Slots and the City - 2004-01-25
New York City is so boring. Thank goodness we may finally be getting a new type of entertainment:
VLTs.

Video lottery terminals, that is. Essentially, they're slot machines. But since slots are illegal here, these games are tied to the lottery, so they get a pass. Gov. Pataki wants to bring them in to raise funds for the schools. Great idea — if you ignore the red flags.

Like the fact that studies show slot-type machines are the most addicting form of gambling. Especially for women, according to Prof. George Ladd at Colby College in Maine. That's why, in Vegas, slots outnumber all the other games, 30 to 1. They're the easiest, fastest way to get money out of gamblers.
Read the full story at New York Daily News

The Scarlett O'Hara approach to budget deficits - 2004-01-25
They have found hidden stashes of cash. They have used an assistant attorney general's opinion to lower their commitment to the education budget. They have been resourceful and creative.

Or, perhaps, they have learned that state government can push debt into the future the way Americans treat credit card debt. It's the Scarlett O'Hara approach: I'll deal with it tomorrow.

Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. and his estimable budget secretary, James C. "Chip" DiPaula Jr., come to us yet again as miracle men. Even as they are cutting almost everything, they have whomped up a whole new department with no new revenue, the fiscal version of making bricks without straw. Theirs is a tour de force of making do, of happily hanging on until help arrives.

But what is the nature of the hoped-for help? Slot machines? Yes.
Read the full story at Baltimore Sun