A tiger, he's not: enough with the Obama-Woods comparison.(2008 II)(Barack Obama and Tiger Woods)

WHO first referred to Barack Obama as "the Tiger Woods of politics"? The answer is a bit murky, but the phrase was not widely repeated in the public conversation until the New York Times's Maureen Dowd used it in a March 2007 column wondering whether Obama is tough enough to win the White House. It seems a self-answering question: If Obama were really like Woods, the steely-nerved winner of all of golf's most coveted championships, then nobody would ask whether he's tough enough to win. But Dowd said it anyway, and the phrase has caught on; if you search the Nexis database for stories containing "Barack Obama" and "Tiger Woods," you'll find 1,232 examples. That makes it official, at least in the world of the punditocracy: Barack Obama is the Tiger Woods of politics.

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It sounds good, except that anyone who knows anything about golf-or who knows anything about politics, for that matter--knows it's simply not true.

The reason is the achievement gap. Barack Obama was elected to the Illinois state senate in 1996 and the United States Senate in 2004. In that 2004 race, he defeated Republican Alan Keyes, the Maryland political activist who was brought in to run against Obama after Obama's Illinois GOP rival self-destructed in a sex scandal. Obama won handily over Keyes's virtually non-existent campaign. In neither his state career nor his brief time in the U.S. Senate has Obama done anything particularly distinguished.

And Woods? In the world of golf, winning major championships--the Masters, U.S. Open, British Open, and PGA Championship--is the most common measure of greatness. Jack Nicklaus, who for decades has held the title of World's Greatest, won 18 major championships. Just for reference, Ben Hogan won nine, Gary Player nine, and Arnold Palmer seven. But Woods, at the age of 32 and perhaps not even at his peak as a competitor, has won 13. (For one more bit of comparison, Woods's closest competitor playing today, Phil Mickelson, has won three.)

So even if Woods were to quit right now, he would be the second-greatest golfer in history. And what would Obama be if he were to quit today? It's hard to say-but he certainly wouldn't be the second-greatest political figure in history.

Okay. But what if Obama were to win the White House? He still wouldn't be the Tiger Woods of politics, not on the basis of one triumph. It might be different were Obama to win this November, and then win reelection in 2012, and in the meantime have the most or second-most successful presidency in the history of the United States. Then people could talk about his being the Tiger Woods of politics. If you still think that some sort of comparison is valid, just ask yourself this: Would anyone view it as a compliment if Woods were referred to as "the Barack Obama of golf"? If the winner of all those major championships were compared to a guy who had done a few years on the Nationwide Tour (golf's smaller circuit for up-and-coming players) and then won one tournament in the big leagues, although against a weak competitor--come on. Nobody would buy that.