Can’t tell you which part of this story I find more puzzling.
First nominee: Massachusetts – my home for just about 50 years now – conducts a special lottery game, and, despite the can’t-lose nature of state lotteries, manages to lose $12 million.
Second nominee: Dimwitted State Treasurer Timothy Cahill, who’s responsible for overseeing the lottery, says of this outcome: “We’re happy with the way things turned out.”
One can only hope that doesn’t mean he’d like to see it happen again.
Consolation prize for those of us who pay taxes here is that a nurse in the western part of the state walks off with $20 million.
Which brings us to nominee No. 3: The state takes a $6 million tax bite out of that $20 million purse that was generated by its own ineptitude at running a lottery.
You decide. My head is spinning.
