It’s been a big week at the New York Times. My sources tell me morale is at or about bottom as Howell Raines continues his manic attempt to corral news stories and now columns to reflect a party line. The Times has now run over 40 stories or columns on the Augusta National Golf Club non-story, all parroting the same line. The resignation of one out of around 300 club members made it to the front page of a national newspaper. The Times has now spiked two dissenting columns and, according to the columnists, the reason was their dissent from the official position. Even a Raines defender, Jack Shafer, has given up, while Raines’ critics, ahem, are feeling vindicated. Perhaps sensing how much damage has been done to the Times’ reputation, Gerald Boyd, Howell Raines’ underling, sent out this priceless leaked memo yesterday. Boyd is unapologetic about the Times’ crazed fascination with the Augusta National Golf Club, comparing it in the same sentence with the need to report on Afghanistan: “There is only one word for our vigor in pursuing a story – whether in Afghanistan or Augusta. Call it journalism.” Boyd then denies that the two columns were spiked for ideological reasons. But his memo shows nothing of the kind. First off, Boyd concedes that David Anderson’s piece was spiked because it took on the position of the editorial page. But isn’t that exactly what the Times is accused of? Here’s the rationale:
One of the columns focused centrally on disputing The Times’s editorials about Augusta. Part of our strict separation between the news and editorial pages entails not attacking each other. Intramural quarreling of that kind is unseemly and self-absorbed. Discussion of editorials may arise when we report on an issue; fair enough. But we do not think they should be the issue.
Where to start with this? First off, a self-confident paper would be perfectly happy to have some internal debate. Second, if you really had to, you could ask the columnist to remove the direct reference to the Times editorial page and make his argument instead. But notice the slipperiness of this Boyd’s logic in any case. Intramural civility is the rule. Which means no open disagreement with the editorial page. Which is dictated by Raines. So “civility” is a euphemism for conformity – especially on contentious issues. And then notice how self-defeating it is. The fact is that the Times has become “the issue” – but not because of dissenting columnists but because of the ham-fisted way in which those columnists have been treated.
THE SELF-DEFEATING MEMO: Perhaps sensing the circularity of his “civility” argument, Boyd then says that Anderson had already written a column, “arguing on October 6 against pressuring the golf club to admit women,” and a second would be too much. But a look at the October 6 piece by Anderson reveals no such thing. The piece makes no such argument; and in fact, clearly steers clear of any argument at all. Sure, Anderson reports on locals’ views that they see nothing wrong with Augusta’s men-only policy. But he also reports on those who sharply disagree. Here’s the whole column so you can see what I mean or make your own mind up. In fact, it’s less a column than a report, and in much of its language, betrays a certain condescension to the club:
Sports of The Times; Augusta National’s Neighbors Wonder What All the Fussin’ Could Be About
AUGUSTA, Ga. — AT the leafy entrance to the Augusta National Golf Club, the green iron gate next to the sentry box is slammed shut, barring access to Magnolia Lane and the white plantation clubhouse above the course where the Masters is played every April. Along the property’s perimeter, green canvas covers the tournament’s parking-lot gates between the tall pine trees and thick bushes that tower above the traffic on Washington Road.
In the weeks before the club will reopen after its usual five-month summer nap, Augusta National resembles a Confederate Army camp under siege.
And it is. The attack is with words and threats from the Washington-based National Council of Women’s Organizations: Admit a woman as a member. But most of Augusta National’s neighbors here seem to wonder what all the fussin’ is about.
Its golf neighbor is the serene Augusta Country Club, where tall pines separate the fairway of its 388-yard par-4 ninth hole from Augusta National’s famous 12th hole down there in Amen Corner where Rae’s Creek flows.
During a recent Masters, as Tiger Woods was near the 12th green, a stray shot from that ninth fairway somehow landed harmlessly near him.
”I don’t know how that ball ever got through those trees,” Henry Marburger, the Augusta Country Club’s general manager, was saying Friday. ”It had to be a freak shot, an embarrassing shot. Whoever hit it never owned up to it.”
Of the Augusta Country Club’s 1,300 members, according to Marburger, 900 are golf members, including ”30 or 40” women and ”some African-American” members. About 25 are also Augusta National members.
