Hightower Lowdown

One of the advantages of being rich is that you don't have to mingle with the riff- raff. No crowded airports—you've got your private jet. No teeming masses at the beach—you've got a secluded getaway in the Azores. And if you want to golf, you golf with your own kind in exclusive country clubs.

So what are the wealthy to do when some Arkansas trailer trash comes knocking at the country-club door? A rude rejection would normally suffice, but this is no ordinary riff-raff: It's Bill Clinton.

Bill likes golf, and now that his home is in New York's Westchester County, a mecca of elite golfing clubs, Bill wants to join one. But Westchester's wealthiest are worried.

First is the matter of the former President's habit of replaying a ball whenever he makes a bad shot. This is called "taking a mulligan"—a frowned-upon practice—and Bill is known to take excessive mulligans.

More upsetting is the prospect of Secret Service agents swarming the course and disrupting play. One Westchester club member told the New York Times, "If they had security dogs sniffing in the ball washers, it would not be a particularly pleasant experience."

So they're not letting Bill in. Winged Foot, Mount Kisco, and Whipporwill are a few of the clubs that took a whiff of Clinton and turned up their collective nose.