Gambling and Smoking:
The Connection: Acalculia,
A Brain Disorder

Have you ever been to a gambling casino? Noticed the extreme amount of smoke, smoking, numbers of smokers? That's the typical profile of a gambler: a smoker.

Be assured, those pushing for gambling, the gambling pushers, predators, have noticed! and take advantage. Predators target their prey. See, for example,
  • J. Patrick Coolican, "Why Big Gaming helped snuff out voter-approved smoking ban" (Las Vegas Sun, 15 June 2011)
  • Prof. Chris A. Pritsos, Ph.D., "The Percentage of Gamblers Who Smoke: A Study of Nevada Casinos and other Gaming Venues" (2006).

    Activists before us have long warned of this connection. This site gives links to pertinent other sites, including on smoker brain damage, especially acalculia, and an overview of the background on the smoking-gambling connection.

  • The pro-gambling side knows this, you should too. They take advantage; you want to help.

    Some of the facts came out when a suffering Nevada casino worker, dying of lung cancer, from gamblers' smoking, filed for worker compensation! The case is Palmer v Del Webb's High Sierra, 108 Nevada 673; 838 P2d 435; 8.1 TPLR 2.174 (1992). That is a worker compensation case; the nonsmoker gambling establishment employee acquired lung cancer from the disproportionate number of smokers gambling—gambling pursuant to their acalculia.

    See also background on the lawsuit, Vincent and Lynn Rennich v Aztar Corporation aka Atlantic City's Tropicana Casino and Resort (11 July 2006). "Despite known risks of secondhand smoke, the complaint charges that 'defendant Aztar purposefully endangers the health of casino workers because Aztar has decided it is more important to accommodate customers who want to smoke while gambling than to ensure the health and welfare of those who are lawfully on its premises providing services such as those Mr. Rennich performs for his employer Adamar.'"

    Note also the death of Cheryl Rose 20 April 2010 from casino second hand smoke, and background cited by Liz Benston, "Ill with terminal lung cancer, ex-slot manager presses for ban" (Las Vegas Sun, 14 February 2010).

    See also the case of Kam Wong v Claridge Casino Hotel (February 2008) (nonsmoker exposed to TTS was awarded approximately $150000 for partial disability and lost wages, and additional amounts for future medical care).

    Note also that "there is a direct correlation between exposure to secondhand smoke in the workplace and damage to the employees' DNA," says "Nev. Study Links Casino Smoke, DNA Damage" (15 May 2006). "The more they were exposed to environmental tobacco smoke, the more the DNA damage, and that's going to lead to a higher risk of heart disease and cancer down the road," said researcher Chris A. Pritsos of University of Nevada. And: "despite equivalent ETS exposure, significantly greater DNA-damage occurred in men than women," he said.

    See also the earlier summary report by Pritsos, et al., in Toxicology Letters, "Differences in DNA-damage in non-smoking men and women exposed to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS)," Vol 158, Issue # 1 (28 July 2005)10-9, and "Study could snuff casino smoke," by Lenita Powers, Reno Gazette-Journal (15 May 2006). See also "WORKPLACE RISKS: Study: Smoke imperils casino staffs: Report shows secondhand smoke can result in DNA damage" (Las Vegas Review Journal, 16 May 2006).

    See also the federal court case involving casino employees at Wynn Resorts, Ltd. d/b/a Wynn Las Vegas (Nevada Federal Court, October 2010) in their case saying that "the casino failed to reasonably safeguard its workers from dangerous conditions caused by secondhand cigarette smoke. . . 'Worker safety is critical and well-recognized under the law. This is a tremendous decision for not only Wynn's employees, but also for workers at other casinos who for years have been unreasonably subjected to secondhand smoke,' said Jay Edelson, whose law firm, Edelson McGuire LLC is pursuing the case."

    See also background on Nevada corruption by Franklin D. Vipperman. Consider the gambling-organized crime-tobacco connection.

