[LINK] Fwd: [Politech] Step aside, war on terror -- now it's war on Internet gambling [econ]

[Rick Welykochy]

The Yanks are now onto the Internet gambling case.

But unlike us Aussies, they attack with some ammunition to back
up their intentions. In this case, the financial institutions
that process gambling payments will be targeted.

Now why didn't the lily-livered milquetoast cowards that try to
pass as our politicians implement something like that?

Does anyone know what effects the anti Internet gambling legislation
has had hear? My guess: zero impact. LOL, I recall our favourite luddite
indicating that offshore gambling will become prohibitively expensive
once on-shore gambling is irradicated, due to the cost of "long distance
phone calls!"  Ya gotta laugh or die trying :)

cheers
rickw


--- Declan McCullagh <declan at well.com> wrote:

> Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 15:41:58 -0700
> From: Declan McCullagh <declan at well.com>
> To: Politech <politech at politechbot.com>
> Subject: [Politech] Step aside,
> 	war on terror -- now it's war on Internet gambling [econ]
> 
> The House of Representatives today voted 317 to 93 for a bill that tries 
> to prohibit offshore Net-gambling. It targets Internet service providers 
> and financial intermediaries, namely banks and credit card companies 
> that process payments to offshore Web sites:
> http://news.com.com/2100-1030_3-6092852.html
> 
> Here's the vote total, which is largely (though not completely) 
> partisan, with the Republicans supporting the so-called Unlawful 
> Internet Gambling Enforcement Act:
> http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2006/roll363.xml
> 
> Here's the text of the bill, which says ISPs can be forced to block 
> access to offshore gambling sites after being slapped with a court order:
> http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:h.r.04411:
> 
> There are two interesting asides here.
> 
> First, how will this work on a technical level? The Federal Reserve is 
> supposed to come up with regulations applying to certain "designated 
> payment systems" (including not just credit cards and Paypal but also 
> eGold and FirePay). Those DPSs must find ways to block payments 
> representing a "restricted transaction," which should be entertaining to 
> try to identify.
> 
> Second, the bill contains carve-outs for, say, horseracing. That's 
> according to no less an authority than the National Thoroughbred Racing 
> Association:
> http://www.ntra.com/content.aspx?type=pac&style=red&id=18064
> 
> But a vote on an amendment (admittedly, a poison pill one) to cover 
> *all* forms of Internet gambling failed:
> http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2006/roll361.xml
> 
> -Declan
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> 



		
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