PATRICK KENNEDY HAS SPENT DECADES FIGHTING for a more compassionate policy response to addiction. A former member of Congress (the son of Sen. Ted Kennedy and nephew of JFK), Kennedy has been open about his lifelong struggles with drug and alcohol addiction, including in his 2015 memoir, A Common Struggle. Since leaving office, he has dedicated himself to advocacy.
So, I was deeply honored when Rep. Kennedy asked me to join him in Washington, D.C., to discuss my book Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling. Not only do gambling addictions tend to coincide with other substance abuse, but the explosion of sports betting across the U.S.—fueled by industry tactics that some call predatory—could produce a public-health crisis in its own right.
We’ll be speaking at 3 p.m. tomorrow on Capitol Hill at the Foundation for Drug Policy Solutions. If you live in the area, you can still RSVP by emailing Jordan Davidson at the address on this flyer:
The event is co-sponsored by a nonprofit that Rep. Kennedy co-founded called Smart Approaches to Marijuana, which will be live-streaming the event on its YouTube, Facebook, and X pages. (C-SPAN’s “BookTV” will also be there to televise the talk on a later date.)
I’m so grateful to Rep. Kennedy and everyone else involved for what is sure to be a terrific conversation. Hope you can tune in!
THE RESPONSE TO THE BOOK CONTINUES to be great, including being featured on NPR’s “Book of the Day” this past week and earning a flattering review from The Wall Street Journal.
I arrived in D.C. yesterday and visited Georgetown to discuss my book with Nate Seidenstein, sports editor of the campus newspaper The Hoya. I cherished every minute working there. Before the interview, I visited the campus bookstore and was so happy to see Everybody Loses on sale at my alma mater, I took this derpy selfie:
I graduated from Georgetown in 2014, and when I was there, I don’t remember anyone betting on sports. I’m not surprised to hear that nowadays, undergrads are betting all the time. I devoted a section of the book to the heartbreaking story of Rob Minnick, who went to Georgetown a few years. He, too, had dreamed of going to college on the Hilltop, but his experience there was ruined as he grew addicted to gambling. (Thankfully, Rob is in recovery and doing impressive advocacy work now.)
I recently spoke with Alison Stewart of WNYC, and a man called in to say his son started betting on sports at 17 and has lost $200,000 in the years since. The caller said he and his wife can’t get through to their son that he needs help, and as a result they’re estranged. Just devastating.
Obviously, millions of Americans bet on sports without it becoming a problem, but these stories are less and less rare. It’s why I’m so looking forward to discussing the health consequences of the betting boom with Rep. Kennedy.
Thank you to everyone who has read the book. (I’m sorry to belabor this point, but if you purchased it through an online retailer, please remember to rate and review!)
Wynnie is taking care of Sally and Louis while I’m gone, and I’m sure she’ll be watching the live stream tomorrow.
P.S. For years, my Mom and I have gotten a kick out of the the extreme disproportions often found in portraits of children. Apropos of Wynnie, here is a painting I saw today at the National Gallery featuring either the smallest cat ever or the largest girl:
Thank you so much for writing this book. Just finished reading it, and it's a remarkable work that will stand over time as one of the first to make this case so clearly. Public opinion is clearly changing, and the entire sports gambling/prediction markets bubble is going to burst--the sooner the better.