    Acalculia is a mental disorder involving impaired ability to do arithmetic. The odds are against them, both in gambling and life. Yet smokers cannot visualize this.

    This mental disorder is taken advantage of by gambling establishments encouraging smoking as a matter of business practice—in essence, they are discriminating against the mentally handicapped as per pertinent medical analyses).

    Activists before us have long warned of this connection. This site gives background.

    Then it develops the solution aspect, by saying, there is a state, Michigan, where our activist predecessors got a law banning cigarette manufacturing, a law still on the books, but unenforced. This site asks for your help to fight gambling, help get the law enforced, by a letter writing campaign to the governor, attorney general, and state police, to get the law enforced.

    Here are quotations from some of our activist predecessors:

    Activists fighting gambling in court goes back over a century; here is an early case, Phalen v Virginia, 49 US (8 How) 163, 168; 12 L Ed 1040 (1850) (applying police power principles against gambling).

    A U.S. anti-slavery activist, Rev. William Goodell, writing in 1852 linked gambling, the conquest of Mexico, and "pillage, desolation, violence, vice, crime, demoralization, and death."

    Gambling establishments know the smoking-gambling link, complain when smoking is banned. Note an example of Delaware smoking ban, reducing gambling 25%!—"Will Smoking Bans Burn Up Dollars for Racing?," by Tom LaMarra (15 March 2003).

    Compulsive gambling is an example of smokers' disproportionate psychopathology.

    Gambling establishments also know

  • "Smokers contribute a disproportionately large amount of revenue from the use of electronic gambling machines (EGMs)"

  • "the ritual links between smoking and gambling [as] 'smoking is a powerful re-inforcement for the trance-inducing rituals associated with gambling' and that 'smoking helps the individual to dissociate and lower inhibitions associated with gambling'."

  • "players were likely to want to respond to smoking cues while playing the EGMs: 'winning is associated with smoking a cigarette and having a drink' or to relax, and reduce anxiety."

  • That "smoking bans [link to] a 10.2% decline in gambling revenue"

  • "Smoking is a powerful re-inforcement for the trance-inducing rituals associated with gambling."

    Reference Todd Harper, "Smoking and gambling: a trance inducing ritual," 12 Tobacco Control 231-233 (2003).


    Pushers, predators, know the tobacco-alcoholism connection (90%), i.e., that smoking leads to drinking, and that when drinking, more gambling results. The term is "comorbid conditions."
    Pushers, predators, know that these people with the "comorbid conditions" can be manipulated by, e.g., video slot machine terminals. These produce addicted gamblers at a faster rate and produce more revenue than table games.
    Pushers, predators, know tobacco causes brain damage, and its role in lowered 'inhibitions' and 'relaxing.'

  •           What this site is asking is your help in

    Please help us prevent gambling, by eliminating cigarettes, due to their role in causing acalculia, the smoking-leading to gambling connection.

    Casino profit margins are in the range of 45 percent to 50 percent. And in Michigan, the average take, according to the Michigan Gaming Control Board, is $68! Detroit has one of the highest profit margins for the casinos. Meaning, they are taking more from their handicapper victims, acalculic smokers. Some people steal from babies, others from the blind, these people, from the mentally handicapped. Nice people, them!!

    An example of a famous smoker-gambler is William Bennett, Ph.D., former U.S. Secretary of Education and Drug Czar. He smoked for 20 years, and in 2002 revealed his struggle against his gambling addiction.

             To fight this problem, here are four sample letters. Sample "A" is to Governor Rick Snyder asking him to have the State Police enforce the law. Sample "B" is to Attorney General William Schuette asking him to take "cease and desist" action to enforce the law. Each has the authority to help. As both the Governor and Attorney General are lawyers, the letters are written in "legalese." Sample letter "C" is to the State Police Director asking for the law to be enforced. Sample letter "D" is different, and is for you to send where the government still ignores the cigarette-abortion link. It is to be sent, for example, to the President, Congress, other Governors, and state legislators.

