Melody Barnes, Chief Domestic Policy Adviser, Joins President Obama on the Links Sunday

The best The Washington Post could come up with this weekend was that President Obama has a female golfing buddy -- Melody Barnes, his chief domestic policy adviser. She is the first woman to become a part of this tight-knit foursome. Okay, so this is a first and a rarity for a regular golf outing that has long been dominated by the so-called "boys" of the White House, but is this really what people want to hear about? We all know that President Obama's first love is basketball, so what's with this new sport? This is scarcely as newsworthy as it is being made to seem. It seems that the President made a quick decision to take a woman along to play golf, but can't seem to make a solid decision on Afghanistan or the public option in the health care reform fight.

Here's the ridiculous coverage by the Washington Post on the president's golf outing yesterday:

Obama departed the White House at 12:18 p.m. wearing a black short-sleeve shirt. Barnes was wearing a baseball cap, dark long-sleeve shirt and beige pants. Marvin Nicholson, the White House trip director, loaded the golf clubs into the motorcade. The group headed for the course at Fort Belvoir on a chilly but clear day in Washington. They arrived just after 1 p.m. for several hours of golf.

Questions about the president's chumminess with the men on his staff -- to the exclusion of the women -- has become something of a buzz about Washington.  White House deputy press secretary Bill Burton said Barnes was not the first woman to play golf with Obama, but he later notified reporters that he had been wrong, and that Barnes was in fact the first woman Obama golfed with as president. "I was wrong about this -- all apologies," Burton wrote. "He golfed with women on the campaign trail." Source: Washington Post

Is it me or was this fluff? What about job creation, making a decision on whether or not to send more troops to Afghanistan, or what to do about Iraq, since there were two car bombings that killed hundreds yesterday. Better yet, what about stemming the rising foreclosure rates in this country and tackling job creation?