Strangely the local RJ has taken the lead in calling for an end to the online gaming persecution. Usually they aren't all that friendly to the gambling industry.
EDITORIAL: Internet gambling 'ban'
Americans are playing poker online? Oh, the humanity!
Of the myriad policy crises churning on the horizon -- entitlement insolvency, illegal immigration and runaway federal spending among them -- congressional Republicans chose to spend the little political capital they have left on an Internet gambling ban.
With brick-and-mortar casinos in nearly every state and card games breaking into network television, millions of moralists found it unbearable that Americans were wagering about $6 billion per year on the Web. That their neighbors might be playing poker or placing sports bets from the comfort of their desk chairs demanded federal intervention. "Ban it!" they cried. "Misguided citizens will lose their homes! Their children will starve! Families will be destroyed!"
Never mind the folly of legislating leisure. (That Prohibition thing was a rousing success, wasn't it? And certainly, no sports wagering takes place outside of Nevada.) Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., was determined to please his base with a new law before November's election, no matter how flawed or misguided it might be.
The cause was so preposterous it couldn't win passage as a stand-alone bill. Sen. Frist first tried to attach the Internet gambling ban to a defense appropriations bill. No luck. So he slipped it into port security legislation that passed the House and Senate early Saturday. A Bush administration official indicated the president plans to sign the bill into law.
And so no children will be forced into homelessness, their parents now prohibited from using personal checks, credit cards or electronic fund transfers to pay off Internet bets placed with online casinos and sports books. The costly, irresistible temptation of playing games of chance on personal computers has been eradicated. Right?
Wrong. Not only did Sen. Frist have to lard up the ports bill to win passage for his pet project, he included enough exemptions to rival the IRS tax code.
The bill permits Web-based betting on horse racing and for state lotteries. It also allows state-licensed casinos, once authorized within their jurisdiction, to construct Web sites with online poker and casino-style gaming. And these casinos would be allowed to provide links to other states and countries where gambling is legal.
So rather than deliver a "ban," Sen. Frist merely cut off the American market from online gambling sites based in Britain and the Caribbean. Like most heavy-handed regulations, this "ban" is really just thinly veiled protectionism.
"In order to get this bill passed, they (Republicans) sold their souls. They gave so many exceptions that it's now a wide-open area," attorney Tony Cabot, editor of the Internet Gambling Report and co-editor of the Gaming Law Review, told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
This Internet gambling "ban" is nothing close to a ban at all -- and that's a good thing. It's foolish to think the Internet gambling genie can be stuffed back into its bottle. Technology is driving the evolution of the gaming industry, so it makes perfect sense that regulated American companies should be allowed to conduct business with their millions of customers through the World Wide Web.
The bill could bring some short-term pain to MGM Mirage and Harrah's Entertainment, which use Internet poker sites to place some entrants in their own poker tournaments. But they'll figure out how to rebuild their qualification networks. The opportunities now available to Nevada gaming companies are staggering in their scope.
"The casino lobbyists in Washington, D.C., thought this was a pretty good deal. It's actually better than that," Mr. Cabot said. "It really opens up the field. It knocks out the offshore companies, and leaves the legal licensees open to take their positions."
It remains to be seen, however, whether the American conservatives who demanded this legislation will think it's a good deal. More likely, they'll realize sometime soon that they've been taken by a sucker bet.
EDITORIAL: Internet gambling 'ban'
Americans are playing poker online? Oh, the humanity!
Of the myriad policy crises churning on the horizon -- entitlement insolvency, illegal immigration and runaway federal spending among them -- congressional Republicans chose to spend the little political capital they have left on an Internet gambling ban.
With brick-and-mortar casinos in nearly every state and card games breaking into network television, millions of moralists found it unbearable that Americans were wagering about $6 billion per year on the Web. That their neighbors might be playing poker or placing sports bets from the comfort of their desk chairs demanded federal intervention. "Ban it!" they cried. "Misguided citizens will lose their homes! Their children will starve! Families will be destroyed!"
Never mind the folly of legislating leisure. (That Prohibition thing was a rousing success, wasn't it? And certainly, no sports wagering takes place outside of Nevada.) Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., was determined to please his base with a new law before November's election, no matter how flawed or misguided it might be.
The cause was so preposterous it couldn't win passage as a stand-alone bill. Sen. Frist first tried to attach the Internet gambling ban to a defense appropriations bill. No luck. So he slipped it into port security legislation that passed the House and Senate early Saturday. A Bush administration official indicated the president plans to sign the bill into law.
And so no children will be forced into homelessness, their parents now prohibited from using personal checks, credit cards or electronic fund transfers to pay off Internet bets placed with online casinos and sports books. The costly, irresistible temptation of playing games of chance on personal computers has been eradicated. Right?
Wrong. Not only did Sen. Frist have to lard up the ports bill to win passage for his pet project, he included enough exemptions to rival the IRS tax code.
The bill permits Web-based betting on horse racing and for state lotteries. It also allows state-licensed casinos, once authorized within their jurisdiction, to construct Web sites with online poker and casino-style gaming. And these casinos would be allowed to provide links to other states and countries where gambling is legal.
So rather than deliver a "ban," Sen. Frist merely cut off the American market from online gambling sites based in Britain and the Caribbean. Like most heavy-handed regulations, this "ban" is really just thinly veiled protectionism.
"In order to get this bill passed, they (Republicans) sold their souls. They gave so many exceptions that it's now a wide-open area," attorney Tony Cabot, editor of the Internet Gambling Report and co-editor of the Gaming Law Review, told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
This Internet gambling "ban" is nothing close to a ban at all -- and that's a good thing. It's foolish to think the Internet gambling genie can be stuffed back into its bottle. Technology is driving the evolution of the gaming industry, so it makes perfect sense that regulated American companies should be allowed to conduct business with their millions of customers through the World Wide Web.
The bill could bring some short-term pain to MGM Mirage and Harrah's Entertainment, which use Internet poker sites to place some entrants in their own poker tournaments. But they'll figure out how to rebuild their qualification networks. The opportunities now available to Nevada gaming companies are staggering in their scope.
"The casino lobbyists in Washington, D.C., thought this was a pretty good deal. It's actually better than that," Mr. Cabot said. "It really opens up the field. It knocks out the offshore companies, and leaves the legal licensees open to take their positions."
It remains to be seen, however, whether the American conservatives who demanded this legislation will think it's a good deal. More likely, they'll realize sometime soon that they've been taken by a sucker bet.
