Odds and Sods

The most interesting thing about Bill Bennett's $8m hobby is that an educated man spends hours and days of his life playing a game which does not require -- and does not reward -- skill, ability or intelligence. Rather, Bennett was playing a game he was guaranteed to lose.

Frank Scoblete, a widely published authority on casino games, said it is unlikely that Bennett could have avoided losing money over time while playing slot machines. These highly popular games are programmed to give the casino an advantage of 2 percent to 15 percent, depending on the machine, and a player's skill cannot narrow the odds.

This is a man whose example we are supposed to follow?