Live from Yale University: Gambling's Connecticut Triangle -> Foxwoods, Senator Blumenthal & ESPN

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to 1% in Recovery Podcast
• 1:19 Connecticut's Gambling Landscape Explained
• 3:35 Senator Blumenthal's Push for Reform
• 6:02 ESPN's Role in Sports Betting
• 8:14 Final Thoughts on Work Ethic

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Here we are. Live in Connecticut, specifically New Haven, connecticut, on the campus of Yale University. Welcome again to another episode of the 1% in Recovery podcast, where we encourage you to laugh every day, to work hard, work hard in recovery, work hard in your relationships, work hard in your job, your business, school, just work. And to love unconditionally. Just put much more love out there and watch all this love and more return to you. Remember, recovery is beautiful. You cannot outthink an emotional issue and your EQ is your IQ. Join the Facebook group Recovery Freedom Circle. It is a community where we talk about the steps, where we talk about recovery, where we share what went right, what we struggled with. We also talk about dreams, goals, things, that, how we want, what we want to do with our lives and allow the community to share. And also, if you're struggling with something, let everyone chime in so we, we can recover together. Now let's jump in to this week's episode.

Speaker 1: 1:19

I'm in Connecticut, connecticut and gambling Now. Now, those two things have a lot in common. And let's just talk about the state of Connecticut. Here in the state of Connecticut, we're on both sides. Number one we are home to the largest resort casino Not square footage, because that can be argued with, especially in America, with casinos in Oklahoma we are talking about what they call resort style, where you have five star restaurants, where you have shows, where you have a lot of other activity besides just gambling. So it is considered the largest and it was built competition with Atlantic City, like a lot of things. A lot of people or a lot of states believe, if all you have to do is build a casino or introduce legislation for sports gambling or scratch-offs, that all this extra money is going to come in and don't realize how damaging it is to their own population and watching productivity die and actual overall household income take a dip because they are losing, wasting money into all types of gambling forms. So Connecticut has this largest resort casino, foxwoods, and I do have some footage. We'll add some footage on social media.

Speaker 1: 3:01

Now, like a lot of places in America, a lot of the land is American Indian land and the specific tribe is the Pequot Indians, the Mashaw-Tucket Pequot Indians, and they are the ones that utilize this casino. So it's in the middle of the state. It's not near any of the so-called larger cities like Hartford or New Haven or New London. It is kind of more towards the east and a lot wooded, beautiful area to drive into. But now I even hear that Foxwoods is having some type of financial difficulties. They used to be worked and worked with MGM, but of course MGM pulled out because they wanted to build their own casinos in Massachusetts.

Speaker 1: 3:54

It was like everyone they all want to get rich and think they're going to get rich Either the player thinking that they're going to win sports betting or win the lotto, or they're going to be this super smart poker player and in the end they end up losing because you end up just wasting too much time. So you have that aspect of it. On what I would consider the negative side, you just have this large casino which is trying to entice more and more players, not only from the state of Connecticut but also from anybody on the East Coast, new York, pretty much in the middle of New York and Boston, about a three-hour drive from either way. But then on the flip side you have one of the very few legislators that truly understand gambling addiction and wants to actually curtail gambling advertising and put more money in the gambling treatment centers. Senator Richard Blumenhall, a Democrat from the state of Connecticut, has always pushed he's co-sponsored bills with people in the House, republican Tom Coe from New York. So you do have people, at least here in Connecticut, that get it, that are actually pushing for some type of reform, because it all starts with the advertising. You have to curtail or eliminate gambling advertising, just like they did with cigarette advertising. It is what is causing this epidemic, this addiction that's on the rise and will continue to rise, unfortunately, and so we have, on the bright side in here in the state of Connecticut, a senator that's fighting hard and hopefully, if more people either, just sound the alarm bell of how destructive to me.

Speaker 1: 5:48

I always say the two most destructive things in gambling are the gambling advertising and the live sports betting. Those are the two things that really need to be shut down immediately. The live betting from a lot of different ways, especially from the player standpoint, just from the whether the gambler from chasing and desperation and actually athletes that people are banking on and then getting harassed online continuously. So live betting. So we have the other, and then on the third piece of Connecticut is the home in Bristol, connecticut, of ESPN, which everybody knows is the hub to get sports information and you can obviously have they have a drop-down menu about gambling, gaming and how to make more bets. Espn is obviously in working with Penn Entertainment with their own app, espn Bet. So you have these three different leaders Largest Resort Casino, the number one US senator pushing for reform, and then you have this almost vehicle for sports information and also for sports gambling and ESPN. So that makes Connecticut very unique compared to other states.

Speaker 1: 7:17

Now, hopefully, senator Blumenhall is able to convince more and more senators. Because is able to convince more and more senators? Because, unfortunately, the gambling lobby is much, much stronger than the people that are advocating for gambling reform, talking about gambling harm, and so they are constantly in the ear of politicians, senators, us representatives of politicians, senators, us representatives, governors about how gambling dollars is so beneficial to each state, which, in all they care about is enriching their own pockets and not realizing at some point they are going to cannibalize on each other and they're going to start having a little more competition. But you cannot let gambling go unfettered. It's almost like it is the Wild West in the way they're able to do things and people get so focused on alcohol or weed or opiates and not realizing that gambling is just coming in the side door and destroying too many lives and also just reducing product overall US productivity, and that's what we need. We need just people to work.

Speaker 1: 8:30

I always say work. You cannot have an easy life by not working hard. You can't just have win the lotto, win a parlay, win the World Series of poker and all of a sudden you're not going to actually have to work anymore. You're going to need to work because you got to work. It's like I said, you got to work on yourself, your relationships, on how to enjoy life. So with that we're going to conclude this episode of the 1% in Recovery podcast. Remember, life is beautiful, this life is wonderful.