One of the more enlightening aspects of the current controversy at the Augusta National Klavern is how little most of the members of the pundit class know about sports. For those of you who might be new to this dispute, please understand that the Masters is not simply a golf tournament; to many golf fans, it's the only tournament that matters. It holds the same position that Wimbledon has in tennis, as the de facto worlds championship in the sport.

It is also played on a course with a rather interesting history. The course was "designed" by Bobby Jones, a great amateur player in the early 20th century, back when that still meant something, and he and his business partner shepherded the tournament into prominence by emphasizing its exclusivity. For years, African Americans were not allowed to play in the tournament, and anyone whose face was not a lighter shade of pale (ie. Lee Trevino) was made to feel unwelcome. It has only been in the last two decades that the club has admitted non-whites as members. Thus, Tiger Woods, cablinasian golfer supreme, has attained mythic status by not only winning, but dominating the Masters.

The importance of the Masters seems to have been lost on many of the idiot commentators of the right, who seem to be blissfully unaware that there are still institutions in our society that discriminate against people. Admittedly, we're not talking about John Kerry's tonsorial budget, but it is one of the highest rated events in TV sports, the most important competition in one of the fastest growing sports on the planet. Rather than debating whether sex discrimination by private clubs should be tolerated, or whether feminist groups should be focusing on something more important, we get treated to silly discussions about whether it is appropriate for feminist leaders to write satirical articles about sterilization. Or whether the NY Times is devoting too much column space to the issue.

Case in point: the spiking of two columns in the NY Times sports section. As this writer correctly points out, the sports section of the Gray Lady does not have the prestige that the rest of the paper now has (although his version of great sportswriting is apparently Mike Lupica and Rick Reilly; if there's one thing the Times doesn't need, it's another overpaid hack deliberately misquoting Barry Bonds), and the refusal to publish two columns disagreeing with the paper's editorial position only emphasizes the fact that the paper does not view sports journalism as an important responsibility. However, I suspect that this policy is not unusual in the newspaper business, and the reason the NY Times sports section is not well thought of is the fact that it still employs stiffs like Dave Anderson (one of the columnists who got dissed by his editors, and famous among my fellow Laker fans for writing that Magic Johnson got what he deserved when he tested HIV+) and Robert Lipsyte, not that it's censoring their work.

Perhaps a better question for those people who wonder why so much controversy has been generated over the Masters is, when do you believe that sex discrimination is ever appropriate? Do you have a justification for allowing private clubs to exclude women, or Jews, or African Americans? I'm not interested in whether they have a legal right to do so; can you make a moral argument in favor of such a policy? Deal with those questions, not whether you think the NY Times is too interested in this topic.