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Honolulu Lite
LET'S get something straight: I'm not anti-gambling, I'm just anti-shibai. And we are about to be buried in truckloads of shibai as a casino developer in league with a few of the governor's buddies and some powerful state legislators begin an advertising blitz to brainwash us into allowing gambling in Hawaii. Legal casinos in
Hawaii a bad betAnd it is brainwashing, not an on-the-table discussion of the impact, both good and bad, of gambling for the state. The advertising campaign is not designed to inform, but to misdirect, manipulate and mislead. Even the name of the organization launching the public relations assault is deceptive: the Coalition for Economic Diversity. It should honestly be called the Coalition of a Few Politically Powerful People Hoping to Get Rich Running a Casino.
The coalition is backed by Sun International Hotels Ltd., which proposes to build a casino in West Oahu. The coalition's name is deceiving because few would want to argue against economic diversity. It's sounds politically correct, but it's not. It's a way for a few powerful people to gain economically at the social expense of many.
There have been several attempts to bring gambling to Hawaii, but this seems like the best financed and organized. Some of the state's top public relations figures are involved, along with key legislators. Even Gov. Ben Cayetano, who shmoozed with Sun honchos at their Bahamas resort, is tentatively supporting this effort.
The way these guys plan to convince the rest of us to go along with it is to tie the gambling proceeds to scholarships for college-bound students. Again, who could be against kids getting to go to college for free?
WHILE sending as many of Hawaii's high school graduates to college for free might seem to be a good idea, it is only the sugar to make the medicine go down. The medicine is throwing open the doors to gambling in Hawaii. Medicine is a good analogy because gambling may be good for the state's economy. Maybe the benefits would outweigh the downside: that state-sponsored gambling is a tax on people who can't afford it; that it can bring organized crime; that it will change the character of Hawaii forever.
The governor says he is interested in Sun's plan because it would limit gambling to one specific site on Oahu. That's pure shibai. The truth, and we've discussed this every time some form of limited gambling is proposed, is that if a state allows gambling, Indian tribes are allowed to apply to the U.S. Department of Interior to run gambling in that state. And it has happened all over the country.
If Hawaii allows casino gambling, any Indian tribe could buy land in Hawaii and open a casino. And if you think any of the various Hawaiian sovereignty organizations would not immediately partner up with an Indian tribe to open their own casino -- since Sun's plan doesn't consider giving Hawaiians a cut of the action -- you're not paying attention.
I've talked to attorneys in the state attorney general's office and they know about the Indian tribe loophole. Why the state attorney general doesn't fill the governor in on this point is beyond me. You simply can't limit gambling to one casino or lottery or even bingo for that matter.
One other point: using gambling proceeds to send students with a B average or above to college smacks of gradism. It discriminates against C students, who, if not helped, go on in life to become Black Jack dealers, criminals and newspaper columnists.
Charles Memminger, winner of
National Society of Newspaper Columnists
awards in 1994 and 1992, writes "Honolulu Lite"
Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Write to him at the Honolulu Star-Bulletin,
P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, 96802
or send E-mail to cmemminger@starbulletin.com.
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