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Show Principles aside: Gorilla wins in silly test If there was one single topic that brought out the silliness in Utahns this past winter, it was the often frivolous debate on pari-mutuel horse betting. Cyclops by Bryan Gray proval for the legislative bill would only place the issue on the ballot for county-by-county voting. The momentum quickly collapsed, however, when the LDS Church kicked the idea in the teeth. Gambling Gambl-ing was not an issue that should be voted upon, said LDS leaders, and, if Sodom and Gomorrah were peeking peek-ing behind the State Capitol bushes, hale and hearty Bud Scruggs would root them out. And that's when the silliness began. Anti-Mormons had a field day, suggesting that LDS leaders should wear a muzzle and not attempt to sway their members. This brought equally intense letters from active church members, including many who trashed the U.S. Constitution by urging non-Mormons to pack up and leave. ("We settled this state and we should control it against the pro-gambling barbarians,' ' wrote one enthusiastic woman.) With this backdrop, the flip-flopping flip-flopping began. The idealistic pro-racing pro-racing lobby, Citizens To Put Utah First, tossed principles aside and began mumbling about a tax to fund a state commission. Amazingly, this idea caught on with normally anti-tax anti-tax conservative Republicans, and all of a sudden the demonstration of democracy was shunted aside in favor of governmental subsidies. In the meantime, some legislators began crying that there was little support for gambling. But in doing so, they ignored repeated public opinion surveys which showed that a public vote had extraordinary backing. When asked if Utahns should vote on a state-run lottery for instance, even 78 percent of active ac-tive Mormons supported the idea and the lottery itself gained approval ap-proval statewide by a strong 54 percent per-cent to 35 percent margin. Additionally, Addi-tionally, a survey by the OgdenWeber Chamber of Commerce Com-merce found that 77 percent of its members wanted to vote on pari-mutuel pari-mutuel and, if placed on the ballot, 70 percent of the members would vote for horsey wagers. When poll after poll showed the same support, why did Rep. David Adamsan early proponent of the gambling issue-stupidly say, "It appears the Utah population finds betting unacceptable. '? These comments from Adams and others only increased the furor. When Scruggs heavy-handedly engineered en-gineered a directive on the church positions of LDS legislators, the Mormon-bashing rose to a thundering thunder-ing roar and LDS defenders ig-norantly ig-norantly struck back that a wager on a pony was tainted with Mafia money. Lost in the entire debate were the real issues: Was the public mature and informed enough to make a quiet decision?.. .Didn't the LDS Church have the right to comment publicly on a perceived "moral issue?"...If gambling were approved approv-ed in an individual county, how many dollars would actually find their way into the state treasury? The final laugh came when Gov. Bangerter shot down the state subsidy, sub-sidy, leaving the horse race lobby to gather 65,000 signatures at assorted shopping malls, restaurants and barber shops. Despite all the blabber and bluster of the winter debate, very little was accomplished except to further slice a chasm among active LDS and non-LDS citizens. AH we have left is a petition which may or may not be successful,. .and comments com-ments from Ted Wilson that the LDS Church acted like a 600-lb. gorilla. Oh, and one other thing still remains. re-mains. Davis County Clipper reporter Mark Eddington has a letter from a Bountiful reader telling tell-ing him that he is a disgrace to the community and should pray before Satan firmly pounces on him. . Mark chuckled at that one. But considering the need for community unity and respect for individual beliefs, the letter is no laughing matter. In the horse race debate,' intolerance in-tolerance won by a nose. 1 - The controversy was a comic opera: Mormon-bashing, con-' con-' voluted arguments, flip-flopping legislators, childish threats, a tap-dancing tap-dancing horse race lobby, a stream of angry letters to the editor and eventually a Norm Bangerter funding fun-ding cut which has led to a petition drive. In Davis County the debate cut both ways: A Syracuse legislator was an active proponent of the measure, while Bountiful area legislators actively denounced the idea. Look back at the carnage: Proponents began with high hopes, citing approval from a majority of local officials and a near-majority (they said) of the Utah Legislature. The bill, said supporters, was not pro-gaming but purely pro-democracy, since ap- |