Skip to main content

Because I think it's not good for you, nobody should be able to do it . . . ever

The current nanny-state-panties-in-a-twist unloading on how awful it is for the Delaware General Assembly to consider legislaton making online gambling legal is both amusing . . . and expected.

Here's El Somnabulo:
They will also leave Dover with yet another revenue source: more dollars via degenerate gamblers thanks to the so-called online gaming bill. This is a particularly odious example of the Delaware Way. Provisions have been put into the bill to ensure that the racinos and the mom-and-pop stores that sell the lottery tickets don’t get screwed, but no such provision for the compulsive gamblers who will help fill the state’s coffers. No fiscal note is even required for this bill, which makes little sense to me. Neither a projection of costs to implement the system, nor a revenues projection? Really? Hey, they don’t want you to know how much they expect to squeeze out of (in-state only) degenerate gamblers. Because they’re ‘humane’ public officials, no doubt they’ll toss an extra $50K or so at compulsive gambling programs a couple of years down the road. Truly a pathetic way to raise revenue at the expense of compulsive gamblers.
And likewise whining commenter Anon:
The gaming bill is the worst case scenario for families in Delaware. Not only does this bill bring gambling right into neighborhoods by turning local bars and restaurants into gambling spots, it goes a step beyond that by bring gambling right into people’s houses through the internet.
Anyone willing to wager that the fine people of Greenville will get more greenspace this session while the rest of us will get beaten outside of a local sports bar for $5? 
The first observation is that there is NO consideration of the fact that many (indeed most) afficionados of sports betting and online gambling do so responsibly, and there are multiple very responsible betting sites available (from Europe, where all social experiments are supposed to be things we want to emulate).

Nor is there a consideration that people who compulsively gamble will find ways to do so anyway, legally or illegally, or will engage in other self-destructive behavior.

My greatest amusement is that Anon actually appears to think that there is currently no gambling going on in bars in Delaware (or anywhere else).

But I guess the most important take-away from this whole thing is the firmly cemented belief that people are not responisble for their own actions, and must be forced to do the things that are good for them--from not gambling to buy smaller sodas to not looking at porm or wearing helmets while they ride horses.

There is a culture, if this is your preference in societal rules, that follows this philosophy very closely, and they've already got the rules written down, so you'd only have to plagiarize them.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Libertarian Martin Luther King Jr. Day post

In which we travel into interesting waters . . . (for a fairly long trip, so be prepared) Dr. King's 1968 book, Where do we go from here:  chaos or community? , is profound in that it criticizes anti-poverty programs for their piecemeal approach, as John Schlosberg of the Center for a Stateless Society  [C4SS] observes: King noted that the antipoverty programs of the time “proceeded from a premise that poverty is a consequence of multiple evils,” with separate programs each dedicated to individual issues such as education and housing. Though in his view “none of these remedies in itself is unsound,” they “all have a fatal disadvantage” of being “piecemeal,” with their implementation having “fluctuated at the whims of legislative bodies” or been “entangled in bureaucratic stalling.”   The result is that “fragmentary and spasmodic reforms have failed to reach down to the profoundest needs of the poor.” Such single-issue approaches also have “another common failing — ...

More of This, Please

Or perhaps I should say, "Less of this one, please." Or how about just, "None of them. Ever again. Please....For the Love of God." Sunshine State Poll: Grayson In Trouble The latest Sunshine State/VSS poll shows controversial Democratic incumbent Alan Grayson trailing former state Senator Dan Webster by seven points, 43 percent to 36 percent. A majority of respondents -- 51 percent -- disapprove of the job that Grayson is doing. Independents have an unfavorable view of him as well, by a 36/47 margin. Grayson has ignored the conventional wisdom that a freshman should be a quiet member who carefully tends to the home fires. The latest controversy involves his " Taliban Dan " advertisement, where he explicitly compares his opponent to the Taliban, and shows a clip of Webster paraphrasing Ephesians 5:22 -- "wives, submit to your husbands." An unedited version of the clip shows that Webster was actually suggesting that husba...

A reply to Salon's R. J. Eskrow, and his 11 stupid questions about Libertarians

Posts here have been in short supply as I have been living life and trying to get a campaign off the ground. But "11 questions to see if Libertarians are hypocrites" by R. J. Eskrow, picked up at Salon , was just so freaking lame that I spent half an hour answering them. In the end (but I'll leave it to your judgment), it is not that Libertarians or Libertarian theory looks hypocritical, but that the best that can be said for Mr. Eskrow is that he doesn't have the faintest clue what he's talking about. That's ok, because even ill-informed attacks by people like this make an important point:  Libertarian ideas (as opposed to Conservative ideas, which are completely different) are making a comeback as the dynamic counterpoint to "politics as usual," and so every hack you can imagine must be dragged out to refute them. Ergo:  Mr. Eskrow's 11 questions, with answers: 1.       Are unions, political parties, elections, and ...