NY gambling arrests don't inspire same awe as before
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NY gambling arrests don't inspire same awe as before. Eight members connected to the Genovese and Bonanno crime families and one Nassau cop were arrested.
Federal indictments relate to illegal gambling and extortion. The illegal bookmakers are not more likely to risk jail over a bad debt than other business owners. Nassau and Suffolk counties own and profit from the same machines as the gambling dens. The state’s casinos run sportsbooks and tithe to the all-powerful governments. “We must protect citizens from the exact same vice we profit from elsewhere” is a cruddy government slogan. It's not true. They try to set your limit at what you can afford to pay if you lose, and what they can write off if they don't.
Gambling is illegal in Queens, Nassau and Suffolk. A gambling boss ordered an underling to tell an indebted gambler to put him under the bridge. Nassua County police detective accepted money from criminals for offering to organize raids on rival gambling clubs.
The governments that pay Peace, Driscoll and Donnelly are funded in part by legal gambling revenue. They are paid to put people away for competing with government-sanctioned monopoly vice. The legalization of gambling spurred an ever-increasing government reliance on the revenue it kicks back.
NY gambling arrests don't inspire same awe as before. Lane Filler is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
