Why President Obama should play more golf

President Obama and former President Clinton take a stroll together. (Getty Images)

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Election season is over and the inauguration has taken place. Jaime Diaz of GolfDigest says that means it's time for President Obama to hit the links:

Now that President Obama has begun his second term, let's hope he feels free to play more golf.

Diaz continues with a few reasons for why this might benefit Obama:

It would promote his physical health. Mr. Obama may already be the fittest president in history (two words: full-court basketball), but photos show the last four years have aged him at the usual accelerated presidential pace. Perhaps he will be able politically to parlay his own record on health care with Bill Clinton's Health Matters Initiative and accept the former president's invitation to play in next year's Humana Challenge pro-am.

I have to admit, it would be pretty cool to see a sitting president promote the Humana Challenge.

Diaz goes on to say why it would be nice to see Obama play more:

Selfishly, as a lover of the game, the big reason I would like to see the president play more is not because of what it can do for him, but what it can do for golf. A president who avidly plays is validation for the game as a worthwhile pastime. Cultural icons such as Michael Jordan, Bill Murray and Willie Nelson all have broadened golf's demographic. But presidents can have the greatest effect.

And a quick history of presidential golf playing:

America's first golf boom was helped along in the late 1910s and early 1920s by two consecutive presidents bitten by the bug, Woodrow Wilson and Warren Harding. In the late 1950s Dwight Eisenhower's obsession with golf laid the foundation for the Arnold Palmer Boom of the 1960s.

You should read the full article, it's pretty intriguing. And despite that it's hard to argue the merits of a president pushing the sport forward, everyone seems to have a pretty strong opinion one way or another.

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