Gambling Industry's Purchase of State Governments

EDITORIAL: Gambling Industry Gets One of Their Own for Governor

West Virginia Governors in both parties have been friendly to the state's gambling industry, with its promises of quick, easy revenue for the state's coffers. Only in recent times has there been even the smallest of considerations for those who get hooked on this "pastime," like the 1-800 Gambler hotline established as part of Governor Bob Wise's infamous slot machine legalization bill.

But Governors Moore, Underwood, and Manchin also danced with the gambling lobbyists, so Wise was not alone. But none of that compares to the gambling industry getting one of their own into the Governor's Mansion. We half expect our new Acting Governor to set up a nice baccarat lounge in the Mansion, complete with a few of his old gray machines to entertain visiting dignitaries.

Earl Ray Tomblin, State Senator from Logan County, is now performing the duties of Governor, due to his being second in command as the President of the State Senate. Here we have yet another ambitious West Virginia politician, as evidenced by Tomblin taking the $150,000 Governor's salary and occupying the Governor's Mansion.

Another interim Governor would not have felt that to be necessary, would have simply gone about serving the people without fanfare and without the added cost of helping him to live like a king at our expense at the Mansion.

But that would have taken a less selfish interim Governor than Tomblin, so here we are.

Some say that, despite Tomblin's voracious ambition, he really wouldn't be all that bad. After all, he's run a fairly smooth show over at the State Senate, compared to the raucousness over at the House of Delegates.

But this assessment conveniently ignores that Tomblin has used his office for personal gain, such as the greyhound breeding contracts the state awarded to his mother's dog kennel (only in West Virginia) to the tune of a quarter of a million dollars.

But more distressing is Tomblin's ties to the gambling industry. You will recall that the so-called "gray machines" were slot machines used for "amusement only"and whose payouts were illegal. Then these slot machines were made legal and regulated through Governor Wise's slot machine legalization bill.

Shortly before the state started regulating the infamous gray machines, Tomblin got out of his own substantial gray machine business. Hey, he had made a mint off the gambling addicts of his own part of the state, so why not?

So our current situation is about like having bootlegger Joe Kennedy being the Massachussetts Governor back during the Temperance Era of the 1920s. Though never caught, everyone knew what Kennedy's business was built on.

Likewise, Tomblin's decision to engage in the promotion of gambling machines in a poor part of the state is a rather low-life business to be in, too. This is evidenced by what has occurred to the gentleman who bought Tomblin's business. Former Logan Delegate Joe C. Ferrell is now up for sentencing--again--on federal corruption charges.

If Acting Governor Tomblin was only going to serve out the remainder of Manchin's term, then head back to his State Senate duties, we could probably live with that as a state. How much damage could Tomblin do in two years?

Without a special election in 2011 to speak our mind about whom we want to be our Governor, we may end up with Tomblin for ten long years. If that occurs, look forward to even more gambling, less jobs, and more business as usual at the statehouse as Tomblin's friends pick over the last bits of what is left of West Virginia.

We can and must do better.