Congratulations to Anita Bedell for having the courage to take on the gambling lobby and speak the truth about this lame “industry” (“Heaven’s Lobbyist,” Jan. 9). What will replace the work and industry that is leaving our country, casinos? Or maybe that other strange growing national industry, prisons? Will we ruin every natural vista on rivers and lakes and fill every harbor with a smoky, smelly, gambling boat? It’s a crass idea. The statistic mentioned in the article-every $1 in revenue from gambling costs the host community $3-should be motivation enough for politicians to look to healthier, more productive sources of revenue and prevent the government from pushing gambling as the local and national pastime.
CHRISTINE VERNON / Oak Park, IL
THE GENERALLY FINE article on Anita Bedell and her leadership in opposing the spread of government-sponsored gambling was marred by the authors’ hackneyed characterization of legislators as being from the “left” and the “right,” with the “liberals” being concerned about poverty and addiction and the “conservatives” being concerned about morality.
Being concerned about people whose poverty hampers their well-being is a moral concern. Being concerned about people whose addictions cause harm to themselves and others is a moral concern.
Get rid of your misleading labels and false divisions and stick to the realities of the situation. Anita Bedell apparently tries to deal with the issue realistically, despite efforts to characterize her as a religious moralist.
FRED SMITH / North Riverside
No fix for terrorists
In response to Emily Johnson of LaGrange (In-Box, Jan. 2): Understanding the motivation of terrorists who are well-educated young men from good families does not mean we can fix them or the world they wish to destroy.
In America we are brought up to believe we can aspire to any status or wealth we earn, but in most of the world young people are brought up to set their aspirations according the socio-economic status of their families. A farmer’s son should become a farmer. A professor’s son expects intellectual pursuits that lead to becoming a professor or doctor.
The Arab countries that produce the most terrorists provide university educations at home or abroad for the brightest children of their wealthier families. But there are not enough jobs to meet the expectations of all those educated young men. Some of them become resentful and focus on how they have been cheated of the life that was promised them.
It does not help when religious leaders seduce such young men with the idea that they were born in the only true faith and teach them there can be sanctity in self-destruction and respect to be earned from harming others. It does not help that religious leaders assure angry young men that all good things in life would be theirs if only infidels had not stolen everything of value. It does not help that the society these young men grew up in still wallows in memories of long-ago glory.
There isn’t much we can do to fix young men whose main problem is their failure to cope with the same disappointments most of us deal with every day.
STEPHANIE BRENT / Deerfield
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