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Daily Nebraskan
Monday, April 25, 1933
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Let's face it. The slate is broke.
Nothing is going to change that fact
in any great hurry. But who's to say that
a short-term remedy is so had when a
long-term remedy is not in sight?
Today, the state lottery bill, LB.v(
conies up for debate. And while the
issue of establishing a state lottery is a
sensitive one, Nebraskans deserve the
chance to decide for themselves if they
want one.
Opponents of the lottery are deter
mined to kill the bill or tack on amend
ments that would make its passage un
likely. As LB336 reads, a state lottery
commission would be established, with
proceeds from lottery tickets providing
property tax relief through the general
homestead exemption program.
Rather than rush to create a system
that has obvious shortcomings, it makes
more sense to delay action and put it
before the voters. That is what Legisla
tive Resolution 10 aims to do - let the
state decide on next year's ballot if they
ate for it.
The situation is similiar to that in
Colorado. A Sunday Omaha World-Herald
article said that Colorado voters approved
the establishment of a state lottery on a
ballot in 19S0. It finally got under way
this year and its popularity and profit
ability have surpassed original goals.
Colorado expected to gross $60 million
for the year, but that estimate has been
changed to S(0 million.
Colorado Gov. Richard Lamm did not
want to start a lottery. Our Gov. Kerrey
seems to be of the same mind, and will
probably veto LB336.
Bat if LR10 passes, Nebraskans would
have the chance to decide for themselves
if they think it's worth the gamble. If
Colorado's success is an indication of what
a lottery could bring to Nebraska, it's
certainly worth a try.
Supporteis say a lottery here could
bring in $20 million. If interest is strong
on the ballot, that could be a conserva
tive estimate. Nebraskans have a love for
taking chances - just look at the Ak-Sar-Ben
racetrack - not what one would call
an unprofitable venture. And in a lottery,
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the returns would be guaranteed - if not
for the individual, for the state.
The businesses that would sell the lot
tery tickets would realize a profit; Nebras
kans seem eager to buy Colorado tickets
when available. According to the World
Herald. Kerrey said he was told that Ne
braska is "losing $100,000 to Colorado
because of the lottery," and added. "Ne
braskans are also going to Las Vegas and to
New Yoik to see plays."
Granted, money is always going to
leave the state; the "good life" can only
go so far. We'll never have the casinos.
And they aren't about to transplant
Broadway.
But we could manage to print up a few
million tickets without much trouble, if
that's what Nebraskans want. It could
be just w hat we need to bail us out.
The state could be the real winner.
Wait: Scaoy eoDowigllD fio make people do sometMinig
Some time ago. 1 can't remember exactly when (was it
atier James Watt's famous analogy between environment
alists and Nazis?), former Wisconsin Sen. Gay lord
Nelson said it was time for the gus in the white coats to
come get the Secretary of the Interior.
Nelson, who now heads the Siena Club, a major
environmental group, is probably a little thankful for
Eric
i Peterson
out such promising candidates as David Stockman, the
bright little boy with the big, trickle down idea, and a
president who co-staned with a chimpanzee.
Two years ago. when he was at a dinner for fat cat
Republicans in the San. Joaquin valley (the kind who
live m fake medieval castles on their vineyards and hire
migrant woikers to pick grapes at a piecework, starvation
rate). Watt said. "I don't use the words "Democrats' and
'Republicans.' It's liberals and Americans." And we
thought he was such a rabid partisan.
But a half year later. Watt undertook in a letter on Ins
off-shore oil drilling policies to insist that Jews had better
support him if they know what's good for them: "If the
liberals of the American Jewi!i community join with the
oilier libeials of this nation to oppose these efforts, (to
open up moie offshore drilling areas) they will weaken
our ability to be a good friend of Israel."
In January there was Watt's ultimate example of the
failure of socialism: not the Soviet Union, but our own
American Indian reservations. (Which I would say are the
results of far too little state aid. and not too much; yes, I
am one of those who think that throwing money at a
problem can actually sometimes help.)
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Watt's push . "Nuke the Whales" posturing. Because Watt
likes to talk so much, and so badly, his plans to dismantle
his department aren't passed over and forgotten. And
membership in environmental groups like the Skrra Club
and the Audubon Society has jumped since Reagan and
Watt took office. Watt is scary enough to make people do
something.
Watt has, entirely by himself, become the most detest
ed and ridiculed member of the administration, beat in a
0
At one of those Washington parties that are more fun
in the movies than they are in real life. 1 approached a
real-life senator and brought up the matter of Chicago -this
was before the election. Would it not be wonderful, I
averred (I aver only at parties), if Bernard Epton, who
initially never expected to win anyway, simply pulled out
of the race? The senator flashed me the smile of dismay
and said, "But he can win."
