Should the Long Putter be banned?

I've been cogitating on the subject of long putters for a while now. I'll never use one because I find them inelegant and cumbersome. Since they don't look right to me I can be confident I would never putt well with one.

But, some people do...

I don't have much pity for the in-their-prime tour players, or the up and coming pros and elite amateurs, who are using long putters with great success. They could and should be putting with a conventional putter but they see the long putter as an advantage, whether it is or not.

More interesting is the player who, without the long putter, would be done and gone. Here I'm thinking of the ageless Bernhard Langer. Langer has been using the long putter since 1997 and he was pretty much forced into using it. Being almost 40, he was just at the point where the natural decline of skill would have joined with the yips to make him an instant non-contender. Instead, at 53 he is still playing great, though even with the long putter he never quite stops complaining about his play on the greens.

There are two theories of why the long putter should be banned. The first is that it is anchored at the butt end of the club to the player. The second is that in most cases players who use long putters adopt a grip which separates their two hands.

I find both theories compelling.

The use of any anchor point strikes me as against the spirit of the rules. The rules speak of playing the game using a stroke, and from stroke we speak of a swing, but can a club really be said to swing when it is in contact with three points of body (both hands and the torso)? I am pretty sure even the most staunch proponent of the long putter would balk at a player wearing a concave pad on their torso that the butt of the club fit into. It would be easy to conclude the player was using that pad to make the butt of the club even more well anchored than would otherwise be true. But, the fact is that the mere contact of the club with anything other than the hands should convey this suspicion of illegality.

The theory that the golf swing is one wherein the player creates a grip using both hands together also strikes me as reasonable. I first read this view in one of Harvey Pennick's books. Quite simply, golf is not croquet or polo, or even or baseball (google a picture of Honus Wager if you miss my reference.)