress Golf Links in California and watched his shot sail directly toward the pin. His playing partners howled at the ball to go in—as Kennedy screamed for it to check up short, which it did. His partners asked, who in the world would root against a hole-in-one? Kennedy replied, “if that went in, people would assume it was just another golfer seeking the White House.”

Kennedy was referring to his predecessor, President Dwight Eisenhower, an avid golfer, who played over 800 times in his eight years in office and joined Augusta National Golf Club. Ike even chewed up the floors of the West Wing by walking back and forth so often in his spikes between the Oval Office and the putting green he installed in 1954 on the South Lawn, a putting green that Richard Nixon later had removed. (George H.W. Bush had it reinstalled).

So, when President Bush arrived at the first tee shortly after dawn that morning in Kennebunkport, Maine at Cape Arundel Golf Club, he was well within the traditions of his office when he addressed the throngs of reporters on hand. He had something he needed to respond to: earlier that day, in northern Israel, a bus bombing later claimed by Hamas detonated and killed nine people and injured dozens more, a bombing in retaliation for Israel’s July 22 bombing of Gaza City.

Even though the attack happened in Israel, it was part of Bush’s “War on Terror,” a global campaign that knew no borders and had a strategy that was more rhetorical than tactical. When Bush rolled up the first tee, he was riding shotgun in the golf cart, driver in hand, golf glove already on. His father, the former President, was driving.

“I’m distressed to hear about the uh, the latest, uh, suicide bombers in Israel. Ummm…For those who yearn for peace in the Middle East, for those in the Arab lands, for those in Europe, for those all around the world who yearn for peace, we must do everything we possibly can to stop the terror.” Bush continued, “we must stop the terror. I call upon all nations to do everything they can to stop these terrorist killers.”

“Now watch this drive.”

Bush went to the back of his father’s cart. He grabbed a ball and walked to the tee. Cameras clicked and pens scribbled. After a waggle, Bush stared down the fairway and hammered the ball, his eyes following his opening shot as he held a golfer’s pose for the cameras. It’s an image Americans wouldn’t soon forget. But in reality, the ball had sliced right. His father looked on: “alright, you’re gonna need another.” The son reached into his left pocket and found another ball, teeing up again. With another chance, he found the fairway on his second shot. A mulligan.

The son hopped into his father’s cart, riding shotgun, putting his legs up on the cart’s dash as the father drove away. The son yet again had scored on a second chance.