My wife was right...Ohio sucks

And this came from a Pittsburgh native. Let me repeat that. Someone from Pittsburgh is saying that Ohio sucks. And I'm agreeing with her. I know, I may have just lost all credibility with anyone who has ever stood at the confluence of despair, pollution and unemployment (also known as the Monongahela, Allegheny and Ohio rivers)...but stay with me for a second.

I have lived in Ohio all of my life (with the notable exception of a few years stuck in traffic on the Beltway of our nation's capital) and I have never been more embarrassed to be an Ohioan. I consider myself a political animal with political friends, political clients and political opinions and I am often the one defending or explaining the actions of politicians. But I do not have an explanation for what is currently happening in the Buckeye State and it makes me ill. Check that. I DO have an explanation for it. And that makes me down right nauseous.

Let me give you a snapshot of the political climate right now as it relates to issues I care about. Slot machines at racetracks (and a few civic locations in Cleveland) were voted down OVERWHELMINGLY last November. Last week, the Senate passed OVERWHELMINGLY a bill which would allow "instant racing" machines to be installed at racetracks (see an "instant racing" machine here). The state's Attorney General is desperately trying to find a way NOT to outlaw games of "skill" like "Tic Tac Fruit" (see a "Tic Tac Fruit" machine here). Poker games are being raided all across the state. The "Dancers for Democracy" failed to get a bill defeated which will cause strip clubs to close at midnight and will require patrons to be at least six feet away from dancers at all times.

Can you get a sense of the hypocrisy?

I know why the slot machines were voted down in November. The way the ballot issue was written and presented, it was going to make the racetrack owners wealthy while being too obscure as to the "real" benefits that Ohio students would see from the scholarships that were to derive from the revenue. Add to that the age-old warring between Ohio's cities and the long-standing competition (hatred) between them and the issue didn't stand a chance.

But that's not the way that politicians and the media spun it. According to them, it was a defeat for expanded gambling. Ohio doesn't want gambling. Nevermind that every state around Ohio has some form of gambling and the parking lots of those states are populated with Ohio cars. Ohio doesn't want gambling. Nevermind the fact that the real "winner" in the short-term would have been the horse racing industry in Ohio, which is an enormous industry on-par with many manufacturing segments that Ohio would be tripping over itself trying to "save" if they were in the competitive disadvantage position that racing is in. Ohio doesn't want gambling.

Fine.

So explain the vote for the instant racing machines. These will provide a fraction of the revenue for the horse industry, they do nothing for Ohio's students and will undoubtedly be just shoved into a corner of a still dilapidated and visitor-unfriendly racetrack. Were the slots to have been approved, these tracks would have been forced to invest in their facilities and actually make racetracks a "destination" instead of a destination for desperation.

Okay, but the REST of Ohio doesn't want gambling.

Fine.

So explain these "skill" games that are popping up all over the state. From what I understand, they're slot machines loosely based on tic-tac-toe that are in almost every truck stop and bar in rural Ohio. And in some circles they're considered SKILL games. And Ohio AG Marc Dann is sending someone around to verify that they are at least 51% skill and therefore legal. Coincidentally, Dann received a tremendous amount of money from those involved with these games. Coincidentally.

But in some of these same bars, or even private clubs, poker games are being raided. People are being taken to jail. For playing a game of unquestionable skill. Right next to someone playing a slot machine. Pseudo-legally. (But nobody in these private clubs is smoking because Ohio's smoking ban was ruled to apply to private clubs as well. I'm just saying.) What kind of a world do we live in where poker is the anti-christ, but dressed up slot machines are accepted revenue makes for those "skillful" enough to succeed? Where are the books on strategy for those games anyway? When is the World Series of Tic-Tac-Fruit? Is it in conjunction with the rock-paper-scissors extravaganza? I'm just saying.

Fine. All of these issues are in some way illegal or at the very least in a legal gray area. But strip clubs are legal in Ohio. They're legal, licensed businesses. Just like bars. Just like restaurants. Except strip clubs happen to have semi-naked people dancing. So what gives the state the right to say they have to close at midnight? What gives them the right to say that LEGAL customers have to stay a certain distance away from LEGAL employees doing LEGAL work? I am passionate about this BUSINESS issue, but it is impossible to discuss with people because they hear strip club, think pervert and stop listening. Similar, I think, to what the legislators did. And the Governor for that matter...who took the chicken's way out and didn't sign the bill, allowing it to become law.

The hypocrisy of all of this stinks. It DEFINITELY doesn't pass the "smell" test as my lobbyist friends say. And, don't forget, I am a REPUBLICAN. Where are the democrats on this? ACLU? Hello? Free speech? Freedom of expression? Liberals? I know you're out there. You voted a lot of respected legislators out of office last November and are propping up phony and vomit-inducing presidential candidates on the single-issue platform that they're "not Republicans."

All of this makes me sick. And it is also part of what led to my career change. I want to make a difference in this state. I want to create associations to look out for the rights of poker players and fix the hypocrisy and temper the influence of radical lunatics infringing on our rights in the name of "values. All of this so that we can once again stand up and say proudly, "Pittsburgh sucks."