A tell-tale sign America's chips are down: States are increasingly turning to gambling to plug budget holes.

Proposals to allow or expand slots or casinos are percolating in at least 14 states, tempting legislators and governors at a time when many must decide between cutting services and raising taxes.

Gambling has hard-core detractors in every state, but when the budget-balancing alternatives lawmakers must consider include reducing education funding or lifting sales taxes, resistance is easier to overcome, political analysts said.

"Who wouldn't be interested if you're a politician who needs to fund programs?" said Bo Bernhard, director of research at the International Gaming Institute at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas _ a government-funded program.

While gambling has not been immune from the recession, it has held up relatively well compared with states' other revenue streams, such as income and sales taxes. This helps explain why past industry growth spurts have been preceded by economic downturns, experts said.

For example, Rhode Island opened the country's first racetrack casino in 1992, and four states soon followed. More recently, states faced with sagging revenues during the 2001 recession joined multistate lotteries such as Powerball and gave more leeway to Native American tribes seeking to expand their casinos.

Analysts say the latest round of gambling initiatives are noteworthy in volume and ambition _ a sign that the industry aims to capitalize on states' badly bruised economies.

"From the gambling industry's point of view, this is their big chance," said Earl Grinols, an economics professor at Baylor University who specializes in gambling.

Ohio's casino advocates, including lobbyists working for Penn National Gambling Inc., are pushing a variety of large-scale development projects. In Georgia, a developer working with Dover Downs Inc., wants to transform a blighted section of downtown Atlanta with a 29-story hotel that would attract tourists with more than 5,500 video lottery terminals.

The developer pitching the $450 million Atlanta project, Dan O'Leary, estimates $300 million a year in revenues would be funneled to the state, helping to pay for a popular lottery-funded scholarship that provides in-state college tuition for students with "B" averages.

Even Hawaii, which along with Utah is one of two states without a lottery or other form of legalized gambling, may consider a change. Aides to Gov. Linda Lingle, long an opponent of gambling, say she is open to discussing it as a way to close the state's growing budget gap.

Gambling proponents are quick to tout its bells and whistles: a $54 billion annual industry that employs more than 350,000 people, with most state gambling revenues coming from lotteries, racetracks and betting devices such as slot and video poker machines. Twelve states reap tax money from full-fledged casinos, and 23 others have casinos on Native American reservations, which generally do not pay taxes to states.

But while advocates argue that casinos will help attract jobs and revitalize downtrodden areas, religious groups and other critics fear gambling has a disproportionately negative impact on lower-income people, and does not provide long-term economic growth.

They point to research that shows casinos attract crime, foster gambling addiction problems and divert money from other businesses.

"We've got gambling in 48 states, and you'd think if it worked, you wouldn't have budget problems or education problems," said Tom Gray, a field director for StopPredatoryGambling.org.

Many of the gambling proposals seek to expand footholds in states that already allow limited gambling.

Kentucky's House speaker had proposed allowing video gambling terminals at the state's racetracks, and legislators in New Hampshire, New York and Texas are seeing proposals this year to allow similar gambling terminals at their tracks. Casino advocates plan to push for casino-style gambling in hurricane-ravaged Galveston, Texas, as well.

Lawmakers in other states are talking about reversing hard-fought crusades to tighten restrictions on gambling.

Nine years after South Carolina lawmakers outlawed video poker, state Sen. Robert Ford is fighting to make it legal again. Since July, lawmakers have cut roughly $1 billion from the state's budget to address revenue shortfalls.

"Gambling ain't no blight on society," Ford said.

In Ohio, where voters repeatedly have rejected ballot proposals to expand gambling, Gov. Ted Strickland said he is willing to listen to proposals to help close a $7 billion shortfall in the next two-year budget.

While analysts have long considered gambling to be almost recession-proof, the economic downturn has seen layoffs, declining revenues and falling stock prices hit casinos. State-run lotteries are faring better, though: More than half of the states with lotteries have reported rising sales over the past six months.

Amid the rush to embrace gambling because of short-term budget problems, some experts say a long-term perspective is needed.

After gambling is approved and revenues are allocated, it's not something lawmakers are likely to reconsider down the road _ no matter how much economic conditions may improve.

"Once you have legalized a form of gambling, the moral argument draws away and gambling is looked at as a cost-benefit analysis," said I. Nelson Rose, a gambling law professor at Whittier Law School in Orange County, Calif. "So many states have opened those doors now."

