ANF: Governor-elect Keisha Lance Bottoms wants the state to revisit decisions on whether or not casinos should be legalized in Georgia
The thing about human nature is that if there’s a topic that continuously keeps bubbling back up, regardless of how many times it has been rejected or shot down in the past, on a long enough timeline, it will eventually get a green light. Sometimes, it’s on account of the landscape changing, the minds of the decision makers changing, or the decision makers themselves have changed.
But at the end of the day, I wager that most of the time it has more to do with the general exasperation of the people tired of having to have the same argument again and again, and much like parents relenting to their children’s incessant whining, even lawmakers have a point in which they just seem to throw their hands up and just say, fuck it, fine, okay.
Off the top of my head, some examples I can think of repeatedly brought up issues that were rebuffed but eventually went through are:
- NCAA player compensation
- Washington Redskins/Cleveland Indians name changing
- Abortion rights
- AI implementation
- Gambling laws in various other states
That’s where I think this is going to happen here in Georgia, eventually. It may not be this go around, but I think it’s a safe bet that this topic will inevitably bubble back up again in a few years, probably justified by like North Carolina or Mississippi having some modicum of positive financial impact from the casinos they’ve erected in their states, and if not this time, but eventually Georgia will relent. Eventually, someone will pose the question, of why should NC/MS/X state get money from our residents when we can be keeping that money here, and bam, casinos will start sprouting in Georgia, like snakehead fish or Asian murder hornets.
I mean, we’ve already got legalized slot machines in a number of Kroger grocery stores, and there are more than numerous gas stations scattered throughout the state who are pretty flagrantly running their own slot machine rooms, loosely adhering to the law, while still sucking down the dollars of addicts under different terminology.
Personally, I’m not a fan of the idea, but I also don’t think this is a winnable fight, seeing as how the whole topic of casinos in Georgia seems to sprout up every two years or so. I just think it’s a matter of time before it’s going to go through, and resisting it seems like a futile exercise.
Fortunately, my gambling bug isn’t nearly what it used to be, and I like to think I’m more resilient to going back to wanting to gamble as much as I used to, which honestly wasn’t that bad considering I never lost my head at any point of my oft-going to Vegas days. So even if and when casinos become a thing in Georgia, it’ll be pretty easy for me to resist.
Additionally, from what I’m gathering, is that it’s places more on the outskirts of civilization, like the mentioned Henry County which is 1-2 hours south of Atlanta city proper that want these things, and yeah, those flyover counties probably would benefit from an influx of cash to their sleepy chunks of land. I just didn’t like the idea of a casino replacing Turner Field’s real estate, and having a gaudy casino right in the heart of the city, but out in those hill tribes, go for it.
Sure, they’ll look ridiculous and gaudy and completely out of place, like most off-the-highway casino resorts do, like they are in North Carolina, Mississippi and Washington, but I guess if the claims are at least close to being true, and some of this money brought in goes towards important infrastructure, it might not be the worst idea in the world.
It’s just sad though, that economies are so reliant on the cash flow provided by, gambling. Because it’s just like that legendary quote from that Chinese kid’s yearbook: it’s not enough that I should succeed – others should fail. Degenerate gamblers cash losses and probably their lives when they kill themselves rather than face the consequences of their addiction, lead to the economic flourish of the places in which these money traps lie.
What a world we live in.
