The state is the bookie

When the money keeps rolling in, you don’t ask how,” sings Che Guevara in Broadway’s “Evita.” A decidedly more capitalist spin on the lyric can now be heard hummed in New York’s Capitol, where legislators and a governor who’ve hiked taxes on the wealthy are also promising more than a half-billion dollars by getting the state’s suckers hooked on betting on games’ outcomes, point spreads and the like.

As part of the budget deal, mobile sports betting will soon be here, there and everywhere, and the nice way to put it is that New Yorkers won’t have to cross the river to Jersey, or go upstate to a casino sportsbook, in order to plunk down hundreds or thousands of dollars on any given Sunday, and plenty of Mondays through Saturdays to boot. Proving the modern age brings innovations in everything, including losing your paycheck, they will soon be able to risk it all with a few taps on a smartphone.

And because of the way Gov. Cuomo and lawmakers have structured the market, the state itself will have a vested interest in getting as many people to bet as much as possible. The state Gaming Commission will issue a request for proposals, awarding licenses based on who will “maximize sustainable, long-term revenue for the state.”

“We operate it, we get the resources,” said the proud bookie, Andrew Cuomo, Wednesday.

Meanwhile, as our columnist Errol Louis has written, there may be as many as 400,000 problem gamblers in New York, with poor neighborhoods — you know, the folks progressives claim to care the most about — home to the most. Believing ignorance to be bliss, the state hasn’t assessed its gambling addiction treatment programs since 2006.

If it makes that much sense for government to run this particular vice operation, one wonders why it doesn’t go ahead and take over sales of cigarettes, alcohol and marijuana to boot. It may be dirty, but there’s gold in them thar hills.