The world should be grateful to golf. I'm thankful for anything that kept Donald Trump out of the White House, off of Twitter, and away from rallies. Golf is the #1 thing that has accomplished that over the past four years. I would gladly have paid more taxes to keep him playing 36 a day every day.
Other than that, I think golf has been laying pretty low. The pandemic has meant that lots more golf has been being played. I don't know whether that's been regular golfers playing more or new golfers trying the game. If it's been more the latter then the image of golf has probably improved.
Lots of people on this board like to disparage Top Golf. While it's not golf, a lot of Top Golf patrons probably don't think golf is a dorky as they otherwise would have.
I don't think who Jack Nicklaus voted for has anything to do with the image of golf.
We've got a thread here right now about "US public's you'd want to play every day". Popular entries include Bandon, Streamsong, Wild Horse, Rustic, Mid-Pines, etc. Huh? Thankfully, most golfers want to play the goat track right next door to them every day! That should be the image of golf.