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Sunday, Jun. 28, 2009

Red horsemen taking aim at anti-slot GOP senators

Lexington's Convention and Visitors Bureau stirred up a bit of controversy recently by choosing a blue depiction of seminal Thoroughbred stallion Lexington as the image representative of the Horse Capital of the World.

Bluegrass, blue horse. I get it, but it was way cutesy for me.

More important, though, it misses the reality mark by light years because Kentucky's Thoroughbred industry bleeds as red — as in Republican — as a raw steak.

Sure, there are exceptions. Former Gov. Brereton Jones and Tracy Farmer, a former Democratic Party state chairman, come to mind.

But the exceptions fill the roles of crazy uncles and aunts at Thoroughbred clan reunions. Most of the family are as proud of their R designation as they are of the colors the jockeys of their horses wear.

Until now.

Now, in the aftermath of a special General Assembly session in which racetrack slots legislation died at the hand of the Republican-controlled state Senate, this scarlet red industry feels betrayed by its own party. And it feels particularly betrayed by horse-country Republican senators who played Brutus to the industry's Caesar during the session.

At a Wednesday evening rally in Keeneland's sales pavilion, two of them got called out by name. A third got called out by district.

"Elections matter," Patrick Neely, executive director of the Kentucky Equine Education Project told the crowd of about 1,000. "Who we have representing us in Frankfort matters.

"We cannot forget that people like (Sen.) Alice Forgy Kerr, who represents so many horse farms and Keeneland, voted no. My own state senator, Ernie Harris, who represents Jefferson County — home of Churchill Downs — and Oldham County with so many horse farms, also voted no."

In case you're unfamiliar with Neely's political leanings, his résumé includes a stint as an aide to U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, the reigning godfather of Republican politics in Kentucky.

Later in the program, state Senate Minority Leader Ed Worley drew a roar from the crowd when he took a dig at Sen. Damon Thayer by asking, "Would the senator from Scott stand up if he's here?"

If Thayer, Kerr and Harris had dared to attend the rally, the clear message they would have heard was that they now have targets on the backs of their political careers. In their next election cycle, they can expect the horse industry to come after them and other Republican opponents of letting Kentucky tracks compete on an equal footing with racinos in other states.

And it won't necessarily involve a red industry backing blue political horses. While it could come to that later, I expect the industry's first option would be to use well-financed primary challengers as a means of making the Senate more horse-friendly.

Wednesday's rally also showed that, although the industry feels betrayed by its favored political party, it does not feel beaten. The crowd may have been mad, but it wasn't in mourning. Nor should it have been.

As a political issue, expanded gambling may not be ripe in the General Assembly. But it's a lot riper than it was just two weeks ago. Progress was made when it passed the House for the first time.

But getting it through the Senate will require meeting the challenge Gov. Steve Beshear laid down at the rally: "We've either got to change some of the senators' minds, or we've got to change some of the senators."

On Wednesday at least, the horse industry seemed committed to doing just that.