Sunday, October 30, 2005

Gambling on Trust


If it weren’t so pathetic, it would be amusing that the Texas Lottery is now considering guaranteeing its jackpots in an effort to win back the confidence of those who play the lottery.

It’s also oxymoronic that an organization dedicated to taking your money and not paying it back, sanctioned by the state as a defacto tax on the mathematically-challenged, would be trying to enhance it’s image as being “trustworthy.”
The lottery is a shell game.
It is designed to take more money than it pays out.

The Lottery panders to a segment of the population that is weak-minded enough to expect something for nothing—or nearly nothing: the wagering of dollars from those least able to afford them in the pursuit of instant riches. For the few who do win (and it's from pure dumb, blind luck) the result is a lifestyle that in most cases changes so abruptly they're ill-equipped to manage well their windfall.

Generally, the lives of lottery winners are changed forever, and not necessarily for the better.

Not surprisingly, the Lottery recently took some licks for portraying lottery jackpots to be larger than life, or at least larger than they were. Now, the wager mongers are trying to win back your trust.

A skunk by any other name still stinks.
And the Lottery, despite all promises of truthfulness, still takes from the gullible, and gives to the state which sanctions what would otherwise be labeled ill-gotten gains.

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