Questions For Billy Payne

The Augusta gang has scheduled a Monday teleconference with Billy Payne, and since I'm still waiting for a Glenn Greenspan email letting me know the phone-in number, I thought I'd post a few questions. You know, just in case it never comes.

Let's get the inevitable's out of the way. Odds on which comes first?:

Is there a timetable for admitting a female member?

Will you restore the PGA Tour winner exemption?

Do you have plans to change the course this summer?

Hootie Johnson: Great Chairman, or The Greatest Chairman?

Okay, maybe the last one won't be asked in Colbertian fashion, but you know they'll be talking a lot about the great visionary that Hootie was. Expect the Augusta Chapter of the Mutual Admiration Society to overtake this teleconference.

That said, here are some questions I'd like asked with the hope of lending a little more insight into Payne and ANGC:

Are you aware that if you eliminated the second cut along with the silly Christmas trees on 1, 5, 7, 11, 14, 15, 17 and 18, that you would eliminate nearly all questions about the dreadful state of the course?

Are you aware that these simple changes would also make it more fun for the members to play the course again?

Have fellow Augusta members Walter Driver and Fred Ridley ever taken you on AirUSGA for one of those Curtis Cup/U.S. Senior Amateur/Goldman Sachs entertainment fact-finding trips to Bandon Dunes, Prairie Dunes, Cypress Point, Seminole or Pine Valley?

Do you agree with Chairman Emeritus Johnson that distance needs to be reigned in somehow?

Did you see any of the "Amen Corner Live" coverage and would you consider making it part of the broadcast on USA Network, minus the announcers who reference "Amen's Corner"?

Have you ever read Bobby Jones's Golf is My Game or Alister MacKenzie's The Spirit of St. Andrews to get a better feel for their design philosophy?

You did a lot of session work on Linda Ronstadt albums. Why do you hate America? (Apologies to Colbert again...oh wait, that's the other Billy Payne, sorry).

Readers, what would you ask?