Haters/ By Maya Angelou

A hater is someone who is jealous and envious and spends all their
time trying to make you look small so they can look tall.
They are very negative people to say the least. Nothing is ever
good enough!

When you make your mark, you will always attract some haters...

That's why you have to be careful with whom you share your
blessings and your dreams, because some folk can't handle seeing
you blessed...

It's dangerous to be like somebody else... If God wanted you to be
like somebody else, He would have given you what He gave them! Right?

You never know what people have gone through to get what they
have...

The problem I have with haters is that they see my glory, but they
don't know my story...

If the grass looks greener on the other side of the fence, you
can rest assured that the water bill is higher there too!

We've all got some haters among us!

Some people envy you because you can:
a) Have a relationship with God
b) Light up a room when you walk in
c) Start your own business
d) Tell a man/woman to hit the curb
(if he/she isn't about the right thing)
e) Raise your children without both parents being
in the home

Haters can't stand to see you happy.
Haters will never want to see you succeed.
Most of our haters are people who are supposed to be
on our side.

How do you handle your undercover haters?
You can handle these haters by:

1. Knowing who you are & who your true friends are
*(VERY IMPORTANT!!)

2. Having a purpose to your life: Purpose does not
mean having a job. You can have a job and still be
unfulfilled.

A purpose is having a clear sense of what God has called you to be.
Your purpose is not defined by what others think about you.

3. By remembering what you have is by divine
prerogative and not human manipulation.

Fulfill your dreams! You only have one life to live...when its your
time to leave this earth, you want to be able to say, 'I've lived my
life and fulfilled my dreams, Now I'm ready to go HOME!

When God gives you favor, you can tell your haters, 'Don't look at
me...Look at who is in charge of me...'

Pass this to all of your family & friends who you know are
not hating on you including the person who sent it to you.

If you don't get it back, maybe you called somebody out!
Don't worry about it, it's not your problem, it's theirs.
Just pray for them, that their life can be as fulfilled as
yours! Watch out for Haters...BUT most of all don't become
a HATER!

'A woman's heart should be so hidden in Christ that a man
should have to seek Him first to find her.'

Ah! It's not tracking numbers this time but FOOD and EXERCISE.  I signed up the take the The Body Challege 2009 and ran across a great tool in the buddy that lives near you forum.  It's an online interactive tool of a food journal, calorie calulator, and fitness log.  The Daily Plate

Federal regulators on Thursday adopted sweeping new rules for the credit card industry that will shield consumers from increases in interest rates on existing account balances among other changes.

The rules, which take effect in July 2010, will allow credit card companies to raise interest rates only on new credit cards and future purchases or advances, rather than on current balances.

They were approved Thursday morning by the Office of Thrift Supervision, a Treasury Department division. The Federal Reserve and the National Credit Union Administration were expected to act on them later in the day. The changes mark the most sweeping clampdown on the credit card industry in decades and are aimed at protecting consumers from arbitrary hikes in interest rates or inadequate time provided to pay the bills.

John Reich, the thrift agency's director, said the rules "will enhance public confidence in financial institutions and establish a level playing field for institutions that want to do business fairly without suffering competitive disadvantages."

Most of the rules were first proposed in May and drew more than 65,000 public comments _ the highest number ever received by the Fed. They also restrict such lender practices as allocating all payments to balances with lower interest rates when a borrower has balances with different rates.

But the changes also could make it more difficult for millions of people with bad credit to get what is known as a subprime card carrying higher interest rates, some experts say.

In addition, consumers will have to be given 45 days notice before any changes are made to the terms of an account, including slapping on a higher penalty rate for missing payments or paying bills late. Under current rules, companies in most cases give 15 days notice before making certain changes to the terms of an account.

The changes could cost the banking industry more than $10 billion a year in interest payments, according to a study by the law firm Morrison & Foerster.

Roughly 16,000 companies in the U.S. issue credit cards. The biggest lenders include Discover Financial Services LLC, Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Capital One Financial Corp., American Express Co. and HSBC Holdings.

The head of the American Bankers Association called the changes "strong new regulations ... (that are) unprecedented in their scope and signal the beginning of a new market structure for credit cards."

"While the new rules are designed to increase protections for consumers, the Fed itself has recognized that they may result in increased costs for most card users and reduced credit availability, particularly for consumers with lower credit scores or limited credit history," ABA President and Chief Executive Edward Yingling said in a statement. "With the uncertainty facing our financial system, it's absolutely vital for policymakers to understand the full impact of these regulations on consumers and the economy before judging their success or further restricting the marketplace."

