Hee hee, ha ha, the New York state lottery has a new series of television ads coming out that pokes fun at the idle rich. Oh ho! Lottery advertising executives should be locked in jail for fraud.

The New York Times reports that the ad wizards at McCann, ever attuned to the pulse of the American public, has conceived the lottery’s new campaign to take advantage of the public’s resentment of the wealthy, who are just sitting around wasting their money. Grrr!

One TV commercial shows a man indulging in “pinot therapy” by soaking in a bathtub full of pinot noir. He gets annoyed at his butler for allowing a speck of cork to get in the tub.

“A New York gentleman spends $28,000 a week on wine — to sit in,” the voice-over says. “You’d make a way better rich person. Lotto: Making more New Yorkers rich than any other game.”

In fact, virtually any professional game—baseball, football, basketball, etc.—has likely made more New Yorkers rich than the Lotto. There are quite a few pro sports teams here.

The New York lottery, on the other hand, netted more than $9 billion in revenue by selling dreams to poor people in exchange for games of chance that offer a one in 45 million chance of a jackpot. The lottery’s slogan (also dreamed up by ad wizards) is “Hey, you never know.”

More honestly, it should be: “Hey, you’ve just spent money you can’t afford on an unstated tax on the poor and uneducated. Please continue making state politicians’ lives easier by believing the misleading fantasy we are selling you by preying on your desperation. This is easier than us taxing the rich to pay for improvements in the social safety net that you, ironically, very much need.” But that one doesn’t fit on the posters so good.

You will not win the lottery. You have much better chances of profiting by investing in private prisons to hold lottery advertising executives after the revolution.

[Photo: Flickr]