[BrentCrude]

When I was younger before casino and online gambling became available everywhere I used to love making a trek a couple hundred miles a few times a year to all forms of racing from T-breds to Harness to greyhound.Great talent at a cheap price paying hardly anything to get in and take up the nice summer atmosphere.Even in the bush leagues the jockeys are pretty professional,the drivers are good and even slow greyhounds are fast.

So when casino gambling came along it put a whooping on racing attendance and handles.Now we have online horse betting from the islands where the horse people here don't receive any of the profit and these off shore race books can afford to give rebates back to bettors that the legal american TVG's can't.

So what is the answer to help people in the racing industy get a fair shake to compete against other forms of gambling?They give the tracks the rights to have slots and poker rooms.Claiming purses at bush league tracks go up 40% from the casino revenew alone.The people playing the slots are usually losers that just keep feeding the machines their SSI and social security checks.In other words,the federal government is subsidising the horse people.

I believe the only favors race tracks should get are that Indian casinos,bars etc.in the state can become off track teletheatres.

Then you have the jockey guild who used to be non radical turning into an activist union where they are hiring people like Jesse Jackson to be their leader.Wow,that's a good move!!!Geesh,wasn't Al Sharpton available.Jockeys take a beating and are tough as nails and don't complain but it sounds like their guild has fallen on the trappings of socialism.It sort of turned me off from racing when I heard all these stories.

[Seattle Slew]

I'd much rather throw my money away at the track/OTB any day of the week over a casino. I also used to drive a long ways to get to the OTB/greyhound park to bet on live racing before the OTBs expanded all over.

In my senior year in high school, when everyone else was out drinking on Friday nights, I'd pay $7.50 for a two-way bus ride to the greyhound park an hour away to just bet greyhounds for 3 hours. The bus was filled with old timers in their 60s and 70s and there I was 17 and 18 and the only person on the bus under 50. As part of the bus fare, we'd get a free program for the ride up and free entry to the track. The bus used to pull in the back and we'd walk in the back door.

This was a big help because no one was guarding the door, so no way I could get asked for an ID when I was 17.

Looking back on that, yes, a little sad, but it was great fun.