{"id":184,"date":"2008-10-07T10:43:46","date_gmt":"2008-10-07T10:43:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/progressiverevival\/2008\/10\/gambling-with-politics.html"},"modified":"2008-10-07T10:43:46","modified_gmt":"2008-10-07T10:43:46","slug":"gambling-with-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2008\/10\/gambling-with-politics.html","title":{"rendered":"Gambling with Politics"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tabitha Knerr at <\/font>Faithfuldemocrats.com<\/font><\/a> just posted a great piece on all the many ties between Republicans and the gambling industry that are starting to pop up in races around the country.  <\/span>I <\/font>commented recently<\/font><\/a> on the effect Sheldon Adelson–the GOP operative behind Freedom’s Watch, who made his billions owning Vegas casinos and investing in the Chinese regime–is having on Congressional races.  <\/span><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/font><\/p>\n

Tabitha connected a lot more dots than I did and demonstrated that, despite the fact that Abramoff is still just settling into his cell, Republicans are quickly reestablishing their ties with organized gambling from the McCain camp down to the Republican running to reclaim Mark Foley’s old seat in FL (she included a bunch of links<\/font><\/a> to all the buzz being generated by Christians pushing back against this trend through local blogs and the media).  <\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/font><\/p>\n

But more than just pointing out the political implications, she provided a very good perspective on why this trend is so troubling…and why Christians should be paying attention.  <\/span>I’ve included an excerpt below (click <\/font>here to read the entire post<\/font><\/a>):<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/font><\/p>\n

There are two key issues at stake here: Gambling & Special interest lobbying:<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Special Interests  <\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

Not all special interests are bad. The American Cancer Society is a special interest. Mothers Against Drunk Driving is a special interest. Disabled American Veterans is a special interest. I am not opposed to these organizations talking to my Representative and reminding them of the impact that legislation will have the sick, the grieving, and the forgotten. We should not buy into the McCain rhetoric that all special interests are bad. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

  <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

But some special interests are less beneficial, less concerned with the common good, less concerned about the least of these than they are about protecting their worldly riches. Some special interests are downright dangerous. The difficult part about being a responsible citizen is that you must engage in the complicated task of separating the sheep from the goats. Luckily for us, we were given some instruction in how such decisions are made…it is indeed worth finding out which special interests [candidates] are tied to. Will we support a candidate who has a “special interest” in promoting addiction, greed, and recklessness? Or a candidate who has a “special interest” in caring for the hungry, the sick, and the imprisoned?<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/span> <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Gambling<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

Ah, gambling. Guaranteed money for those who own the games and racetracks, but a wolf in sheep’s clothing for those who actually play and bet. Its one of the most effective ways ever discovered to make poor people even poorer…Many Christians object to gambling as a personal vice, but as a person who believes in the freedom Christ gives us to choose virtue over vice, I try to avoid legislating morality. The issue, as I see it, is not about moral policing, but about how we treat an industry that is based not on providing goods or services, but on transferring wealth from the poor to the already-rich… <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/span><\/b> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tabitha Knerr at Faithfuldemocrats.com just posted a great piece on all the many ties between Republicans and the gambling industry that are starting to pop up in races around the country.  I commented recently on the effect Sheldon Adelson–the GOP operative behind Freedom’s Watch, who made his billions owning Vegas casinos and investing in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":167,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,36,1,13,51,19,9],"tags":[161,152,191,192,162,190,193,6,163],"class_list":["post-184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christians","category-defining-progressive","category-election-08","category-evangelicals","category-media","category-poverty","category-religion-in-the-public-square","tag-bobby-bright","tag-eleison-group","tag-faithfuldemocrats","tag-foley","tag-freedoms-watch","tag-gambling","tag-mahoney","tag-mccain","tag-sheldon-adelson"],"yoast_head":"\nGambling with Politics - Progressive Revival<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2008\/10\/gambling-with-politics.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Gambling with Politics - Progressive Revival\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tabitha Knerr at Faithfuldemocrats.com just posted a great piece on all the many ties between Republicans and the gambling industry that are starting to pop up in races around the country.  I commented recently on the effect Sheldon Adelson–the GOP operative behind Freedom’s Watch, who made his billions owning Vegas casinos and investing in the…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2008\/10\/gambling-with-politics.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Progressive Revival\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-10-07T10:43:46+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Eric Sapp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Gambling with Politics - 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CGS received significant national attention following the \u00e2\u20ac\u212206 cycle for its groundbreaking faith outreach and messaging work for the DSCC, Senators Casey and Brown, Governors Strickland, Granholm, and Sebelius, Rep. Shuler, and the Michigan, Kansas, and Oregon State Democratic Parties. CGS clients significantly out-performed Democrats nationally (normally by double-digits) with Protestants, evangelicals, Catholics, and weekly church attenders. Dr. John Green, Sr. Fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, said about CGS\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s work that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153if Democrats learn a lesson from \u00e2\u20ac\u212206 and are able to duplicate these efforts more widely\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6we could potentially see historic shifts in voting blocks that would dramatically change the relationship between faith and politics in this country.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Eric has been a regular speaker on faith and politics on television and radio shows, most often providing a Democratic perspective on conservative programs. Eric\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s background also includes stints with Representative David Price (D-NC), where he handled faith and politics, budget, tax, and homeland security issues. Before that, he worked for Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. Eric has a Master of Divinity and Master of Public Policy from Duke. He is married to his high school sweetheart, Julie.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/author\/esapp"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/167"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}