Whether it is to other states or international jurisdictions, there almost always seems to be something unseemly about the process.

Don't get me wrong. I like the casino business, and I enjoy gambling, whether it is poker or dice or even, occasionally, video poker.

And I don't have a problem with widespread casino gambling in other states.

But I do have a problem with the way jurisdictions make their decisions to allow casinos, and the crazy rules and taxes they impose.

Awarding near monopolies, using foolish methods to determine which applicants get licenses and imposing ridiculously high tax rates are some of the biggest problems.

I'm going to pick three states as cases in point, all of which I have a connection to: Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Before I moved to Las Vegas in 1999 I lived in Sarasota, Fla., for 11 years.

When I lived in Florida there was no casino gambling in the state. There were small gambling ships that operated "cruises to nowhere" from many of the state's coastal cities, but they weren't much of an option for those who appreciated Las Vegas-style gambling.

If you wanted to gamble in a casino you had to fly to Las Vegas or the Bahamas, or drive to Biloxi, Miss.

A couple of Seminole tribal casinos operated low-stakes poker, high-stakes bingo and slot-type games that were considered to be linked bingo devices under federal Indian gaming law.

Those casinos were also sorry substitutes for the real thing.

A few years ago Florida voters allowed Broward County pari-mutuel facilities (horse and dog racing as well as jai alai) to have slot machines and to pay an exorbitant 50 percent tax rate on their winnings.

Las Vegas-based Boyd Gaming made a play for the market by buying Dania Jai-Alai, with plans to operate a 1,500-slot casino.

But then Gov. Charlie Crist made a deal with the Seminoles granting the tribes (and their Hard Rock-branded casinos) the right to operate table games, a compact reached to reduce a severe state budget crisis.

That made the prospect of competing without table games and with the sky-high tax rate against the tribes a less appealing proposition, and Boyd indefinitely postponed the project.

Of the states I'm surveying, Florida's path has been the most foolish. If ever there was a state that could compete with Las Vegas as a casino resort destination, Florida is it.

Instead of the short-term fix of the Seminole deal, Florida should have adopted a more free-market-oriented plan, allowing casinos in populous counties if the folks there approved them, and requiring resort amenities just as Nevada does (hotel rooms, entertainment and dining options, etc.).

With a moderate tax rate of, say, 15 percent to 20 percent, Florida's tax coffers would stand to make much more.

Pennsylvania is another state that made some foolish decisions, imposing a nutty 53 percent tax on its slot-only casinos while using some ridiculous criteria to decide which license applicants would be chosen.

My connection to the Keystone State: My parents were born in western Pennsylvania, and I spent a lot of time there visiting my grandparents in Beaver Falls and Kittanning.

One of the most foolish decisions the gaming regulators made was bypassing a superior Harrah's Entertainment and Forest City Enterprises bid to operate a Pittsburgh casino.

The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board wanted to make sure it included minority owners - an admirable goal - among those it chose to operate casinos. But instead of requiring a minority ownership stake in each bid or in certain bids, it selected an undercapitalized minority candidate, Don Barden, to develop and operate the Pittsburgh casino. Barden, who owns Fitzgeralds in Las Vegas as well as a couple of other casinos, recently was forced to surrender most of his stake in the license after he was unable to raise money needed to build.

Barden's pain has been a boon to another Las Vegas-based operator, Cannery Casino Resorts, which bought a harness track south of Pittsburgh and has operated a racino there without much in-state competition while Barden fiddled and then lost most of his Pittsburgh opportunity.

I was born and raised in Ohio and still have a lot of friends in the Buckeye State.

Ohio voters have repeatedly turned down casino gambling proposals, but are faced with another one this year.

And this may be the most foolish one yet.

Minnesota-based Lakes Gaming would build and operate a casino in Clinton County, a rural area southwest of Columbus and northeast of Cincinnati.

The casino would enjoy an in-state monopoly and would pay a tax on winnings of no more than 30 percent.

So far the casino proposal seems to be polling well, but I hope Ohioans come to their senses.

Yes, it is ridiculous for Ohio not to have casinos and let surrounding states' casinos get the tax windfall from Ohioans, who drive to Michigan, Indiana, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York to gamble.

But granting one casino to a single operator in the southeast corner of the state is ridiculous.

The lawmakers should craft a law allowing casinos in the state's largest counties, and should impose a reasonable tax rate.

I don't like limits on the number of casinos, as I believe the free market should decide, but if lawmakers want to limit the number they should decide which operators to license in an open, fair and sensible manner.