Next time you are watching LIV Golf and celebrating the millions of dollars players like Cam Smith are revelling in just remember you are paying for it. The high prices at the petrol pumps are being pumped up by OPEC, the cartel responsible for oil prices globally. LIV Golf is funded by the Saudi petroleum fund, which is at the heart of OPEC. They have lowered production to keep oil prices high to fleece more money from you and me. LIV Golf bankers keeping fuel prices high, and we are paying for it.

Saudi Oil, OPEC & High Fuel Prices Paying LIV Golfers

The number of golfers I meet with their heads in the sand around LIV Golf and what it means for the game amazes me. Everything is connected in this world. Where the money comes from matters, it is not just pulled out of a magic hat. OPEC is supporting the Russians via their production settings designed to accrue more money from oil sales globally. The deal done between the PGA Tour and the Saudi petroleum fund is an uncomfortable fit. The PGA Tour is a non-profit entity, and the Saudi bank is not. Associating golf with these questionable chaps and their oil money is not great for the game, in my view.

LIV Golfers Costing Us At The Petrol Pump

Who pays your wages matters. Golfers cannot turn away from uncomfortable truths re- who is paying the piper. If the Saudis have bought elite men’s golf where does that leave the game of golf?

Personally, I don’t want to have the game I love associated with murderers and those making inflation worse around the world. Ordinary golfers can vote with their feet and eyeballs. Consumer action can take the form of not watching LIV Golf for a start. Kill the golden goose before it lays any eggs.

“Surging fuel prices are igniting fresh inflation fears, as production cuts by the global oil cartel heap yet more pain on consumers. 

Economists say much of the increase has been driven by a group of major oil-producing countries that have deliberately cut back on output to generate higher prices.”

• (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-09-14/inflation-fears-rise-on-resurgent-fuel-prices/102852148)

Celebrating Top Golf

I can sort of understand that fellow golfers reckon it is a good thing that top golfers are paid a motza for playing golf. However, that money must come from somewhere and right now it is coming out of our wallets at the petrol pump. Personally, I would prefer if Cam Smith earned a little less and LIV Golf went the way of the Dodo. I do not support the Saudi Petroleum fund taking over golf.

Senate Investigating Proposed Merger

“WASHINGTON — Bipartisan members of a Senate subcommittee on homeland security demanded transparency Wednesday from a Saudi Arabian investment fund at its second hearing on the controversial deal to merge PGA Tour and Saudi-backed LIV Golf.

“Saudi Arabia’s bid to buy professional golf in America is not just one investment in a vacuum,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said on Capitol Hill. “It is instead part of a web of growing investments in this country. They are largely unknown and they are almost entirely without oversight.”

Blumenthal announced that he had issued a subpoena on Wednesday to USSA International LLC, the PIF’s wholly-owned U.S. subsidiary, for documents related to the PGA Tour-LIV Golf deal and other U.S. investments.

Blumenthal and witnesses at the hearing accused Saudi Arabia of mirroring other authoritarian regimes like China and Russia by exploiting loopholes in certain investment platforms to spread their influence and exert soft power within the United States.

“At its core, then, this is not a business deal,” said Benjamin Freeman, director of the Democratizing Foreign Policy Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, of the PGA-LIV deal. “This is an influence operation. It’s meant to shape U.S. public opinion and U.S. foreign policy.”

According to Joey Shea, a Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates expert at the nonprofit Human Rights Watch who testified Wednesday, the PIF “has been ranked as amongst the least transparent, least accountable and with the least credible governance structures in the world.”

PIF and LIV didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. A PGA Tour representative declined to comment.”

• (https://www.cnbc.com/2023/09/13/senate-subpoenas-saudi-public-investment-funds-us-arm-on-pga-liv-golf-deal-.html)

Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author The Stoic Golfer: Finding Inner Peace & Focus on the Fairway. ©GolfDom