Comp chips for the bloggers!

PR guru Evan Zeppos sent us a short note to promote a new blog for the Menomonee Indian tribe, Casino Competition for Wisconsin. No, it's not a contest to see which tribe can give the most money to Governor Jim Doyle. It's a blog to defend the Menomonee Indian tribes' efforts to build a casino in Kenosha. Their first post promises, "We’ll illustrate it all with links to public documents, news articles, economic studies, video, audio, photos and more. You won’t want to miss this – so please subscribe to our blog and plan to come back often for updates."
I don't really have a dog in this fight (yes, pun intended). If we're going to have legalized gambling at all in Wisconsin, I'd open it up for real competition. Listening to one tribe whine for the special right to be rich from gambling because another tribe got the special right to be rich from gambling ignores that it is a special license to profit from the misfortune of others, that it is hardly competitive given no other business can offer legalized gambling, and that tribal gambling has had a corrosive effect on Wisconsin and even national politics.

On the other hand, what's the sports book going to be like?

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Rolling the dice

Tiffany Wankowski of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin Kenosha Project Team for Zeppos and Associates send us a link to a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Community Columnist column by Steven Pigeon on the efforts by the Potowatami tribe to prevent a proposed new casino in Kenosha. I'll give you the best of the argument:

The objectors' argument can be translated to this: A Wisconsin-based entity should not be allowed to do business with a non-Wisconsin-based entity because a portion of the profits from such a partnership will be given to the non-Wisconsin-based entity.

With this belief and show of opposition, I would expect that the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Wisconsin, Milwaukee Urban League, VISIT Milwaukee and Forest County Potawatomi to soon come out in opposition of a partnership between Miller Brewing (a London-based company) with Leinenkugel Brewing (a Wisconsin-based company) because some of the profits will leave Wisconsin.

Surely members of Wisconsin Gaming for Wisconsin will seek the closure of Kimberly-Clark and Mercury Marine plants in Wisconsin because money generated from these plants will be sent to their parent companies, which are headquartered out of state.

The opposition materials created by Wisconsin Gaming for Wisconsin also allege that the Mohegan tribe's casino in Connecticut sucks billions of dollars from Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey.

If having out-of-state visitors spend money in your state is as bad as Wisconsin Gaming for Wisconsin suggests, we should board up the water parks in Wisconsin Dells, build a wall around Lake Geneva and cut off Wisconsin's thumb and sink Door County.

Most important, the Potawatomi tribe should bar all out-of-state visitors from its casino in Milwaukee since it apparently believes it is wrong to accept money from out-of-state gamblers. Since the Potawatomi will never do this, its advertising campaign appears to be simply an effort to protect the tribe's monopoly on gaming in southeastern Wisconsin.

Reasonable enough. However, should someone with the name of "Pigeon" be writing articles about expanding casino gambling?

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