In a recent gambling-news article, Tribal leaders called Barney Frank’s online gambling bill, H.R. 2267 , “…the greatest threat to Indian gaming in 20 years.”
Tribal leaders clearly feel threatened by the possibility of more competition. “… the threat of Congressional legislation that will transfer billions of dollars from Indian Reservations to foreign offshore internet casinos,” said Daniel Tucker, leader in the California Nations Indian Gaming Association and chairman of the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation.
Tribal opposition to Frank’s bill is expected to escalate in coming weeks and months, as is the opposition from pro-family groups. Frank’s bill would pipe thousands of online, virtual casinos into approximately 91 million U.S. homes via the Internet.
About 230 million men, women and children access the Internet for business, school and information. Many feel that Frank’s sponsorship of policy legalizing online gambling is irresponsible legislation that is being pushed by foreign, online gambling interests and their U.S.-based front-group, Poker Player’s Alliance.
If you want to learn more about this issue, visit our Internet Gambling Take Action site.
“It’s millions of dollars … And it will help education,” Florida’s Gov. Crist told the press in regard to his new compact with the vastly wealthy, gambling-saturated Seminole Tribe.
Gov. Crist’s compact would give the Seminole Indians a gambling monopoly on blackjack and Vegas-style slots outside Broward and Miami-Dade. In return, the tribe pays Florida $150 million annually. Oh, and don’t forget, “… it will help education.”
Funny. That’s what the Florida Lottery claimed in order to dupe voters into legalizing state-operated gambling, or the Florida lottery. Today, the lottery has supplanted – or replaced – state funding for education and now Florida education and thousands of children are held hostage to the lottery’s uncertain performance!
Nobody told citizens that education would be DEPENDENT on unstable lottery proceeds, or else the bill never would have passed. States should not use education to justify the legalization of more gambling. Don’t handcuff vice to virtue.
Many in the Florida Legislature expect this compact will fail. But what other types of gambling are looming in the shadows, waiting to be sold to the public to “help” education?
Citizens beware, there are a lot of gambling crooks selling “snake oil” to the Florida Legislature and to you, the citizens. Don’t buy into their lies about gambling profits. This is a losing bet! Gambling is in decline , and banking on gambling revenues could break the state.
Snake oil! Snake oil! Get your snake oil here! Snake oil, anyone?
Parents may be surprised to realize that gambling machine manufacturers are creating video slot machines that imitate the video games little Jimmy and Alice playing in the living room. Spider Man, Hulk, Superman? Yep, they’ve got most any video gambling machine imitation of the games your kids currently play at home.
The difference? Video slots take your money – up to $54 dollars a minute in a nickel slot, as a matter of fact, and even more online.
A recent study out of Australia found that teens who “game” regularly may be more likely to develop social characteristics that lead to problem gambling. But it’s not so much the physical act of playing video games as it is the lack of parental supervision. ”[T]he sorts of kids who are playing video games probably do so because they’ve got less parental supervision … They’re probably bored; they probably don’t have a lot of structured activity in their life,” said one of the researchers.
Dean Bryden began gambling at age 14 and his habit led him to spend $180,000 in a single year. ”It’s an adrenaline rush for people,” he said. ”I think the internet poker is a big thing because you don’t have to be over the age of 18; it doesn’t matter how old you are.” Just one more reason not to legalize Internet gambling in the U.S. and for parents to interact with – and closely supervise – their kids’ activities.
Don’t bet on Internet gambling becoming legal anytime soon. The Interactive Media Entertainment & Gaming Association (iMEGA) challenged the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA) in an oral argument on June 7, 2009, in the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals. The hearing did not bode well for the online gambling interests, who are pushing to legalize Internet gambling in the U.S.
Prior to the hearing, online gambling’s iMEGA chairman, Joe Brennan Jr., smugly remarked, “This law will finally have to stand on it’s own two feet in court, free from politics and all other outside influences. We feel very confident that when the judges take a look at the law, they will see just how defective it is, and they will overturn it.” That didn’t happen. And, ironically, it’s the “other outside influences,” like foreign Internet gambling interests, who are pushing U.S. politicians to overturn UIGEA.
The two iMEGA lawyers attempting to overturn UIGEA met sober opposition with their tired arguments. They claimed that UIGEA is too ambiguous and it violates gamblers’ First Amendment rights. Their arguments were aptly rejected by the three judges who were not impressed.
The 3rd Circuit judges discarded the supposed ambiguity in UIGEA. “I’m struggling with what’s vague …” said Judge Kent, “[gamblers] could have a beef [with state laws] … that doesn’t mean this statute is vague [UIGEA].”
None was impressed with iMEGA’s arguments claiming that UIGEA violates gamblers’ First Amendment rights. Judge Ambro asked one of the iMEGA attorneys, “Are you asserting that you have a privacy right that trumps the police powers of the state?”
Overall, the judges seemed to unanimously uphold UIGEA and the face of Internet gambling’s oral arguments. More to come as Rep. Frank attempts to overturn UIGEA with his bill to legalize Internet gambling (H.R. 2267), but the House Financial Committee has more important, pressing concerns with the teetering U.S. economy.
