By MARY THOMAS WATTS, guest columnist

Not every fable has a happy ending. Like the one about the frog who wanted to cross the river so badly he hitched a ride on a crocodile’s back. The last thing that gullible frog heard was the croc’s deadly chomp.

The tale really couldn’t end any other way, of course, not with the crocodile’s nature being what it was. It also can’t be denied that the frog’s own poor judgment contributed in large part to his unhappy, irreversible end.

So, Ohio voters, what’s it going to be? Will we hop on the Lakes Entertainment crocodile, which has deviously masked the true nature and motives of the casino industry to get what it wants? Or will we step back and soberly consider the inevitable outcome of putting our precious future in the jaws of a predatory business?

The true nature of developers Rick Lertzman and Brad Pressman, from the Cleveland area, and Lyle Berman, of Lakes Entertainment, the Minnesota company that would own and run the proposed local casino, lies barely under the surface of their professed respect for our “Midwestern sensibilities.”

If they respect us so much, why didn’t they deliver on their promises of three separate public meetings (last fall, winter and spring) at which we might have asked questions and aired our concerns? And why, if they meant what they said about not coming here if we didn’t want them, did they dismiss a “casino, keep out” petition signed by more than 2,200 local citizens?

More recently, they refused to participate in a League of Women Voters-sponsored televised debate, at Wilmington College.

At least they’re consistent.

Journalist Christopher Hitchens recently said that when you reach the point of asking “What do they take us for?” about someone in the public arena, there’s not much left to salvage. Voters who understand what Issue 6 does for Lertzman, Pressman and Berman and to the State of Ohio should be shouting that question at the top of our lungs.

Not only is the “up to 30 percent” tax rate this casino would pay downright paltry compared to the 70 percent paid by casinos in Pennsylvania, but you could drive a hijacked Brink’s truck through the loophole in the amendment that will reduce the Lakes Entertainment casino’s tax rate to zero when a tribal casino comes to Ohio, and the Oklahoma Eastern Shawnee are poised to do exactly that. All they’re waiting for is passage of Issue 6, after which the Department of the Interior is expected to sign off on their application for land in Ohio.

Confronted by the Columbus Dispatch about the ramifications of this loophole, the developers said they “erred” and would “fix” it. That would have required withdrawing the issue from the ballot, because the language approved by the Ohio Ballot Board can’t be changed. Let’s be clear, this scheme — the ace up their sleeve they didn’t think we’d catch — to exempt themselves from paying any revenue taxes whatsoever is what we’re voting on, and it will become law if Issue 6 passes.

A partial list of those opposing Issue 6 includes Gov. Ted Strickland, Sen. George Voinovich, Congressman Mike Turner, Warren County Commissioners, the Ohio Republican Party, the Oho Chamber of Commerce, the Fraternal Order of Police, the Ohio Roundtable, the Ohio Council of Churches, evangelical pastors and congregations around the state, and numerous Ohio newspapers.

Special shout-outs go to the editorial staff of the Wilmington News Journal and to Our Clinton County, a committed group of religious, civic and business leaders who believe our best shot at an economic comeback is to be casino-free.

If you’re still on the fence, I urge you to heed the words of Frank Fahrenkoph, CEO of the American Gaming Association, who is on record (you can watch it on YouTube) saying that if a casino wanted to locate in his hometown, he’d work hard against it.

In other words, the industry knows know how undesirable casinos are, so they conspire to distract and tempt us with phantom tax revenue and salaries that are wildly out of line with the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers for casino jobs. It would be laughable, if 10,000 imperiled DHL employees weren’t being out and out lied to about what casino workers really make.

Ask yourself, what’s at stake for whom in this casino deal?

This is not about gambling money leaving Ohio at 65 miles-an-hour. Rather, in that 90 percent of a casino’s revenue comes from gamblers within an hour’s drive, Issue 6 is actually about your neighbors’ catastrophic gambling losses leaving Ohio at the speed of an electronic transfer to a Minnesota company that runs tribal casinos in Oklahoma, California, Michigan and Mississippi.

Contrary to the TV ads, this casino couldn’t make it on what Ohioans now lose in Indiana, Michigan and Pennsylvania. So, their first order of business would be cultivating new gamblers by the tens of thousands, many of whom would become gambling addicts, who are every casino’s number one revenue source.

The moral of the fable about the crocodile and the frog? Smart frogs know what riding on a crocodile will cost them.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Mary Thomas Watts lives, writes and votes in Wilmington.