AMATEUR SPORTS: A BAD BET

Washington Post: Nine years ago, Congress banned legalized betting on almost all amateur athletics -- a step intended to remove a major corrupting influence from college sports programs and student athletes. But well-bankrolled gambling industry lobbyists saw to it that the lawmakers exempted Nevada, home of a hypocritical policy that allows betting on college sports except on Nevada teams. Over the years college presidents, athletic directors, coaches and NCAA leaders have led campaigns to close the Nevada loophole, which they see as helping to legitimize illegal gambling on amateur sports and contributing to scandals involving student athletes.
How great a role the Nevada betting plays in this corruption is open to question. Opponents contend that those who are concerned about the integrity of amateur sports should focus on illegal betting rather than on legal bets, which they say account for less than 1 percent of all sports betting. But any legalized betting on college sports reinforces an imbalance that has made athletics the dominant big-business preoccupation on too many campuses.
Bipartisan support: This year, legislative efforts to stop the wagering in Nevada again enjoy widespread bipartisan support in both houses. But again there are no guarantees of help from the leadership in allowing floor votes. A bill sponsored by Sen. John McCain cleared a key committee vote early this month, but the big test is ahead; last year, similar bills passed with solid margins in House and Senate committees, yet leaders kept them from coming to the floor. During the recent election cycle, the gambling industry contributed more than $10.7 million to candidates and parties, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Gambling is the fastest-growing industry in the country. While nothing will stop people from gambling, governments ought not to be sanctioning wagering on amateur sports.
FIVE HUNDRED AND COUNTING
Chicago Tribune: The cruelest images of the Palestinians' seven-month uprising are those of the slain children. The pattern of strike and counterstrike is so familiar now it's mind-numbing. The agony of children caught in the crossfire on both sides is even more unbearable.
Yet neither Israelis nor Palestinians seem capable of pulling back from their deadly minuet of violence and retaliation.
Last week, after 500 deaths, the youngest victim was killed. Iman Hijjo, a 4-month-old Palestinian girl, died inside her home in the Gaza Strip after Israeli tanks, responding to a mortar attack, fired on a refugee camp in the strip.
Then came the awful discovery Wednesday that two teen-age Israeli boys had been stoned, slashed, slain and mutilated in a West Bank gorge. The bodies of Koby Mandell, 13, formerly of Maryland, and Yossi Ishran, 14, were found in a cave not far from their homes in the Jewish settlement of Tekoa. Israel blamed the Palestinians.
Revenge: Amid righteous fury and calls for revenge on both sides, it is hard to find voices of reason showing a way out of this endless cycle. But the report released last week by an international fact-finding committee headed by former Sen. George Mitchell did just that. Israelis and Palestinians had reservations about the draft report, but both found parts of it they could endorse. Getting them to heed its objective advice won't be easy. But there is wisdom in it worth learning.
Most important, the report calls strongly for a freeze in Israeli settlement activity and a Palestinian crackdown on terrorism as a prelude to ceasing the violence and resuming peace talks.
Palestinians objected to the fact the committee failed to endorse the international observer force they wanted, but they chose to accept the report. If they were serious, Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat would start reining in extremists. He hasn't. Israel fired missiles Thursday at Arafat's security compound in Gaza in a tough response to a roadside bomb by Palestinians that killed two migrant Romanian laborers repairing an Israeli border fence.
For his part, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon objected strongly to the Mitchell report's call for a settlement freeze, arguing he will build no new settlements but will allow expansion of existing ones. Sharon should listen to the majority of Israelis, who support a settlement freeze.
So Arab and Israeli leaders go on arguing over who has suffered the latest grievance. Meanwhile, young, old, men, women, babies, teen-agers die. There's no argument about this: Everyone has blood on his hands.