There is in that remark all you ever need to know
about politics - its ethics, its philosophy, its morality. It
it n
' (- Richard
y' -')( Cohen
is, like football, bridge and, until recently, war - about
winning. After winning, there is nothing else and all the
cliches apply - winning isn't everything, it's the only
thing, and all of that.
And that, I suppose, was what was on the minds of the
Republican Party (if a party can be said to have a mind)
and the White House (ditto) when they threw themselves
behind the candidacy of Epton, a reluctant and unlikely
front-man for white racism. The word from the White
House and from Republican spokesmen everywhere was
that the GOP could not lose in Chicago. Either it would
get itself a mayor or it would get itself the loyalty of
countless blue-collar voters. Never mind the nation and
never mind even Chicago: the GOP could not lose.
For that reason, the Republican Party gave Chicago its
best shot. It dispatched John Deardourff, a media master
respected for both his talents and honor, who promptly
dove right into the mud. It was he who coined the tag
line "Epton - before it's too late." And it is too late for
him now to say that he could not understand how anyone
could read race into it.
In fact, it might be too late for the Republican Party to
get out of the corner it has painted itself into. Somehow,
the party of Lincoln has managed to transform itself into
the party of Jim Crow. If it has not become identified
with white racism, it has at least become the party you
turn to when you want to express some sort of racist
sentiment.
Blacks, of course, know this. They are now so solidly
Democratic it's hard to believe that they were once just as
solidly Republican. Franklin Roosevelt altered that, but it
is not too much to say that the black vote was up for
grabs until almost recently. Then, GOP opposition to
virtually all-civil rights legislation, exemplified by the vot
ing records of such presidential candidates as Barry Gold
water and, much later, Gerald Ford, all but iced it.
Chicago put it away.
If is, of course, foolish to argue in the context ot
politics about morality when the only morality recognized
is the numbers. And the numbers, the GOP concluded,
were on its side in Chicago. At most, it could have a
mayor in office, making it harder for the dead to Cast
their usual Democratic ballot come 1984. But at mini
mum, the election would accustom normally Democratic
blue-collar voters to the strange sensation of voting
Republican. Having done it once and having not been
struck dead as a result, the voters then were supposed to
be able to do the same thing in 1984.
You could make the argument that the Chicago
election was a perfect example of media hype. There is
something to that. Chicago is not America- It is not even a
But Watt's most recent caper, replacing the apparently
too dissolute Beach Boys with Wayne Newton, went too
far even for the presidents and the Missus. The First
Couple, who. as quoted in a recent Mike Frost column,
"couldn't go New Wave . . . on the beach!!" admitted to
liking the Beach Boys.
All this criticism, even the implied criticism of Nancy
Reagan herself, ;s not likely to put James Watt's job m
trouble, because every ridiculous thing he says only en
dears him more to the New Right.
That is piccisely his gieatcst alue to the Reagan ad
ministration. James Watt functions in the same way that,
say. Eleanor Roosevelt did in her husband's administra
tion. (I hope that whatever divine powers there be do not
stroke me down for comparing the two.) Eleanor Roose
velt did. and Watt does, keep the "extremes" happy.
Meanoi's involvement in civil lights was enough to keep
the left from ever becoming disaffected with the New
Deal and James Watt is pure balm to the wounded pride
of those who think Reagan has sold out to Washington.
Bad press was enough to get Anne Gorsuch Burford
out of her job, but each new assertion by Watt only makes
him more secure in the heart of Jesse Helms, and there
fore in his job.
ft few lacks
typical big-city. Its Democratic machine protected it like
an indulgent .mother. And by wagging a threatening Finger
at Washington, D.C., especially during Democratic admini
strations, Chicago managed to live in a racial time warp.
Sometime in the next decade, Chicago will have to move
into the 1980s.
But media hype in an age of media hype is not some
thing to ignore. Whatever the actual ramifications of the
Chicago election might be, one for sure is a hardening of
the image that the Republican party is not for blacks. And
if it is not for blacks (or women or the poor), then it is
not for anyone who cares about social justice. And unless
you believe that intolerance is the wave of the future, that
things will get worse and not better, then what the
Republican Party won in Chicago was the right to be on
the wrong side of history.
A couple or more contests like this and the GOP will,
like its Chicago standard-bearer, not go from victory to
victory, but to oblivion instead.
(c) 1S83, Th Washington Post Company
Letter
Policy
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