Monday, August 30, 2010

Which Would You Pick?

Where is the national outrage over the building of a gambling parlor less than ½ mile from national hallowed ground?

Developers want to build a casino ½ mile from the battleground at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.  Over 400 people are scheduled to speak at the public hearing related to the development.  Some of them will probably speak against the proposal, but there is no outrage expressed at the national level.

What is the difference between a casino at Gettysburg and an Islamic center 2 blocks away from the site of the World Trade Center in New York City? 

Why haven’t fearmongering national leaders come out in protest of the Gettysburg Casino Project?  Is it not insensitive to put a gambling establishment so close to the site of this heart-wrenching Civil War battle, surely hallowed ground for our nation?

I’d take the Islamic center over the casino any day.  Not that I am against gambling, per se, but the Islamic center would probably be smoke-free.  And it might have a swimming pool, and a quiet place to pray. I don't reckon you'll find either of those at a casino.

3 comments:

Angie Kay Dilmore said...

I hadn't heard about this. We have casinos in Lake Charles, so I don't think much about them either way.

Mariah Reed said...

I'm being facetious here but at least the casino would add to the tax base of the community; religious organizations are tax exempt. Seriously, though, there have been disagreements over where things are built and, quite often, the battles are won by the objectors. The sticky thing about the Islamic community center is that it strikes at one of our nation's core tenets: freedom from religious persecution.

Mariah Reed said...

One of the reasons I was accepting of the Pittsburgh casino is that of the tax base. Pittsburgh is loaded with educational and medical institutions, neither of which add to the tax base. Hence, the 2.7% wage tax burden on city dwellers.