Betting
The insurance industry has had, for decades, entire divisions dedicated to "betting" on the odds of horrible things happening to people, including terrorist attacks. Somehow, this doesn't seem to gross people out.
People who didn't understand how it worked were upset by how they think it worked, and got it squashed. It wouldn't be the first time.
The Democratic Party is betting its entire political future on something bad happening to America and Americans (failure overseas, crappy economy, etc.), and that doesn't seem to gross anyone out either.