The new rules prohibit:

_Placing unfair time constraints on payments. A payment could not be deemed late unless the borrower is given a reasonable period of time, such as 21 days, to pay.

Placing too-high fees for exceeding the credit limit solely because of a hold placed on the account.

_Unfairly computing balances in a computing tactic known as double-cycle billing.

_Unfairly adding security deposits and fees for issuing credit or making it available.

_Making deceptive offers of credit.

Travis Plunkett, legislative director of the Consumer Federation of America, said customer frustrations run deep, as reflected in the comment letters submitted to the Fed.

Many of them "were spontaneous from consumers who feel they've been treated unfairly by their credit card companies and are literally begging the Fed for help," he said.

Many people acknowledged paying late, often mistakenly, and felt it was unreasonable for their card issuer to increase the interest rate on the balance, Plunkett said. Another common theme came from people who pay on time but are hit with a rate increase because the company needed to recoup losses from other cardholders, he added. 

Under the new rules, credit card lenders will be required to apply any payment above the minimum to the part of the balance with the highest interest rate.

The so-called subprime cards for people with low credit scores typically have no more than a $500 credit limit but require a large upfront fee.

The rules cap that fee at 50 percent of the credit limit and allow the cardholder to pay off the initial balance over a year, not immediately.

The Consumer Federation estimates that credit card debt held by U.S. consumers is about $850 billion, some four times what it was in 1990.

__

Associated Press writer Carson Walker in Sioux Falls, S.D., contributed to this report.

Undercover officers use Taser on pallbearer

Posted: Today at 9:53 a.m.
Updated: Today at 1:35 p.m.

Have you ever had a conversation with someone and when you started to say something, they jumped in - cut you off and answered you before you finished saying what you had to say? My question is - how can you answer me when you didn't hear what I had to say?

Some people need to learn listening skills.  If you are thinking about what you are going to say when someone is talking - you are not listening. 

http://video.rr.com/?v=qdF4rq0VDqTFHSU3ABYHiGrOV3Pjt6Rk

A South Carolina Roman Catholic priest has told his parishionersthat they should refrain from receiving Holy Communion if they votedfor Barack Obama because the Democratic president-elect supportsabortion, and supporting him "constitutes material cooperation withintrinsic evil."

The Rev. Jay Scott Newman said in a letterdistributed Sunday to parishioners at St. Mary's Catholic Church inGreenville that they are putting their souls at risk if they take HolyCommunion before doing penance for their vote.

"Our nation haschosen for its chief executive the most radical pro-abortion politicianever to serve in the United States Senate or to run for president,"Newman wrote, referring to Obama by his full name, including his middlename of Hussein.

"Voting for apro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life alternative existsconstitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil, and thoseCatholics who do so place themselves outside of the full communion ofChrist's Church and under the judgment of divine law. Persons in thiscondition should not receive Holy Communion until and unless they arereconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance, lest they eat and drinktheir own condemnation."

During the 2008 presidential campaign,many bishops spoke out on abortion more boldly than four years earlier,telling Catholic politicians and voters that the issue should be themost important consideration in setting policy and deciding whichcandidate to back. A few church leaders said parishioners risked theirimmortal soul by voting for candidates who support abortion rights.

Butbishops differ on whether Catholic lawmakers _ and voters _ shouldrefrain from receiving Communion if they diverge from church teachingon abortion. Each bishop sets policy in his own diocese. In theirannual fall meeting, the nation's Catholic bishops vowed Tuesday toforcefully confront the Obama administration over its support forabortion rights.

According to national exit polls, 54 percent ofCatholics chose Obama, who is Protestant. In South Carolina, whichMcCain carried, voters in Greenville County _ traditionally seen asamong the state's most conservative areas _ went 61 percent for theRepublican, and 37 percent for Obama.

"It was not an attempt tomake a partisan point," Newman said in a telephone interview Thursday."In fact, in this election, for the sake of argument, if the Republicancandidate had been pro-abortion, and the Democratic candidate had beenpro-life, everything that I wrote would have been exactly the same."

ConservativeCatholics criticized Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004for supporting abortion rights, with a few Catholic bishops sayingKerry should refrain from receiving Holy Communion because his viewswere contrary to church teachings.

Sister Mary Ann Walsh,spokeswoman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said she hadnot heard of other churches taking this position in reaction to Obama'swin. A Boston-based group that supports Catholic Democrats questionedthe move, saying it was too extreme.