    * * * Sample Letter A * * *

    Honorable Rick Snyder
    Governor, State of Michigan
    P. O. Box 30013
    Lansing MI 48909-7513

    Dear Governor Snyder:

             This is a request that you assign the Michigan State Police to enforce the cigarette control law, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216.

    MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, bans unsafe cigarettes. It forbids "any person within the state" from action that "manufactures, sells or gives to anyone, any cigarette containing any ingredient deleterious to health or foreign to tobacco . . . ." Please, as an abortion prevention measure, assign the Michigan State Police to enforce it, and aid county sheriffs and local police departments to do likewise.

             All cigarettes are deleterious, their label admits they are, and most if not all are adulterated with additives. MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, puts personal responsibility on those with most knowledge of the contraband substance (manufacturers and sellers), not on unwary consumers, often children.

             State Police enforcement action is a normal action that they do in other state-wide law violation situations. There are precedents as well. Austin v State, 101 Tenn 563; 48 SW 305; 70 Am St Rep 703 (1898) aff'd 179 US 343 (1898); Shimp v N J Bell Tele Co, 145 N J Super 516; 368 A2d 408 (1976); Commonwealth v Hughes, 468 Pa 502; 364 A2d 306 (1976); and Smith v Western Elec Co, 643 SW2d 10, 13 (Mo App, 1982).

             As a matter of preventing abortion, the Michigan safe cigarettes law needs to be enforced. Please help. The law against this deleterious and adulterated product needs to be enforced. Please assign the State Police to protect acalculic smokers, children, and nonsmokers, by enforcing the safe cigarettes act, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216. Please have them halt the rampant violations, and interdict deleterious and adulterated cigarettes.

    Respectfully,

    * * * Sample Letter B * * *

    Honorable William Schuette
    Attorney General, State of Michigan
    P. O. Box 30213
    Lansing MI 48909

    Dear Attorney Schuette:

             This is a request that you take "cease and desist" action to stop violations of the safe cigarettes law, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216.

              The safe cigarettes act, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, bans unsafe cigarettes. It forbids "any person within the state" from action that "manufactures, sells or gives to anyone, any cigarette containing any ingredient deleterious to health or foreign to tobacco . . . ." Please take "cease and desist" action to stop the rampant violations of the law. "Cease and desist" action is an action you take in other state-wide law violation cases.

             All cigarettes are deleterious, their label admits they are, and most if not all are adulterated with additives. MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, puts personal responsibility on those with most knowledge of the contraband substance (manufacturers and sellers), not on unwary consumers, often children.

             "Cease and desist" action is a normal action that you do in other state-wide law violation situations. There are precedents, for example, Austin v State, 101 Tenn 563; 48 SW 305; 70 Am St Rep 703 (1898) aff'd 179 US 343 (1898); Shimp v N J Bell Tele Co, 145 N J Super 516; 368 A2d 408 (1976); Commonwealth v Hughes, 468 Pa 502; 364 A2d 306 (1976); and Smith v Western Elec Co, 643 SW2d 10, 13 (Mo App, 1982).

             As a matter of preventing abortion, the Michigan safe cigarettes law needs to be enforced. Please help. The law against this deleterious and adulterated product needs to be enforced. Please take "cease and desist" action to protect acalculic smokers, children, and nonsmokers, by enforcing the safe cigarettes act, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216. Please take "cease and desist" action to halt the rampant violations.

    Respectfully,

    * * * Sample Letter C * * *

    Col. Kristie Etue, Director
    Department of State Police
    714 South Harrison Road
    East Lansing MI 48823

    Dear Col. Etue:

    This is a request that you assign officers to enforce the safe cigarettes law, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216.

               The safe cigarettes act, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, bans unsafe cigarettes. It forbids "any person within the state" from action that "manufactures, sells or gives to anyone, any cigarette containing any ingredient deleterious to health or foreign to tobacco . . . ." Please work with the Governor, Attorney General, and/or prosecutors; assign officers to enforce the law; and aid county sheriffs and local police departments to do likewise.