”If you polled any group, the opinions would be mixed,” Marburger said, alluding to Augusta National’s controversy, ”but I’m sure more of our members would be pro-National. They like the National a great deal. It’s part of our society. And during the Masters many of our members are gallery marshals there. They look forward to that.”
Opened in 1899, the Country Club was ”the” golf course in Augusta long before the National opened in 1933. Bobby Jones often traveled 130 miles from his Atlanta home to play at the Augusta Country Club. In 1930, Jones, a career amateur, prepared for his Grand Slam by winning the Southeastern Open at the Augusta Country Club by 15 strokes over the best pros of that era.
”Bobby Jones was an honorary member here,” Marburger said.
In Augusta, where there’s a Bobby Jones Expressway, don’t expect much dissent at the Country Club for whatever happens at the National, which Jones founded. And among the National’s other neighbors, the businesses across Washington Road from the club entrance, dissent was the exception.
At the International House of Pancakes, the manager, Lynn Smith, a divorced mother of two, shook her head.
”I agree with what the National’s doing,” she said. ”It’s been like that forever, no women members. I’m a women’s libber, but it’s a man’s thing over there.”
At the Clubhouse, a green-and-white banquet-reception hall where corporate groups gather during the Masters, the owner, Terry Wick, shrugged. ”I don’t see where it’s an issue either way,” he said. ”I can see the women’s side of it, but why would you want to make it an issue?”
At the nondenominational Whole Life Ministries, the senior pastor, Dr. Sandra Kennedy, was in Atlanta, but its property manager, Howard Gaither, nodded.
”Our pastor is a woman,” he said, ”but from the few comments I’ve heard around here, it seems ridiculous for a woman to break into the club. It’ll take a miracle for a woman to be a member there. It’s a private club. They can do what they like.”
Like the Clubhouse, the Ministries’ income is improved by the Masters; it leases its 700-space parking lot the week of the Masters. Another neighbor, Windsor Jewelers, also does a brisk business during Masters Week.
”The National is a good, quiet neighbor,” Donald Thompson, Windsor’s owner, said. ”Everybody I’ve talked to here, the Augusta Women’s Club, the Junior League, they say they don’t want any men in their clubs either. Many of them play golf at the National anyway. Locally, we don’t see it as a big deal. If you don’t like what the National is doing, you don’t have to go to the Masters.”
But at the Food Lion, the local outlet for the South’s popular supermarket chain, a dissenting voice was heard.
”Pers
onally, I’m not for exclusion of any sort,” said Tony Clark, a 34-year-old African-American who is an assistant manager. ”It’s perceived here that the Masters takes over the city. It’s an intrusion that week for the people who live here.”
Clark remembered a customer, an elderly white woman, talking about William Johnson, known as Hootie, the Augusta National chairman.
”This lady hates the Masters,” Clark said. ”She told me: ‘Doesn’t he have a wife? What does his wife think about all this?’ ”
Mostly, or at least publicly, Augusta National’s neighbors were defending it along Washington Road. But neighbors usually stick together. Especially when heritage or dollars are involved.
Now, does that read to you like a column “arguing against pressurizing the golf club to admit women”? A column that analogizes the club to a Confederate Army Camp? A column that ends by implying that defenders of the club are motivated by money? And yet this is the basis on which Boyd argues that Anderson’s “freedom to argue that way was not – is not – in question.” The truth is: Anderson’s freedom to argue that way is precisely what’s at question. And Raines knows it.
THE SECOND SPIN: The second spiked piece was turned down, according to Boyd, because its logic wasn’t sound enough. I will resist the temptation to point out that they publish Maureen Dowd twice a week, but this line is just as dubious. It’s impossible to know whether it has any validity without reading the drafts. But suffice to say that I’ve had plenty of editors in my time who have not seen the “logic” in an argument with which they disagree. And the way in which Boyd described Anderson’s October 6 column suggests the Times’ editors’ view of logic is somewhat subjective. Here’s the only way in which the Times can now prove to their readers that their columnists actually are free to argue what they believe: run the two columns and prove me wrong.
The Dish 