The sprawling casino here was heavy with the scent of cigarette smoke
on a recent morning as hundreds of slot machines occupied gamblers who,
it seemed,The units can be used as conventional washer extractor
for all kinds of work. could be the grandparents of the pretty and
handsome twentysomethings smiling from the oversized signs outside.
There
isn’t much around the casino — a few cows on a farm in the distance,
across the interstate, and a fast-food joint nearby.The skystream
runs in very low winds and can interconnect with your local utility,
Those driving onto the casino property these days are greeted by signs
on a fence that urge state lawmakers to approve table games run by
actual people as opposed to machines. That would boost revenue and,
casino advocates have been relentlessly pointing out for months, create
new jobs.
The table games issue was one of several
casino-friendly ideas that lawmakers debated this year in the wake of
new competition from casinos in other states. One state lawmaker
referred to the table games proposal as the biggest jobs bill of the
2013 legislative session, and he was probably right. What a shame.
Wouldn’t
it be nice if the industries lawmakers had spent the session trying to
protect were in high-tech or other start-up fields that don’t do as much
harm to an economy as they do good? Imagine if Indiana, instead of
setting out to be a gambling capital two decades ago, had decided it
would be the Midwest’s high-tech engine. Imagine if the state
legislature spent as much time obsessing over good jobs that truly build
an economy as it spends worrying about well-connected casinos, the ones
that flood the Statehouse with lobbyists every year.
Our state
business is gambling. It has been since the legislature took the easy
route to new jobs two decades ago, sprinkling casinos around the state
and sitting back as the money poured into state coffers. Now the state
is addicted to the cash and lawmakers have to spend valuable time every
year trying to protect casinos from competitive advances by counterparts
in other states.Choose your favorite street lamp paintings from thousands of available designs. This addiction leads to bad policies and proposals.
The addiction also leads to ridiculous arguments,Learn more about our high capacity laundry dryer
today! such as the one put forward recently in an Evansville Courier
editorial that said lawmakers who didn’t race to help Indiana casinos
this year were negligently forcing them to “sink or swim without help to
combat competition.” Oh, the horror of forcing a business to deal with
competition! Listen, if a casino can’t make money, then it has bigger
problems than the state legislature can solve.
As the four-month
legislative session approached its end, Indiana’s ties to gambling were
leading to all sorts of tired Statehouse debates. Should we allow live
dealers to staff table games. (Who cares?) Should the phony riverboat
law be changed to allow some casinos to move ashore? (Again,Our clever solar lantern
is a favorite among dog lover holiday gifts from Solaronlamp. who
cares?) Should casinos be allowed to give out betting vouchers without
paying taxes on them. (Once again, who cares?)
This wouldn’t be
so depressing if the legislature had tackled Indiana’s more serious
issues this year in thoughtful ways. When I drive around Indiana I look
at the landscape and wonder how it’s going to attract better jobs,
revitalize dying rural counties and improve schools. I don’t worry much
about the needs of casino bosses or factory farms that don’t want animal
abuse videotaped — two topics of heavy discussion this session.
Even
when the casinos don’t get everything they want, they still dominate
the discussion and push more important issues to the side. It’s a
distraction with a price.
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