They Paved Paradise (and put put up a casino)

“Lock ‘Em Up, Throw Away The Key”

A Pox On Both Their Houses: Ward Churchill and UC-Boulder

2 Comments

• Kevin O'Reilly said:

  As a libertarian who fully supports allowing legal gambling, what bugs me about the way so much of it *gets* legalized is that it while it may be legal it's not really free. States either own the gambling outright (lotteries) or determine who and how many and where casinos can operate -- usually based on who donates the most cash or place special fees and taxes on the operations that are put in place primarily to generate revenue. I don't want to see the state outlaw gambling, but the way things are now states encourage people to gamble as they reap the financial rewards from it. I mean, I'd like prostitution to be legal but I don't want the state running brothels. Though consider the people whom brothels employ, it would be appropriate.
  July 30, 2007 8:17 PM

• Harvey Silverglate said:

  The main impetus behind the proliferation of casino gambling is the fiscal starvation of our cities and towns, and even our states. This starvation is directly attributable to the huge amount of our wealth that is scooped up by the Internal Revenue Service, and then thrown down a gigantic sink-hole by the federal government. What is not wasted by incompetently-executed and ill-considered military adventures (and misadventures), a world-wide and futile drug war, faith-based initiatives, aid to one despot after another, a sprawling and disorganized "Homeland Security Department," and countless other federal boondoggles and pork barrel projects, is wasted in ways that we don't even know about. Suddenly, "federalism" seems like an idea worth considering, doesn't it? Harvey Silverglate
  August 15, 2007 3:42 PM

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