Online Gaming Sites to Fight Fascist Frist Legislation

It’s about time.

Online gambling sites have mostly been asleep at the wheel as fascists like Bill Frist and Bob Goodlatte (at right) pushed legislation through Congress to prohibit Internet wagering (except for things like horse racing) and poker in the U.S. However, it’s reported that some online sites may finally be stepping up to fight this 21st century form of prohibition. The question is, will it be too little too late?

According to Gambling911.com, "litigation brought on by some industry giants and other nations dependent upon internet gambling might hinder the measure pertaining to wagering online."

The site has learned that "at least one industry giant plans to release a statement as early as this coming Monday."

Gambling911.com also claims that Las Vegas, a city that greatly benefits from the influx of business online poker brings in (particularly during the WSOP), is ready to step up its efforts to keep online wagering legal.

Wicked Chops Poker was going to issue our editorial rant on this mess over the weekend, but 1) we didn’t want to overreact to the news like some other sites before analyzing the facts at hand, and 2) we first want to read the statements from major wagering sites like PartyGaming (and see how the stock market reacts to them) and transaction facilitators like Neteller.

With that said, we can’t help but to editorialize a little: We’ve been stating for a long time how totally unorganized the lobbying effort is by online wagering sites in fighting to keep Internet gambling legal. Considering the billions and billions of dollars at risk, and the thousands of jobs at stake, you’d think that maybe, just maybe, they’d have been a little more hands on in educating legislators on the hypocrisies of a bill that allows some forms of online gambling but not others, AND the benefits of legalizing and regulating online gambling. The ironic thing, although we don’t buy into the conspiracy theory set forth by some sites, is that if these companies willing to challenge Frist’s legislation have any success in their litigation efforts, we may eventually end up with a legalized and regulated game. Or at least we can hope so.

So we’ll wait for some proverbial shoes to drop now, if we even knew what that meant. The London Stock Exchange’s reaction to PartyGaming in particular should be interesting, as shares for the industry giant rose 4% at the close of last week on news that Frist would NOT get anti-gaming language inserted into any legislation.

For some great 2+2 Forum discussions on the topic, read the linked threads below.

:: Good breakdown/analyis of the bill

:: More good analysis

:: On the use of EFTs

:: General concerns on the language

:: All 2+2 legislative topics (solid, thoughtful posts throughout)