{"id":12509,"date":"2014-01-21T14:10:26","date_gmt":"2014-01-21T22:10:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=12509"},"modified":"2014-01-21T14:11:43","modified_gmt":"2014-01-21T22:11:43","slug":"iowa-gone-to-the-dogs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/iowa-gone-to-the-dogs\/","title":{"rendered":"Iowa: Gone to the dogs"},"content":{"rendered":"

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It looks like the handwriting is on the wall for dog racing in Iowa<\/strong>. It’s a deplorable sport that brings in negligible revenue: an ancient curiosity kept alive by casino revenue. Dog tracks can’t even get the support of city fathers in Council Bluffs<\/strong> or Dubuque<\/strong>. The two tracks grossed a measly $6 million last year<\/a>, numbers that would spell doom for any other sort of gaming facility.<\/p>\n

Can one really argue with the proposition that $14 in annual casino subsidies “could be better spent on charitable causes in the communities where the tracks exist, or to make improvements at the adjacent casinos<\/em>“? Certainly not in the face of vast public indifference to dog racing. State Sen. Pam Jochum<\/strong> (D) certainly has a point when she says, “If this were any other business in the private sector, it would have been shut down a long time ago<\/em>.” Where is the invisible hand of the free market?<\/p>\n

\"Greyhound\"<\/a>Jochum’s colleague, Jeff Danielson<\/strong> (D) “probably won\u2019t consider a bill to end dog racing unless the greyhound industry and the casino industry can reach an agreement that both sides are comfortable with<\/em>,” which is the perfect recipe for gridlock; irresolution brought upon senatorial spinelessness. The one certainty seems to be that it’s going to cost casinos a fair packet of money to be rid of greyhound racing.<\/p>\n

Casino owners enjoy bipartisan support for proposals that would allow them to drop dog racing without endangering their gambling licenses. Civic \"CAESARS-ENTERTAINMENT-LOGO\"<\/a>pressure from Council Bluffs and Dubuque might turn the tide, particularly coming from the latter, which owns the Mystique<\/strong> dog track. But the biggest charity supported by Mystique has been the track itself. Caesars Entertainment<\/strong> would no doubt be only too happy to have back the $10 million a year with which it props up the Council Bluffs track. As Iowa Greyhound Association<\/strong> attorney Jerry Crawford<\/strong> puts it, “Do you throw hundreds of Iowans out of work in order to pay down corporate debt in Las Vegas<\/strong>?”<\/p>\n

Of course, that depends on how many Iowans really have skin in the dog-racing game. From the look of … not too many.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It looks like the handwriting is on the wall for dog racing in Iowa. It’s a deplorable sport that brings in negligible revenue: an ancient curiosity kept alive by casino revenue. Dog tracks can’t even get the support of city … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[98,14,7,86,33],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12509"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12509"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12510,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12509\/revisions\/12510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}