Stina Sternberg sucks back (so to speak)

Erroneously thought Swedes were definitively in pancake family of high gluten preference, but there's one member of golfing community showing predilection, based on recent comments, towards waffling instead. Said Nord is none other than the Golf Channel’s Stina Sternberg [See cartoon right] and evidence is her partial plus nuanced semi-apology in the Jan. 2009 “Golf Digest” for some highly offensive cigar-lover comments in the Nov. issue.

Apparently poor S.S. got a bevy of angry responses to her previously penned (and unprovoked) attack against cigar smoking on the golf course, whether as participant or spectator. In a memorable riff from her Sly Stallone-esque machismo hall-o-fame piece, the Swede S2 claimed that she has been known to haul around, grab a lit cigar out of some puffer’s mouth and stomp it out right in front of his girly-self when walking in the gallery. Obviously blonde basher is unbeknownst white female Samuel L. Jackson because anyone doing that (and without a pack of menthols in their shirt pocket) is one Jack Shaft bad motherf$%^&+r!

Although suitably, albeit - I must confess - only momentarily, cowed by such a rhetorical display of ripe bravado, your humble scribe able still to summon sufficient courage to send following to Ms. Sternberg's “Golf Digest” e-mail address:

That you don't like cigars is your right, but the faux machismo of "In crowded places like that, I've been known to grab a cigar out of a guy's mouth & stomp it out" is flat-out wrong + impertinent.

Public smoking is allowed at many PGA venues per the local ordinances. Not only do you have no right to follow that course of action in said situation, but I'm sure my fellow stogie workers will be glad to have the relevant authorities - afterwards - apply whatever criminal code redress is most suitable/penal should you try to perpetuate your hostile behavior upon one of us. As another golf aficionado once said, "Go ahead, make our day".

More importantly than the quasi-battery you espouse without even Pearl Harbor-like warning, your comment flies in the face of our game's inherent spirit. Leave the silly rhetorical bravado & verbal showboating such as yours to all the other sports which exploit supposed students to line, instead, the coffers for the developmental programs of their professional ranks. In the only game still which prizes the competitor who calls a penalty on themselves and continues to embody the true ethos of the amateur, there's no room for smack talk by spokespeople based on silly personal peccadilloes. You set a poor example for us all with these type of Chuck Norris-wannabe remarks, besides personally embarrassing yourself.

If you're offended by the smoke, simply ask my fellow indulger to refrain in your proximity. Based on bellicosity exhibited, I'm sure the gentleman (or woman) would be more than happy to remove themselves from such a toxic presence in favor of mild leaf burning at considerable distance to a potentially hostile fellow patron.

Your new enemy for life and I'm beginning post haste, rest assured, to line-up fellow compatriots. Keep up the columns; doing wonders for your PR.

p.s. Can't wait to see the "Cigar Steel Cage" Pay-Per-View of yourself vs. Dana Quigley on the back nine of next year's Champions Tour opener. Vegas odds-makers, no doubt, will give you the edge based on attitude alone, but I'll put my money on the cagey Bay State veteran. Go DQ!!

Well I shan't cite exclusive credit for such, but fellow stogie-imbibers must have swelled with rancor similar to mine own, and Ms. S2 was compelled to try to put out the simmering fire of resentment with following, under title of ‘Readers Smokin’ Mad’, in her Jan. column:

“My strong stance against public cigar smoking resulted in a pile of reader hate mail so large that I could barely find my way to my desk (some of the e-mails … were downright scary). Most of the wrath was aimed at my statement that I’ve been known to snatch a cigar out of a guy’s mouth and stomp it out in a crowded gallery. Let me clarify: …”

Stina-la, at this point, then becomes the “Golf Digest” equivalent of Bill Clinton expounding upon the ontological definition of what “is” is [Still my favorite Bubba moment] by stating that it only happened once, the guy was drunk, she had asked him to put it out (which she implied the opposite of in the original piece) and, finally, that it is, in fact, okay in her estimable opinion for the rest of us to keep puffin’ with our buddies without raising the prospect of her potential smack-down retribution. Basically her ‘clarification’ has about the same veracity as the argument for WMD’s poppin’ up like fresh-made Bojangles biscuits all over the Iraqi desert, but did we really expect any better from an Annika Sorenstam bud?

My latent animosity stands & don’t buy Stina’s re-stance; she is now, officially, on Enemies List. [A future post, to be sure.] Although fetching in figure [Not S.S. to right though], her voice - which makes fingernails scratching a blackboard sound like Bruckner by comparison - target Ms. S. as ripe candidate for ongoing rhetorical animosity. Most importantly though, the sheer sucking-back feebleness of her subsequent reply, in reaction to the lightning rod of animosity her original blowhard comments, is proof positive that only media venue to which she should be allowed future contribution is the next “Playboy” ‘Girls Of Golf’ pictorial extravaganza! The prosecution rests.