Observations and inanities by a second-shift assistant supervisor in the Puppy-Grinding division of the Evil Atheist Conspiracy® (our motto: "Sure it's cruel, but think of the jobs!"), your host, Brent Rasmussen.
Let's be Reasonable.
So, what do you do if your local VFW group hosts events to raise money for charities, to pay their bills, and to provide for a community gatering place for vets?
Well, if you're the Dallas Police Department, you bust in with a SWAT Team, of course! From Reason Magazine:
Maybe Dallas wouldn't be ranked as the 34th most dangerous city in America if Dallas police weren't devoting precious resources to raiding friendly poker games played by veterans. In his latest video for Reason.tv, Drew Carey examines a paramilitary-style raid on a poker game at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1837 in Dallas, which has now been forced to close its doors.
"Poker is about as American as baseball and apple pie," Carey says in theReason.tv video. "It was born here in America. Mark Twain loved it. He's a great American. Until recently, Supreme Court justices had a monthly game. They're great Americans. You'd think playing poker in a VFW hall would be about as American as anything you could do."
"This story highlights the hypocrisy that surrounds gambling in this country," said Nick Gillespie, editor of Reason.tv. "States will gladly take your hard-earned money if you want to play the government's lottery. But if you sit down with some veterans to play Texas hold 'em you may end up with cops, in full riot gear, busting down your door. No one gets hurt when consenting adults sit down for a game of cards. And there's no reason for the government to get involved."
I don't gamble, as a general thing. But even I will join in a friendly game of poker now and then, particularly if it is for a good cause. Glad I don't live in Texas.
And of course, there's no cause for the cops to come in geared up for a war. Sheesh - just one more example of the para-militarization of our police, and how it can be applied in even the most absurd situations.
You can see the Reason.tv video here.
Jim Downey
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Heh.
They probably screwed with the wrong people. A raid on the VFW?? Which is by now made up almost exclusively of Vietnam and Iraq vets? Guys who not only know how to use guns, but who've had actual EXPERIENCE in killing people with them? Hmm. Interesting.
I never figured out why church bingo wasn't illegal. That goes on everywhere.
State lotteries were a BAD idea. I said it from the day they proposed the one in California. "Oh, but it'll add so much money to the schools." Bullshit. It didn't. It was never intended to. That was just the cover lie.
Here's how to think about government-sponsored lotteries: When people get so far down they can barely afford to live, when they're forced into the wretched neighborhoods where drug dealers operate in daylight and peace and safety are only a dream, when they lose all hope that they can pull themselves out of the Pit by their own efforts ... THE GOVERNMENT CAN STILL FUCK ONE LAST DOLLAR OUT OF THEM with a Despair Tax.
I could be wrong
but I believe that the lottery has added a lot of money to the school budget here in California- the problem is that for every dollar the lottery adds, a dollar gets cut out from another source. Republicans in this state love to talk about how important education is, but any time a Democrat (or anyone)tries to get a buck for textbooks, teachers, or anything besides unnecessary P.E. equipment, the repubs start screaming bloody murder and demand more "accountability from our teachers." Never mind that most of our teachers don't get paid enough to buy a decent house in today's market, and often end up leaving the state. Never mind the flood of spanish- speaking immigrant students that repubs always talk shit about, but refuse to run their farms without. Most of the school improvements here are done on a local level, which explains the rather wide variation in quality from county to county and school to school.
Assuming that some lottery money is actually going to schools, I have a different take on it. It's a Bad Math Tax. If you ignored your education to the point where you are so poor and financially clueless that playing the lottery makes sense to you, then you can give your last dollar to help make sure that some other student has a chance to know better. Cruel perhaps, but that's what happens when everybody wants their kids to go to school, but nobody wants to pay for it!
On topic of the post, there is no end to the silliness of prohibition. Gambling, alcohol, drugs, prostitution. It's not like it's going to stop. It was several years ago, but there was a similar incident in California, I believe it was actually an old ladies' card game that had been going on for some time. Makes me sick-if California could be truly progressive, if politicians and armchair fascists could just respect personal liberty for once... If we would just listen to our own homegrown California freaks for once, we could legalize the bunch, tax it all, earmarked for education and maybe some public services, and not raise individual taxes for decades. Instead I am stuck with the realization that for all the reputation for modernity, Californians are no different than Texans in our fuddy-duddy attitudes and petty moralizing...sigh...
Lottery Money
Talk to California schoolteachers about it.
Yes, Lottery money went to the schools. But it didn't ADD anything. Legislators responded to the influx of Lottery money by cutting funding from traditional sources (a side effect absolutely to be expected), depending on the Lottery to make up what they cut. But Lottery funding is irregular.
In addition, the law mandates that Lottery money can only be used for certain things. I've had two teachers tell me the advent of the Lottery made it MUCH harder to get money for needed supplies, and some things they simply cannot get.
It's what government does.
It's what government does, Hank. Only competition they got is from the clergy, preying on the poor and elderly for donations to save souls.
Jim Downey
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Why did they even do that ?
Well, everything's in the title. What law were these guys breaking by playing poker ?
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