"Father Newman is off base," said Steve Krueger, national directorof Catholic Democrats. "He is acting beyond the authority of a parishpriest to say what he did. ... Unfortunately, he is doing so in amanner that will be of great cost to those parishioners who did votefor Sens. Obama and Biden. There will be a spiritual cost to them forhis words."

A man who has attended St. Mary's for 18 years saidhe welcomed Newman's message and anticipated it would inspire furtherdiscussion at the church.

"I don't understand anyone who wouldcall themselves a Christian, let alone a Catholic, and could vote forsomeone who's a pro-abortion candidate," said Ted Kelly, 64, whovolunteers his time as lector for the church. "You're talking about themurder of innocent beings."

(CNN) -- Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. told followers the nightbefore he was killed that he had been "to the mountaintop" and seen thepromised land of racial equality. Last week's election of Barack Obamawas the equivalent of taking all African-Americans to that peak, saysDr. Alvin Poussaint.

Dr. Alvin Poussaint says Barack Obama's election will shape the perceptions of a generation of black children.

In his view, Obama's victory last week wasn't just a political triumph. It was a seismic event in the history of black America.

Poussaint has made it his life's work to study how African-Americans see themselves and how the larger society sees them.

From the days of the civil rights movement through the 1980s, when hewas a script consultant on "The Cosby Show," to today, he has been aleader in assessing how images of black people in the media shapeperceptions. Poussaint, who is 74, is professor of psychiatry at JudgeBaker Children's Center in Boston and at Harvard Medical School.

At a key point in the civil rights movement, Poussaint moved toMississippi and worked for the Medical Committee for Human Rights, inJackson, from 1965 to 1967, helping care for civil rights workers andaiding the desegregation of hospitals and other health careinstitutions.

Poussaint met Bill Cosby in the 1970s and hasworked with him on a variety of books and shows, most recentlyco-authoring a book with Cosby. He was interviewed by CNN on Wednesday.

   CNN: What do you think is the long-term impact of the election of Barack Obama as a symbol and a message to the black community in America?

Dr. Alvin Poussaint:We're going to have a generation of children -- if he's in there foreight years -- being born in 2009, looking at television and images,hearing before they can talk, absorbing it in their brain and beingwired to see the visual images of a black man being president of theUnited States and understanding very early that that's the highestposition in the United States.

So I think that's going to be very powerful in its visual imagery ...and they're going to see these images constantly on television,probably offsetting a lot of the negative imagery that they may see inshows and videos and sometimes in stereotypic comedy.

Theseimages will also make black parents proud. Although there are manybarriers to this, it might put back on the table the importance of thetwo-parent family. ... Maybe it will do something for couples and bringblack men and black women closer together.

The sense of pridemay carry over into family life, the same way it is being carried overnow into the life of the church already. At black churches this pastSunday, all of them were talking about Obama and being ambassadors forObama -- in other words, suggesting that now that he's president, thatblack people should take the high road.

The big problem with allof this is that if there's high expectations that somehow the socialills that the black community faces will suddenly evaporate, they'regoing to be disappointed -- because the economy, the economic crisis isa major issue that's going to affect the black community, making thingsworse. ... So there's going to be more unemployment, more poor people,more black homeless and more poverty. ...

Obama's also going tohave a positive effect on the white community. Way back in the 1960s, Iused to go to Atlanta when it was segregated and even after it starteddesegregating. When you went downtown to restaurants, you would walk inas a black person and they would kind of act like, "What are you doinghere?" You weren't welcome, you know, you just felt it.

AndMaynard Jackson became the first black mayor, and I felt a whole changein the tone of the city. You went places and when you walked in, peoplehad to consider: "Is this someone who knows the mayor, this blackperson?" And so I think they began to treat all black people betterbecause black people were now in power. ... This may help to eradicatestereotypes that they hold. ...

So this may have a spinoffeffect -- maybe more blacks will break through the glass ceiling incorporations, more blacks may, because of their newfound confidence,become more civically engaged, run for office.

CNN: What if he had lost, what would the impact have been then?

Poussaint:A lot of black people would have concluded that he lost because of hisrace, and the black people who had no faith in the system in the firstplace would have continued to feel that way, maybe even more strongly,and maybe even have more anger at the institutions that have authorityover them and that they see as white-controlled.

CNN:Obama is taking over at a time of tremendous international and nationalchallenges. Every president has setbacks. What would be the impact ofsetbacks on a political level?

