I hope that in the coming election, Maine votes do not allow the proposed casino.

We’re not being asked to change the law from gambling being illegal to gambling being legal. We’re simply being asked to make one small minority group exempt from laws that the rest of us must obey, solely for their financial benefit.

How can so many Democrats, whining about equal opportunity for so long, support such a thing? To be democratic means to give everyone the same opportunity and let the competition begin, doesn’t it?

It will still be illegal for a group of guys to play poker if there’s money involved.

Oddly, it seems that vices that we might find reprehensible in those close to us are blithely accepted once they become institutionalized or develop an industry. I suppose that way the responsibility is spread so thin that each person’s guilt level is negligible.

But such institutions, I suggest, are more harmful to society than the most extravagant notions of personal freedom. They make moral distinctions irrelevant; they cloud, or just run roughshod over, the legal issues, and they replace both with an arbitrary order of authority in which it is clear that those with the most money have the most power.

Are we children then that the law must tell us we can’t play games with our money unless we do it at a built-in disadvantage? For my money, personal freedom is infinitely more desirable than a chance to feed the rich.

Stephen Wrentzel, Auburn

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