Casinos, Judges, and playground logic

My mother-in-law took me to Dejope "casino" the other day. I put it in quotations because technically, it is a bingo hall. Not that you'd be able to tell that by the advertising they do. "A Little Vegas, right here in Madison" they say. Except they lack a few essentials to be even a little like Las Vegas. No poker, blackjack, or card games of any kind. No roulette, no craps, or other table based games of chance. And though they have what appear to be slot machines, they technically do not have slot machines - they have video bingo games.

They seem to skirt the law by assigning a bingo card to each play of the reels, which otherwise looks and feels a hell of a lot like a slot machine. The only difference is the lack of a handle and a tiny bingo card in the corner of the screen. Some creative person created an association between all possible positionings of the reels to a pattern on a bingo card, and assigned the winning slot reel combinations to winning bingo card patterns. Oh, and instead of hitting a button to spin the reels, you have to hit the button twice. The first time is to start a new "bingo game", which each spin of the reels is. Then within 3 seconds you must hit the button again, performing a virtual daubing of your virtual bingo card. Failure to hit the button the second time is akin to failing to daub ones bingo card, thus negating all winnings. After you daub the card the reels spin and the screen looks almost exactly like the slot machines, even makes the same noises.

How this gets around they the gaming law is beyond me. This is as blatant a violation of the spirit of a law while technically adhering to its letter I have seen since the Frankenstein vetos, or the time Judge Michael Gableman distorted the record of Louis Butler with his campaign ads (we'll save those for another post). This reminds me of the kind of logic kids use when they are in the very early stages of using their ability of reason. Any of you ever have an annoying sibling who, when mother told him/her to stop touching you, kept his/her hand a millimeter away from your body while maintaining the annoying behavior? This kind of legal manipulation reeks of the kind of logic I thought we extinguished in when we entered puberty. Is this where we have come as a society, accepting the playground logic of bullies and manipulators? Only now instead of skirting the "stop touching your brother" law, they have taken their underdeveloped logic to the state statutes and regulations.

Maybe there are too many of us to have that shared common understanding without some nut getting out of line and reintroducing the sensibility of the devious recess hoodlums. While education and debate may take generations to end this kind of travesty, I think the free market option of avoiding the products and services of such places (or voting for such representatives)will provide more immediate gratification. Maybe someday we will evolve to a higher level of common understanding. I'm just surprised its taking so long.