Poussaint: Nearlyeverybody that you hear talk about it realizes that he's inheriting ahorrible situation. In fact one of the black leaders joked about how,as soon as things are falling apart in the country, that they hand itover to a black person -- "Here, you take it."

People are sayingthat he's just been dealt a terrible hand and is going to have to workvery hard to be successful and they're rooting for him and hoping.There's a mindset right now of "What can we do to help Obama?" And Idon't think it's just black people saying it, it's all the people whovoted for him, young people and women, the workers, the unions -- "Whatcan we do to help him be successful, and undo the mess that we're in?"

CNN: What do you make of the idea that "The Cosby Show" made America more ready to vote for a black man to be president?

Poussaint:I don't know, you can't study this stuff scientifically. The intentwhen the Cosby show came on ... was to present a black family that wasnot the old stereotypical family that white people laughed at in asitcom. And we wanted the show to have a universality, in terms of amother, a father, wonderful children, a lot of love being shown, anemphasis on education.

Today if you have 12 or 15 millionviewers of a show a week, it's number one. Well, Cosby was bringing inabout 60 million people a week. So this had a deep effect on whitechildren, Latino children, and even many adults, what their images ofblack people were.

So that's why Karl Rove reached into thehat the other day and said this was the beginning of the post-racialera, because it made white people embrace this black family like afamily of their own and fall in love with it.

It probably playedsome role at chipping away at those negative images, which made whitepeople ... more ready to embrace a lot of things, including Tiger Woodsand Oprah Winfrey and Denzel Washington and Will Smith. Certainly whenObama gets on the scene, people don't say, "What kind of black familyis that? We haven't seen any black family like that."

Becausethat's what they said about the Cosby show, ... that this doesn'trepresent a black family, this is fantasy. And it wasn't fantasy,because there were black families like that in 1984, and there are manymore black families like that in the middle class and upper-middleclass today.

CNN: You were a consultant on the Cosby show. How did that come about?

Poussaint:I knew him and his wife. When the show was coming on, he called me andsaid he wanted me to ... be a production consultant to keep this apositive show without stereotyping: "I want you to read and critiqueevery single script before it goes into production, anything you wantto say to make this family psychologically believable, living inreality." He wanted the story lines to have a plot that made sense. ...He told me to weed out what he called put-down humor, which he felt wastoo prevalent, particularly on a lot of black shows where you make funof people.

I was allowed to comment on anything, from theclothes to some of the people they were casting, to making sure therewas a wide range of colors on the show in terms of complexion, what'son the reading table, what cultural activities the kids are going to,what colleges they're applying to. ...

   CNN: You co-authored a book with Bill Cosby. What's the message of that book?

Poussaint:It's called, "Come on People: On the Road from Victims to Victors." Themessage is, don't be helpless and hopeless and see yourself as a victimand wallow in failing and think that's your lot in life. What you haveto do is take the high road and you have to work hard to try to achieveagainst the odds. ...

Most of the black people are where theyare today because we succeeded against the odds, we didn't allow theracism out there to totally squelch us. And we feel that spirit isbeing lost, particularly in low-income communities and sometimes amongmiddle-income people too. And we felt they had to adopt more of anattitude of being victors.

And victors are active, they try todo their best, they take education very seriously. And Obama's a goodexample -- if he took a victim's attitude and said, "Well, a black mancould never get elected president of the United States," which a lot ofus felt like, he wouldn't have run for the presidency. So he adoptedwhat we call a victor's attitude -- "I'm going to go for it, it may bea longshot, but it's possible."

CNN: What do you compare the Obama victory to in terms of significance?

   Poussaint: The civil rightsmovement's success in getting the civil rights bill of '64 and theVoting Rights Act of '65, that opened things mightily for the blackcommunities all over the country. Obviously getting those bills andthose accomplishments -- forget about The Cosby Show -- the votingrights bill played a significant role in Obama's victory.

CNN: Does Obama's victory as a historical moment equal those?

   Poussaint: It equals those but it has a more powerful visual symbolism. It's like people are going from [Martin Luther] King,who was moving us toward the mountaintop ... to Obama, people saying[we're] getting to the mountaintop and now being able to gaze down. Soit's the fruition of a movement beginning in slavery. ... We were inslavery for 250 years, and then Jim Crow segregation for another 100,and we've been struggling for freedom. Obama represents us winning ourfreedom -- like "free at last, free at last, free at last."

But it's not really true. We still have racial discrimination in thecountry, we're still going to have racial injustice that we have towork on and eradicate. But he's a great symbol that we're going to getthere. We're going to get there.