State Has Long Since Lost All Credibility About Gambling
Some people’s addiction is no justification for curtailing gambling for the public at large, says Gary Garrison of Kettle Falls.
“It is just another example of everyone should be deprived of an enjoyable sport because of a few people with problems,” he said.
And who is the state of Washington to limit gambling?
“What is more of a long shot than the lottery?” Garrison asks. “The odds are far higher than for any other type of gambling, and even when one wins the lottery in this state, they don’t collect the prize. All they get is little more than the interest on $1 million dollars, and at the end of 20 years, the state keeps most of the million dollars.”
Garrison says he considers the lottery “a tax on stupidity.”
A lesson for higher education
Wayne B. Kraft of Spokane sees a parallel between state Sen. Jim West’s angry phone message to a lobbyist and the Spokane lawmaker’s role in letting Washington State University take over from Eastern Washington University in Spokane.
“The public will be reassured to know,” writes Kraft, “that Sen. West is merely seeking the political death, not the physical death, of Eastern’s old board of trustees, the university’s ‘unionized faculty’ and all the other ‘sons of bitches’ he’s angry with at Eastern. It’s good to know that Jim West means only figurative harm when he wields his power to kill things.”
West, chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, left a phone message telling Tom McCabe, executive director of the Building Industries Association of Washington: “McCabe, you son of a bitch, you better get me ‘cause if you don’t, you’re dead.” West was angry over critical newspaper ads.
Kraft says West’s defenders seem to be saying, “Leaving death threats is OK so long as you say afterward you didn’t really mean it. “Furthermore, since lobbyists are vermin, it’s particularly OK to leave them death threats,” said Kraft.”By these lights, Jim West is, well, a hero.”
Kraft says we should take an interest in elected representatives’ public conduct.
“If they have acquired lots of power and if they betray hotheadedness and petty vindictiveness against the university boards of trustees and faculties, against the builders and other constituents they have a quarrel with, well, then they may not be heroes. In fact, they may not be very good representatives at all.”
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