The big myth about gambling in Oklahoma is that it enhances “economic development.”

Any gains for local economies are heavily offset by the personal tragedies created by the Oklahoma Lottery, the states 135-plus casinos and gambling on the Internet.

The proliferation of gambling wrecks marriages and destroys careers. It costs hard-working people their savings, their vehicles and their homes. It takes a terrible toll on some families – particularly the poor who inhabit casinos day and night.

The house always wins. Players always lose. This forces some to turn to crime and others to despair.

You don’t see these stories or hear about them or read about them in the daily newspaper because the lottery and the casinos spend millions of dollars in advertising at radio stations, TV stations and newspapers. Only a small handful of media outlets (including KCFO, KXOJ and the Tulsa Beacon) refuse to accept gambling ads.

The gambling ads keep away any widespread investigative stories because the liberal media doesn’t want to “kill the goose that laid the golden egg.”

Casinos claim to employ 75,000 people statewide and have an annual impact of $4.3 billion in wages. But most of those jobs don’t have high pay and gambling doesn’t create anything except debt for their patrons.

Politicians like U.S. Rep. Tom Cole, R-Oklahoma, and U.S. Rep. Kendra Horn, D-Oklahoma, love to cozy up to the casino operators.

This is too much. Government and the media are in cahoots with gambling operations and they are siphoning off productivity and net worth from unsuspecting Oklahomans.

This is a public shame, not economic prosperity.