HOYLAKE, England — Votes of confidence are powerful instruments, capable of toppling once-popular governments and ending formerly flourishing careers. The last such motion of consequence in Britain, in 1979, brought down a Labour government and ushered in the bleak era of Thatcherism. The themes that prevailed then — worker unrest, claims of mismanagement, demands for reform, mockery of collective interest, promises of riches — are eerily familiar to the dynamic in professional golf now, though it would be uncharitable to draw parallels between the PGA Tour-Saudi Framework Agreement and the Labour manifesto in’79, which was dryly described as the longest suicide note in history.
