Hey Steve Crosby you tin eared schmuck. Why the hell are you speaking at a gambling interest event?
Who told you do this? You are chairman of a board that is yet to be appointed. Whose interest do you represent? Not the board’s because there aren’t the other members in place to set policy. Talk about feeling your oats.
Don’t you have one in five votes in deciding who gets a license? Aren’t there “subjective factors” associated with who wins the licenses? Right now you’re a lone cowboy. Shouldn’t you be getting the office ready? Do you have a Staples card yet? Are the phones in? Make the sure the women’s room is super clean. It will save you a lot of headaches. Trust me on this.
So you’re making a lobbyist look super great to his client by headlining his event. You know how much money you made this lobbyist by coming to his party. You being there is the MA casino lobbyist equivalent of having Justin Bieber at your sweet sixteen party.
You’re like the guy in Goodfellas who got whacked because he was spending the loot much too soon. Just couldn’t wait.
And don’t give me this “Ethics Commission cleared it” bullshit either. What’s that have to do with it?
Listen, this is the kind of shit that bad guys exploit. Ego and stupidity. Much easier than graft to manipulate.
Steve-o, you speaking before the casino boys is beyond dumb. The scary part is that your decision to accept the speaking invitation was like blowing an easy lay-up. Everyone on Beacon Hill with an ounce of political skills knows this.
Your audience at the speech will be sizing you up the same way they size up an Asian bureaucrat in Macau or like great whites size up baby seals before they attack. They’ve done this a thousand times.
Hey Steve, I don’t know how this whole casino thing will end up in a mess of lawsuits but I do know it will.
What’s the point of being gaming commissioner if you can’t be feted by the gaming industry? Who else is going to do it, gaming opponents? Please. Some stale pastries in Scott Harshbarger’s office is simply not good enough.
we’re gonna do it right.”
-wink, wink, nudge, nudge
Deval L. Patrick, Therese Murray, Robert DeLeo and legislative lemmings.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqrLDGK3U90&feature=youtu.be
What if the anti gambling folk organized a conference with the same title that featured some experts with data on how other states have/are handling/benefiting or not from organized gaming.
And Steve agreed to address the group. Separately from any panel of paid organized anti gambling activists of course.
Whaddathink?
Takers?
“doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results”
-Albert Einstein
………”paid organized anti gambling activists” is an oxymoron.
I just kept staring at the same phrase with my mouth open and imaginary question marks floating over my head till I clicked out.
The anti-casino folks have no funding. None. Zilch. The casino and slot industry are awash in money because their industry is nothing more than the equivalent of a giant sucking hole that vacuums money from the vulnerable, kind of like Sarnoth in Star Wars.
After all, there are no billionaires who stand to make money by stopping gambling. Example – Sheldon Adelson who tossed $5,000,000 into a pro-Gingrich PAC via his corporation – for him that was penny change. The head of United to Stop Slots is a retired social worker, and frail these days. He is stepping down. No one ever paid him a dime. For him, as an addictions counselor, trying to prevent the rape of the poor by the predatory gaming industry was a matter of heart and soul – not pocket book and bottom line. Talk about David and Goliath – hint – the casino industry is “Goliath”.
These hacks are so hackish that they can’t even remember to keep their hack behavior behind closed doors.
thanks for the laugh, Ryan!
So true, but so sad….the Beacon Hill hackocracy is arrogant about their “deals” behind closed doors and then they flaunt their pandering and flaunt their flaunting…..and it smells bad!
…but did anyone think to just let the Massachusetts people decide — via an up or down statewide referendum — whether we want gambling here in the Commonwealth?
I saw that a petition was started to repeal the law — but that it faced a significant issue in that the people cannot overturn an appropriations measure (go figure!).
Anyways, as someone who is progressive, pro-democracy, and anti-corporate-Democratic party, this issue really gets me in the gullet. I think we need legislators to make certain technical decisions — but I think big, grand questions like “should we have casinos in our state or not” should be part of a direct democratic process. Am I living in a fantasy world?
Here’s the landscape……it takes significant financial and people resources to get the question on a ballot. It will likely happen and your support will be needed to gather signatures, entice people to learn about the issue, etc.
The legislation was carefully crafted (this is how our public servants spend their time on our dime behind closed doors) to block repeal (the people’s recourse for egregious legislation). The timing during the holidays to gather signatures as well as the designation of the bill as “appropriations” made it a long shot with SJC. The triumverate with the passive support of the Attorney General made it a cake-walk to turn the people from accessing the courts.
Meanwhile, the Treasurer is salivating about the expansion of his role and powers that are directly linked to his campaign coffers (ABCC) and the Auditor is MIA.
Not one of the ninnies has voiced concern over the impacts of potential legalized on-line gambling with the “estimates” by the gambling industry for revenues. What is the contingency plan when local aid drops?!?!?! Sell the horses????????
Democrats……every single one of them. Forget “tax and spend” the slogan for these unprincipled anti-(D) policies and politicians is, “Gimmick and Grab.”
Or, “gimme and grab.”
Well put.
Massachusetts is simply too good for gambling casinos.
We have Harvard, we have M.I.T., we have all the great research Hospitals, we have significant outposts for great tech companies like Microsoft, Google, and now, Amazon. We have leading Pharmaceutical companies, we have the best professional sports teams in the nation over the past decade, we have the Cape, we have the Berkshires, we have great communities, rich diversity, amazing history, and we were the place where they invented Facebook, for crying out loud! We don’t need casinos.
Casinos belong in places like Connecticut, New Jersey, or Nevada. States that are on perpetual “also-ran” status. So, please pardon my soap-box-ing, but I do resent the fact that this bill was passed without a popular vote. We are better than this.
For me only constitutional questions should go to public ballot (which to be clear is only my opinion as I realize the law allows for more than this). It is for the legislature to determine the public policy of our state as they are the ones with the resources to make decisions on our behalf (the whole republic, not a democracy argument to which I very much subscribe – see Edmund Burke). The trick is to elect people who share your views.