Appeals Court Says Nothing Wrong With Law Banning Online Gambling
from the wanna-bet? dept
Back in 2006, as part of an effort to make our sea ports safer, Congress banned financial institutions from accepting money from online gambling sites, effectively outlawing online gambling (no, I don't understand what that had to do with port safety, but that's just how Congress rolls, apparently). Since then law has been challenged -- but hasn't had much success. The district court tossed it out saying the bill was perfectly Constitutional, and now an appeals court has said the same thing. The groups fighting the law made two claims, neither of which the court agreed with: first, that the law breached users privacy rights to gamble in their own homes, and second that the law was too vague. It seems likely that this will be appealed yet again, but who knows if the Supreme Court will care. In the meantime, every few months there are stories about Rep. Barney Frank promising to legalize online poker... but they never seem to get anywhere.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Filed Under: online gambling
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Re:
But I absolutely agree. It is definitely illegal for Congress to protect OTB (which is what this law was all about) at the expense of authors and artists who now have lost (once Antigua decides to move on it) the right to be paid for their works abroad. Once Antigua moves, expect a lawsuit against this law of a very different kind than the one mentioned in this post.
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That does not make sense, the same thing could be said about Vegas gambling. All that would have to be done is pass a law stating when any funds are withdrawn from an online gambling taxes (federal) must be deducted from payout. Then if the site does not do so they would be charged with tax evasion and illegally running a gambling establishment.
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Your response does not make sense. Not every online gambling company is in the USA. US law can't force companies outside the USA to do something.
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> evasion and illegally running a gambling establishment.
How exactly is the US going to charge a web site owner in Belize with tax evasion? Citizens of Belize have no obligation to follow US tax law.
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This isn't lumber or DRAM chips we're talking about. All attempts to conflate this issue with those involving non-controversial commodities or products is fundementally dishonest.
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USA is protecting its interests with Gambling Law!
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What!?
(We did it once--prohibition. We can do it again. If it's going to take a Constitutional amendment to actually enforce our basic human rights, then We The People will do it... or just ignore asinine, fascist laws in the first place.)
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Re: What!?
VRP
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Weird Laws
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