Few people outside the film industry have heard the strange story of Peg Entwistle, the shy young girl who travelled from London to Hollywood to pursue a career as an actress. Despite her quiet beauty and her promising future as an actress, Peg met only rejection. Finding herself alone, hungry, and out of  work, Peg made her way to the towering sign which spelled out the words "Hollywood." She removed her shoes, then carefully placed one foot after the other on the wooden  beams, until she had climbed slowly to the top. Through the night, she shivered in the cold, her head pressed to her knees, looking up at the dark sky, then down at the city lights below. Towards morning,  the sky brightened, reminding her of the cares and troubles of a new day. Then she stepped over the edge, and threw herself to her death.

By now, many more people have heard the name "Aaron Walsh." Shortly after moving to Maine, Aaron gambled and lost at Hollywood Slots. In despair and shame, he drove to a secluded spot in Baxter State Park and shot himself. If this were the entire story, there would be nothing out of the ordinary. What makes the death of Aaron Walsh so troubling is that Aaron was a father with young children and a beautiful wife; and he was also a decorated soldier whose gambling addiction started in the Army. After losing $20,000 at slot machines operated by the Department of Defense, he was discharged from the Army, and moved to Maine to start a new life. Only one thing stood in the way of a better future  and that was Hollywood Slots.

The business of Hollywood, after all, is illusion. Perhaps the greatest illusion is one that has gone unnoticed, the fact that there were two referendum questions on the ballot in 2003. One referendum question was for a casino, and the other for a  rasino, whose sole purpose -- we were told -- was to help the harness racing industry. Having two questions on the ballot was a cynical manipulation of the referendum process,  a subtle deception   which ensured the  desired result would be achieved.

As much as the Christian Civic League of Maine has warned of the inevitable consequences of casino gambling -- embezzlement, broken homes, and suicide -- the people of Maine were seduced once again into considering only the economic argument. The ethical objections against the rasino were ignored. As a result, the bargain struck with the gambling industry included the death of a young hero.
 
Given time, truth will invariably gain the upper hand over deception. In this case, the plain truth about the gambling industry was made clear to all by the death of Aaron Walsh. The circumstances of his suicide were so troubling that Representative Lincoln Davis of Tennessee has introduced a bill into Congress to stop the use of slot machines in the Armed Forces. The bill is called "The Warrant Officer Aaron Walsh Stop Department of Defense-sponsored Gambling." All this resulted from the death of a young father who gambled and lost at Hollywood Slots.

The public cannot turn a blind eye to the death of Aaron Walsh.   Those who promoted the casino, those who voted for it, and above all, those who continue to profit from it, share in the blame for his death. If slots are to be banned from the Armed Forces, what justification can be given for their presence in Maine, where they damage lives on an even greater scale? What justification can there be for a gambling industry which preys on the public at large? I must emphasize once again that the gambling industry is predatory. Like predators, the men who run the casinos hunt down their prey  by using concealment, deception, and a knowledge of the psychology of their victims. They baffle the herd, isolate the weakest members, and then devour them.

In the case of Aaron Walsh, they obtained a petty sum of cash by depriving a young mother of her husband, a family of its father, and a nation of a good soldier. In former times, such money would have been called blood money, and rightly so.

You and I, working together, must stop them from doing this again. To this end, I am proposing a bill to outlaw slots entirely within the State of Maine, and I hope that you will join me in this effort.