couldn't find that article either but studies have been going on for a LOoooonnnnng while....


As far as slots are...look at it like this,,,it is money coming from 2 ends...you spend it to play and then your insurance spends it to wean you from playing....

This comes from the legislature. We do have the initiative petition, but we don't have any of those this time 'round.

The next ballot should be interesting. We have something called the "HOPE" Act. Something which would force the legislature to appropriate about $1,100+more per pupil in our schools than they presently are, i.e., raise funding from ~$6,900 per student to the regional average which rings up at ~$8,000 per student.

That, coupled with a current on-the-books part of the Oklahoma Constitution which requires a vote of the people to raise taxes should lead our state government into instant fiscal disaster.

Should be fun to watch!

Issue 6 - A casino down by Dayton -- can't tell which side is lying
Issue 5 - Limiting how much interest Pay Day lenders can charge -- VOTE YES, OHIOANS!!!!

I'm curious about this casino prop/initiative. What is it they're asking the voters to decide? We have sooo many casinos here due to all of the indian reservations, but I've never seen anything up for vote on them before.

Indian casinos are - I think - legal everywhere since they are considered to be on land belonging to the Indian nation and not technically part of the state. To have casinos on non-Indian land you have to either legalize casino-style gambling in your state overall or pass an exception for that specific place (or type of place if you're voting to allow slot machines at horse/dog tracks or something).

CB: I believe that for Indian Casinos to be legal, the tribes have to compact with the state. While the states don't usually exercise direct regulatory authority, they usually have as a contractual obligation of the compact the payment of certain taxes and fees (which is fair because the casinos take a helluvalot of infrastructure to get going.

I know that there's at least one casino in southern Oklahoma which is currently raking in huge profits because Texas hasn't compacted with its tribes.

Another interesting thing the tribes can do is buy regular land, i.e., a downtown city block, and deed it into a certain kind of trust administered by the feds. That has the effect of making that land the same as tribal land.

In Oklahoma City right now, a landless tribe, the Shawnee I think, bought a very well-situated piece of land right off of I-35, between Edmond and Oklahoma City (Edmond, being a suburb to the north of OKC, generally a pretty well-off place). They've been trying to deed that land into a trust so that they can build a HUGE resort/casino, complete with a performance hall, bowling alley, casinos, hotel, etc. Very controversial stuff.

Ooh, not that people weren't motivated to vote already, but both those are doing to drive people to the polls. The first always gets the evangelicals out.

It will be interesting to see how they go with what's expected to be a big turn out. Maybe it will moderate the vote.

Could they at least name this amendment after the SNL Mother-humping Moose?

You'd probably have to come up here to understand, but we've got casinos right next to the freeways in all the major metropolitan areas and in all the major cities' limits. The tribes run them, but as far as I know, the land is no longer owned by the tribes. Some are little casinos, some are big resort casinos.

Like in many other places, there is a marriage protection amendment. I plan to vote NO on it.

Found it! Stem Cells From Fat Create Beating Heart Cells.

"Melbourne scientists recently discovered that stem cells isolated from human fat could be made to turn into beating heart muscle cells when cultured with rat heart cells...."

That is incorrect. The Narragansett Indian Tribe can't open up a casino on their land.