I’m currently on vacation, but to make up for the gap in long-winded, run-on-sentence-filled posts on arcane topics, here are five things, in bullet-point form, that are currently on my mind:
- Is IEAH ever really going to go public by the end of the year? It’s currently operating under a Reg-D exception from SEC ‘33 Act registration, so going public could mean that it would have to register and then comply with all of the registration and reporting requirements. It’s everything most racing entities work extremely hard to avoid, because it’s expensive, and there are a lot of pesky details, like disclosure.
- Here’s a great little anecdote about our buddy Rick Dutrow, related by Bennett Liebman, Coordinator of the Racing and Wagering Law Program at the Government Law Center (GLC) of Albany Law School: Tubing Rick Dutrow (June 2, 2008).
- When did gambling become gaming? Or gamblers “horseplayers?” Are we being politically correct? I’m not asking a rhetorical question, I’m just wondering at what point it happened over the twentieth century evolution from “gambling is immoral, so we should prohibit it, except for this kind of gambling, called pari-mutuel, where there are no evil bookies involved,” to “we need to protect the wagering public, so that they keep betting, so maybe we will call them something nicer.” On a related note, I would like to point out that back in the day the states banned “bookmaking,” which was never banned in the UK, and they turned out OK. Meanwhile, over here, anti-gambling sentiment = state police power = fragmented state regulatory system. Building on that, I present my Grand, Overarching Theory for Why We Have So Many Problems In Racing: It’s all the Puritans’ fault.
- Why has KHRC not released a response to Bobby Rush? Should I send them a copy of my last post and give them permission to use my explanation of the statutory provisions?
- I can’t believe anyone has a problem with Woodberry boy Halsey Minor buying Hialeah.
Talk amongst yourselves.
Edited to add: To the person who found this site by searching for “Lidocaine, does it come from a cobra?” — No. No it doesn’t.
13 responses so far ↓
winston // August 5, 2008 at 9:34 pm |
Puritans are to blame for more than just racing’s woes.
Teresa at Brooklyn Backstretch // August 6, 2008 at 7:33 am |
Forgive my delving into the arcane, but “gaming” preceded “gambling”; I’m away from home without access to the 17th/18th/ 19th century sources to back me up, but the use of “gaming” to mean “gambling” goes back to the 16th century. Check out this 2002 article
on this topic…
Kerry O'Neill // August 6, 2008 at 8:18 am |
Cool, thanks, Teresa! None of the early cases I’ve read use the term “gaming” instead of “gambling,” although they do use “wager,” so that’s my frame of reference. What about “horseplayer,” do you know anything about the origin of that word? That link is not working for me now, I will try again later.
And the arcane is always welcomed here.
Kerry O'Neill // August 6, 2008 at 8:25 am |
ooo, I made the link work. Nice. My thought was that maybe “gaming” substituted “gambling” in horse racing at about the same time that gambling addiction began to be recognized as an actual disease, so maybe the tracks were trying to avoid the negative connotation. Anyway, it’s all very interesting. I do still wonder about ‘horseplayer,’ though. But it follows that if wagering on racing is a ‘game,’ then those who wager are ‘playing.’
Ernie // August 6, 2008 at 9:05 am |
Yo! Teresa is building an army of distaff brainiacs!
Dumb sports guys unite!
winston // August 6, 2008 at 8:03 pm |
How did you get the link to work? I just get an error page.
Teresa at Brooklyn Backstretch // August 6, 2008 at 8:51 pm |
The problem is likely in my bad hyperlinking.
Trying again…
Teresa at Brooklyn Backstretch // August 6, 2008 at 8:54 pm |
OK, last time.
Teresa at Brooklyn Backstretch // August 6, 2008 at 8:54 pm |
Here’s the damned address!
http://www.sptimes.com/2002/12/01/Columns/Let_the_euphemisms_go.shtml
Kerry O'Neill // August 6, 2008 at 9:33 pm |
No, I think WordPress is html-challenged.
I just clicked on the link and then deleted the stuff past ’shtml’ in the address window when the error page popped up.
Again, Teresa, not your fault. It seems like wordpress only understands when you just input the link …
Geno // August 8, 2008 at 9:15 am |
I like to call it Investing in Race Horses….
No different than playing the stock market…information available P/E Ratios, etc.
winston // August 8, 2008 at 5:11 pm |
Thanks for the yeoman’s effort.
Alexandra // October 14, 2008 at 7:21 am |
NO THE LIDOCAINE DOESNT COME FROM A COBRA, HOWEVER I AM NOT SURE WHICH SNAKE THE SNAKE VENOM COMES FROM THAT MANY, MANY , MANY TRAINERS USE , TO DEADEN THE PAIN IN THE HORSES FEET !!!!! AN INSIDER HERE !!!! GOOD LUCK ALL YOU GAMBLERS – YOU ALL TELL EVERYONE HOW MUCH YOU ” WIN ” NOW HOW ABOUT ADDING UP YOUR LOSS’S , LOSER’S !!!!!! LOL ” WE CAN ALL CHANGE A LOT OF THING’S ABOUT OURSELVE’S , HOWEVER NO- ONE CAN CHANGE- STUPID !!!!!!