             All cigarettes are deleterious, their label admits they are, and most if not all are adulterated with additives. MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, puts personal responsibility on those with most knowledge of the contraband substance (manufacturers and sellers), not on unwary consumers, often children.

             State Police enforcement action is a normal action that officers do in other state-wide law violation situations. There are precedents as well. Austin v State, 101 Tenn 563; 48 SW 305; 70 Am St Rep 703 (1898) aff'd 179 US 343 (1898); Shimp v N J Bell Tele Co, 145 N J Super 516; 368 A2d 408 (1976); Commonwealth v Hughes, 468 Pa 502; 364 A2d 306 (1976); and Smith v Western Elec Co, 643 SW2d 10, 13 (Mo App, 1982).

             The Michigan safe cigarettes law needs to be enforced. Please help. The law against this deleterious and adulterated product needs to be enforced. Please assign officers to protect acalculic smokers, children, and nonsmokers, by enforcing the safe cigarettes act, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216. Please have them halt the rampant violations, and interdict deleterious and adulterated cigarettes.

    Respectfully,

    * * * Sample Letter D * * *

    President Barack ObamaU.S. Senator ____U.S. Representative __Governor ___ State Senator __State Representative __
    1600 Pennsylvania AvenueSenate Office BuildingHouse Office BuildingState CapitolState CapitolState Capitol
    Washington DC 20500Washington DC 20510Washington DC 20515City State ZipCity State ZipCity State Zip

    This is a request that you take action to get a law passed like Michigan already has It is law number MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216. It deals with cigarettes.

    The Michigan safe cigarettes act, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, bans unsafe cigarettes. Please get a copy of that law, which in essence forbids "any person within the state [from action that] manufactures, sells or gives to anyone, any cigarette containing any ingredient deleterious to health or foreign to tobacco . . . ."

    All cigarettes are deleterious, their label admits they are, and most if not all are adulterated with additives. MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, puts personal responsibility on those with most knowledge of the contraband substance (manufacturers and sellers), not on unwary consumers, often children. Michigan's well-written abortion prevention act deals with one of the risk factors in abortion, unsafe cigarettes, and bans them. We need the same law for the protection and benefit of everyone. Smokers should not be discriminated against by being the only people regularly sold a deleterious product. Other deleterious products are recalled and taken off the market.

    As a matter of preventing cigarette effects, everyone needs you to take action to get a safe cigarettes act passed. Please take action to copy the Michigan safe cigarettes law, MCL § 750.27, MSA § 28.216, so all of us can benefit from its wise prevention-oriented approach.

    Respectfully,

    * * * * *

    Please re-type, add recipient addresses where unlisted,
    add your name and return address, sign, and mail the above letters.
    The person you save may be yourself or your friend.
    If you wish, you can use different wording.

    * * * * *

    The tobacco lobby is powerful enough. Let's not get the gambling establishment against us too. They are subtle, we can be too. Note that the sample letters only ask for enforcement. No need to mention reasons. Or your connections. Or why you are writing. The law should be enforced. Period.

    Related Sites of Interest
    Smoke-free Casinos Petition
    By Stephanie Steinberg, Chair
    Smoke-Free Gaming of Colorado
    National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling
    North American Ass'n of State & Provincial Lotteries
    National Thoroughbred Racing Association
    A Sample Casino Manual
    Psychiatric Background
    "Colorado Casinos Go Smoke-Free" (31 Dec 2007)
    "Gambling study shows that sex really does sell:
    Research concludes that erotic stimuli can make men
    more prone to taking risks
    " (6 April 2008)
    "Dressing down: Web gambling’s hallmark: UNLV study finds online betting areas thick with bullying, foul-mouthed players, repelling some, enticing others" (Las Vegas Sun, 23 July 2008): "negative environment dominated by bullying, foul-mouthed players who prowl gambling chat rooms."
    21 Sep 2009 Report on Gambling
    Internet Gambling Ban Upheld in Washington State
    (29 September 2010)

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    Information In The Public Interest
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