[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 91 (Wednesday, June 19, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Page S6544]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     HIDDEN HUMAN TOLL OF GAMBLING

 Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, in all the discussion about the 
problems of gambling in the United States, most of us in those 
discussions use statistics.
  What we frequently fail to understand are the human beings involved 
in the addiction.
  Ken Adelman, the former head of The Arms Control and Disarmament 
Agency and now a columnist who is nationally syndicated, recently had a 
column in the Washington Times that told about a cousin of his.
  It tells in simple, graphic terms why we need a commission to look at 
this problem.
  I don't know how many personal cases I have heard of since 
introducing the bill on the commission, but it is enough to encourage 
me to fight for its creation, and I hope my colleagues will have the 
good sense to pass the measure and create the commission.
  I ask that the Washington Times column be printed in the Record.
  The column follows:

               [From the Washington Times, June 13, 1996]

                     Hidden Human Toll of Gambling

                            (By Ken Adelman)

       Stopping for a fund-raiser in Las Vegas last weekend, Bill 
     Clinton solicited big gambling bucks, as has Bob Dole. Lost 
     in the policy debate over state-sponsored gambling--via 
     lotteries, casinos, horse races, whatever--is the personal 
     dimension.
       This hasn't been lost on our family, which has endured pain 
     from my first cousin, Alby, becoming a compulsive gambler. At 
     15 years old, I should have sensed Alby's problem when our 
     grandfather, Papa, took us on a trip abroad. The whole way 
     Alby wanted to bet on whose room would have a higher number 
     (Papa's or ours), whether our seats would be on the right or 
     left side of the airplane, on anything really. He was--and 
     presumably is, though I haven't seen him in years--an 
     engaging and brilliant fellow. We never suspected the years 
     of jail and a failed life gambling would bring.
       Between prison sentences, beginning at age 16 or so, Alby 
     would hit the track, poker tables, and sports events. No 
     state lotteries had yet been established, so we can't blame 
     them for our family woes. How much state-sponsored gambling, 
     now dubbed ``gaming,'' multiplies the number of Albys in 
     America should be a key focus of the national commission on 
     gambling, which Congress is now debating.
       ``The main ambitions I ever had were fantasies,'' Alby told 
     me in 1975, when I spent six months researching his life. He 
     poured his mathematical genius, personality and wit into 
     gambling. Alby won big at times--$10,000 in one day and 
     $7,700 in one race. But those triumphs were fleeting as all 
     winnings went back into the game. The amounts were 
     staggering, at least to me. Alby burned through more than $1 
     million before turning 30. He squandered it all, as well as 
     two marriages and a host of natural abilities.
       Alby became attracted and then addicted to horse-racing 
     while still in high school. ``When you're at the track or 
     when you're gambling, you're in a different world,'' he 
     mused. ``There's nothing else that matters until you walk 
     into reality again. It's a dream world.'' Gambling became his 
     trademark.
       ``When I won, I would have a lot of money in my pocket and 
     flash it around. It was an ego trip for me.'' And a macho 
     thing, since compulsive gambling is mostly a man's disease. 
     Unlike alcoholism or drug addiction, only 10 percent of 
     compulsive gamblers are women.
       But women become victims. One elderly landlady in New 
     Mexico housed Alby and a buddy when they were 16. After they 
     skipped out without paying rent, she wrote Alby's parents, 
     ``They were both good, likable kids.'' She missed them after 
     Alby ``left town like something from a cannon. He said he 
     needed to return home on account of a death of a sister.'' No 
     sister had died. Such began a life of lies.
       Though having now spent more than half his life behind 
     bars, Alby never considered himself a criminal. He trashed 
     common convicts, especially armed robbers: ``They're 
     stupidest people in the world. They go to jail for 10 years 
     for a hundred bucks when I can get $50,000 with a pen in hand 
     rather than a gun.''
       Like most compulsive gamblers, Alby abhors violence. None 
     of his crimes involved guns, knives or physical assaults. 
     They involved passing bad checks and schemes of every sort. 
     Though non-violent, they still hurt others, especially family 
     members. Alby's father bailed him out of jail and dangerous 
     situations for several years before giving up. His 
     grandfather lasted longer, but after Alby stole his prized 
     stamp collection and World War I medals, he too gave up.
       The burden falls too on friends and neighbors. Rummaging 
     through family correspondence, I came across scores of sad 
     stories. One came from the mother of a high school buddy who 
     ``loaned'' Alby his coin collection but never got it 
     back.``My son is a stranger to you but he is my only child 
     and the most important person in the world to me,'' she wrote 
     Alby's folks. ``The coins he's been saving since he was 
     little were his only concrete asset. They are now gone.
       Though sharing an addiction, compulsive gamblers differ 
     from drug and alcohol abusers. The gambling life is one of 
     involvement and stimuli. Drug and alcohol addicts lead a life 
     of withdrawal and passivity.
       While gambling is as old as humanity itself--archaeologists 
     have found a 4,000-year-old lamb bone used as dice--
     compulsive gambling is a relatively new affliction. Upward of 
     10 million compulsive gamblers in America--perhaps 10 times 
     the number of drug addicts--may be increasing in numbers now. 
     For state and local lotteries not only furnish the 
     opportunity, but encourage ``striking it rich'' without any 
     effort.
       Alby's tragedy may become epidemic since legalized gambling 
     has increased 2,800 percent over the past two decades. To 
     grasp this danger, imagine the furor if state and local 
     governments not only legalized drug sale and use but 
     themselves sold and advertised drugs to the general public.
       As Congress debates establishing a national commission on 
     the effects of gambling, everyone has focused on the 
     commission's subpoena powers. More critical would be a focus 
     on the human toll gambling takes, on tales of wasted lives, 
     like Alby's.

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