Golf stars sell morality to the highest bidder
The Saudi Royal Family discovered long ago that almost everyone in the West has a price. Now, that campaign of bribery has come to the gentlemanly game of golf.
Let’s get this out of the way: The Saudi regime has blood on its hands. The people of Yemen have suffered daily aerial bombardment during their brutal civil war, and they are only one of the regime’s victims.
And then there’s Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist who chronicled the regime’s crimes as a columnist for The Washington Post. According to intelligence reports, he was lured to a consulate in Turkey where he was murdered and dismembered by agents working on behalf of Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MBS), the next ruler of the Kingdom. His remains have yet to be found.
While Saudi Arabia’s reputation has taken some hits, it has yet to be subject to crippling international sanctions. Russia invades Ukraine, and the West lines up to defeat it. Saudi Arabia tries to destroy a neighbor, and not one of those nations objects.
MBS was supposed to be a reformer, but he has not changed his nation much if at all. Now, the crown prince has decided to rehabilitate his country’s image by papering over its outrages with cash and the glamour of international sport.
The Saudi government is the prime investor in the new LIV Golf International Series, spearheaded by the retired Australian star Greg Norman. The tour offers the highest ranked American pros an opportunity to play for paydays that dwarf any they make at home.
The purse for “regular season” LIV events will be twice that of the U.S. Open, the most lucrative major tournament, which begins today in Massachusetts. The last place golfer in LIV events will make $120,000.
Win or lose, former world number one player Dustin Johnson will reportedly make $150 million to play in a slate of upcoming tournaments, double his career earnings. The gregarious Phil Mickelson, who spoke dismissively of Saudi crimes, will make $200 million for 10 events this year and 10 next year.
As for Mr. Norman, he spoke of MBS and his henchmen as if they had gotten nicked for drunk driving, not targeted missiles at civilians and masterminded murders and other human rights abuses. “Look,” he said, “we’ve all made mistakes.”
No, we haven’t. Not that kind of mistake.
As the United States and its allies try to reassert the superiority of liberal democracy in a world increasingly in thrall to strongmen, the Saudis are taking advantage one of the West’s biggest moral weaknesses: greed. Celebrity sportsmen give it cover in exchange of very large paydays. If it proves successful, networks will pay to broadcast such events. Major corporations will buy ads on those broadcasts. Millions will watch them.
How many will think of what Saudi Arabia is doing to Yemen? Fewer than before.