"The secret card club gang bankrolling the disturbing anti-Indian casino ad blitz in Richmond has failed to acknowledge basic city psychology: It's OK for us to criticize us but it's not OK for outsiders to do it.

The eight-page mailer and 30-second TV spot from a group calling itself Stop The Mega Casino features some of Richmond's most unseemly neighborhoods.

The text paints a nightmare scenario, in which the opening of a Las Vegas-style Indian casino at Point Molate will render permanent the presence of drug dealers, loan sharks, poverty and crime.

Richmond residents are outraged. And with good reason. They know they have problems.

And many folks are rightfully concerned about how the city will balance the negative social impacts of a full-blown gambling institution against the economic benefits.

But the last thing Richmond residents want is an overblown depiction of the city as a cesspool from an outside group that won't disclose its members and stands nowhere close to moral ground.

Like casinos, card rooms are gambling establishments, only smaller and with less flashy ways to lose your money. They don't care about Richmond. They don't want the competition. It's pure hypocrisy, plain and simple."

Get the Story:
Lisa Vorderbrueggen: Card clubs' secret dealings (The Contra Costa Times 3/6)

Earlier Story:
Card clubs implore Richmond residents to oppose “mega casino” (KALW News 3/2)