In gambling, it’s best to avoid getting in over your head. Just ask Mike Peters.

On April 18, the Maine Gambling Control board member from Dixfield resigned from his post to protest slot machine proliferation in the Pine Tree State. He feels, as many do, that increasing the availability of casino gaming will cause “grave harm” to Maine.

Peters’ resignation followed legislative approval of a tribal racino complex in Washington County, which the depressed region is pushing for its economic survival. A similar cry is emanating from Oxford County, where entrepreneur Seth Carey is politicking to construct a resort casino.

In his resignation letter, Peters echoed many of our concerns. He worries about the source of casino revenues – he called them “shameful profits” – and accuses these types of establishments as possibly overrunning Maine with the “few getting rich at the expense of the many.”

Based on the experience with Hollywood Slots in Bangor, Maine’s first and only legalized gambling parlor, Peters’ assessment is correct. The bulk of Hollywood Slots’ revenue comes from Mainers, with the profits benefiting an out-of-state corporation, Penn National, with a share going to the city and state.

In speaking his mind, Peters is speaking for the large segment of Mainers who oppose casino gaming as a tool of economic development. We stand with him, and believe the pie-in-the-sky financial promises from racinos and casinos are inflated and unequal to their potential harm to Maine and its people.

Yet Carey, in pushing for a resort casino, is also speaking for a segment of Mainers. He’s representing a different generation that’s proud of its heritage, but saddened at the economic and social changes of their hometowns. A Rumford native, Carey’s proposal is derived from a desire to give back to his community.

There’s nothing more laudable. And while we disagree with his conclusion of a resort casino that capitalizes on Western Maine’s tourism draw, we find little fault with Carey’s intentions. We want what he wants – economic security in Oxford County – but just through different, and more sensible and sustainable, means.

On Thursday, Gov. John Baldacci vetoed the Washington County racino, as expected, which sends the question of whether legalized gambling has a place in rural Maine before the voters. Other statewide referendums on gaming, like 2003’s divisive campaign regarding a proposed resort casino in Sanford, have been defeated.

The sentiments expressed by Peters and Carey crystallize the gambling debate in Maine then, and now. One side striving to preserve the present, the other desperate to seize the future.

Now, their words will ring throughout another referendum reaching all Mainers.