Jim Anderson and Anna Kay France Talk About Gambling

Some people at a small radio station in Buffalo, New York, are trying to help inform the public about issues concerning the expansion of legalized gambling, not only in Erie county, but across the Nation. Jim Anderson and Anna Kay France invited me to be a guest on their show, Conversations About Gambling. The show airs on Mondays from 12:30-1:00 (EST). I talked about my book, Confessions of a Slot Machine Queen, and also about what is happening here in Detroit, where I am spending the week promoting the book and visiting family.

I’m grateful for the way people in the black community who work with media-community based radio and community newspapers-are responding to my work. I believe it’s important for those of us who live and work in university environments to collaborate with people who are leaders in their communities on issues, such as gambling, that bring more harm than good. Otherwise, we render ourselves obsolete.

Sandra Adell, Author: CONFESSIONS OF A SLOT MACHINE QUEEN: A MEMOIR

Andy Rooney takes on the American Gaming Association.

Andy Rooney’s comments about the American Gaming Association’s recently released statistics about the “losses” the commercial casino industry reported suffering during 2009 should be a wake-up call for anyone who still believes that casinos are the way to help boost this country’s economy.

In his typically caustic manner, Rooney brought the Sunday, May 16, 2010, edition of the CBS show 60 Minutes to a close by informing us that, according to the American Gaming Association, casinos earned $32.5 billion in 2008, but only $30.7 billion in 2009.

“It’s enough to bring tears to your eyes,” said Rooney. Of course, he was being his usual cantankerous self, but he raised some serious issues about this country’s growing dependence on gambling for new revenue. In order for casinos to make that much money, people must lose billions of dollars, money that could be put to better purposes.

Rooney also wanted to know why the government doesn’t protect its citizens from losing so much money by making gambling in casinos illegal. The answer is simple: it’s the government-local, state, and national elected officials-that is ensuring that we have ample opportunities to lose the billions of dollars the casinos rake in every year, by allowing the expansion of legal gambling to happen everywhere.

It also is important to note that the American Gaming Association reported on revenues from the “commercial casino industry,” and not the Native American casinos, since the Native American casinos don’t have to report their profits. So the numbers are probably much higher, even more billions of dollars, if the Native American casinos are taken into account.

I’m so glad Andy Rooney had the guts to speak out on national television about this plague on our society. The billionaire Warren Buffett also has been very critical about the gambling industry. He recently met with Tom Grey, who for years has been fighting against legalized gambling, to talk about the negative effects of gambling.

Hopefully, some of the country’s more prominent black entrepreneurs and elected officials will speak out as well. We just can’t afford to have more gambling in poor communities like Detroit, Gary, Indiana, Milwaukee, the list keeps on growing.

Sandra Adell, Author, CONFESSIONS OF A SLOT MACHINE QUEEN: A MEMOIR

Roland Martin, CNN’s Mary Snow, Lisa Robinson, and the Wall Street Showdown

I watched with interest a CNN report posted on Roland Martin’s Blog titled “Wall Street Showdown” that featured a struggling black woman named Lisa Robinson as she went about her daily routine with her family while worrying about how to save her home from foreclosure. Robinson said to CNN Reporter Mary Snow, “Goldman Sachs, Wall Street bankers, for me it’s all the same,” referring to what she called their “predatory” lending practices.

That’s the way I feel about the Casino industry. It’s no accident that people critical of Wall Street use terms such as “casino economics” to describe how the rich are ensuring that they will get even richer by preying on poor folks. The casino industry isn’t doing anything different, except that they can legally rob us blind. Most folks just haven’t awakened to that fact yet. I hope they will soon, before it’s too late for us to change the tide that’s accelerating a whole lot of people’s decline into greater and greater debt.

Sandra Adell, Author: Confessions of A Slot Machine Queen: A Memoir