Surely the Legislature will not allow itself to be sidetracked on questions like Sunday beer, wine and liquor sales — the pet legislative agenda item of convenience store operators — or video gambling in Underground or elsewhere.No Sunday alcohol sales. No casino gambling. Why? Because Jim believes the state should "draw the line somewhere on the exploitation of its vulnerable".
So called "conservativism" - government shouldn't tell you how to spend your money or live your life, until we decide it should.
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They don't care how much revenue something like this would generate. All they care about it drowning government in a bathtub to the point that it doesn't exist, even though government is needed for somethings, like, oh, making sure our children aren't dumber than bricks; we have adequate police protection; we're not stuck in transportation hell....
No one forces anyone to buy a lotto ticket. No one forces anyone to go to a casino. No one forces anyone to buy alcohol.
Nope. They all want us to be teetotalers who sit in church every Sunday and refuse to dance because it's a sin.
My problem with this casino is it sounds like the lamest casino in human history. You can print out lottery tickets and that's all? It sounds positively horrible. That really and truly would be a place where only the stupid would go to waste their money.
Not to mention, Sara, the increase in the number of panhandlers by a zillion fold, around Underground and Five Points.
This is starting to sound like a carbon copy of the Iraq strategy as a terrorist magnet. Only now, it's the casino strategy as a panhandler magnet.
I have no opinion on the lameness or non-lameness of the casino. But I disagree that it will increase panhandling in the area. One of the problems with Five Points and Underground is that there is not a collection of property owners in the area with a real incentive to stop it. Many of the buildings are either government-occupied or cater to nearby office workers, students, or MARTA riders, not people who will elect (or not) to visit. Panhandlers don't just go where the money is, they go where they are free to operate. That's why you don't regularly get hit up outside Phipps and Lenox Square -- management chases them off. (And that's why there is begging less around the aquarium than at Five Points.) Tenants with the economic incentive and resources to keep the area pleasant and appealing are the best way to improve that area.
Grift -- did you expect this from your most socialist friend?
It seems the possession by the demon known as Attornius is finally complete.
Shit. I've been esquired.
Maybe I haven't been to enough casinos, but I've been to them in at least 3 states at this point and I have not seen any greater amount of crime or panhandling around the casinos as compared to other parts of those cities. Now, granted, the only thing in Tunica is casinos and hotels, so there are not going to be many panhandlers there, but even in Biloxi and New Orleans the areas around the casino did not seem measurably more crime- or panhandle-prone as compared to the rest of the city itself. Hell, if anything in Biloxi the rest of the city (what I saw of it while driving around trying to find a restaurant) seemed WORSE than the area by the casinos.
I think people assume casinos bring crime and panhandling because they think of cities like Vegas and Atlantic City where the casinos are the entire economy of the city. But I don't really think that model pans out if you look at cities that have added casinos in recent years.
I appreciate the quotes areound "conservatism" in the piece. Faux conservatives make it hard for people to understand being a conservative.
You should apply: http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/stories/2009/01/16/ajc_conservative_columnist.html?cxntlid=homepage_tab_newstab
Nah, writing the column would be tough enough.... knowing I needed to provide half the content on this site would be too much :-)
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