WTO rules against US gambling ban

eek. · Nov 11, 2004

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The cricifix kissing communists that run America will not be pleased.

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WTO rules against US gambling ban

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Could the chips be down for US authorities?

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>US laws prohibiting cross-border gambling break trade rules, the World Trade Organisation says.

The WTO case was brought by the Caribbean state of Antigua and Barbuda, host to many of the online casinos whose use is illegal in the US.

The ruling confirms a preliminary judgement issued in March.

But the US said it will appeal and - as a last resort - could activate its right to change the deal under which it joined the WTO in the first place.

"This panel report is deeply flawed," said a spokesman for US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick.

An appellate panel will now consider the appeal over the next few months.

'David and Goliath'

The ruling, written by a three-person panel, says the US law effectively breaches a 1994 global deal which liberalises trade in services.

Antigua and Barbuda, whose population is just 67,000, says it gets as many as 3,000 jobs from internet gambling.

The business has helped it weather the downturn in tourism.

The US law - which forbids paying for betting by means of US-issued credit cards or cheques - is endangering its economy, it said.

In a statement, the islands' government said it had won a "David and Goliath" fight, and insisted it had tried to reach a negotiated settlement only to be rebuffed five times.

It also quoted a survey suggesting the US was home to half the worldwide online gambling market.

'Shocking and troubling'

But the US says the ban, based on a 1961 federal law originally designed to cover telephone bets, is designed to protect against both money laundering and the exposure of vulnerable sections of society to gambling.

One often-cited example is stopping children from running up gambling bills on their parents' credit cards.

The WTO panel had turned down a request by the US to use a "public morals clause" in WTO rules to keep the ban, one trade official told Reuters.

The rebuff was "shocking and troubling", he said. Antigua and Barbuda, however, represent just a small part of the world's online gaming. The General Accounting Office has estimated that there are more than 1,800 internet gambling operations.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4001793.stm

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xpanda · Nov 11, 2004

What's a "public morals clause"??? Seems 'morality' is an increasingly loose term these days ....

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Morality in this country known as the USA:

* When a VP was involved with a company that cooked the books and screwed stock holders we call that "accepted business practice"

* When a female celebrity makes 200k on an Insider trading gig she is a "threat to society" but when a President of the USA makes over 800k on an Insider trading gig as Board Member at Harken Energy the CIA jumps in to shut down investigations by the SEC

* When a female sleeps with a pro basketball player she is referred to as a whore and the basketball player is forgiven quickly as HE IS A MAN WITH MANLY NEEDS ....

* When a soldier is shot up and comes back to the tell the truth about a BS war that killed over 50,000 American kids he is called a "traitor" .. yet, when the President invades a Muslim country illegally and kills over 100,000 innocent kids & civilians he is applauded for being "courageous"

The USA is a country that is burning from within ... a cancer that is spreading like wildfire ... kids carrying guns ... kids killing innocent animals .. the Church telling everyone they need to vote for the "Moral" candidate ....

Rome dissolved from within and its happening as we speak in this very divided country .. and remember in the Bible: "a house divided .."

xpanda · Nov 11, 2004

Every time I hear the word 'morals' coming from the mouths of US politicians, I'll just replace it with 'covering the asses of special interest groups and lobbyists across this great nation' and that should pretty well do it.

If the US is so concerned with depleted morality from gambling, why are Vegas and Atlantic City still at it? The WTO is simply ruling that you cannot deem a foreign nation's practices illegal and lock them out of fair trading when the product/service in question is not illegal in your own nation. The US will either have to outlaw gambling altogether, which won't happen, or suck it up. This is good news, though, since it will have a positive effect on Canada's gaming industry and all that goes with it.

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

This kills me ...

they have no problems hyping state lotteries or race tracks and worried because I might corrupt this country for betting $50 online on a basketball game ???

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Wait a minute ...

We could always invade Antigua!!!

xpanda · Nov 11, 2004

doc mercer said:
This kills me ...

they have no problems hyping state lotteries or race tracks and worried because I might corrupt this country for betting $50 online on a basketball game ???

Here, we have plenty of state gambling, as well as legal charitable gambling. Casino Niagara, Casina Rama, etc. all owned by the gov't of Ontario. A couple of weeks ago, some study came out saying that 30%+ of Ontario gamblers were 'addicted' and that the gov't should do something to discourage gambling. Hogwash. These people are obviously adults and can take responsibility for their own actions. The Ontario Liberals told the study to take a hike.

But, what they won't do is allow private gambling facilities. Seems they want to hog the profits. In effect, it's not much different than the US's rules, except ours only apply to domestic scenarios. Offshore gambling seems to be at least tolerated, and the rule is that provided you earn a profit of $20,000 CAD or less in a year, you can leave this extra income off your tax statement.

cussin'it · Nov 11, 2004

xpanda said:
Every time I hear the word 'morals' coming from the mouths of US politicians, I'll just replace it with 'covering the asses of special interest groups and lobbyists across this great nation' and that should pretty well do it.

If the US is so concerned with depleted morality from gambling, why are Vegas and Atlantic City still at it? The WTO is simply ruling that you cannot deem a foreign nation's practices illegal and lock them out of fair trading when the product/service in question is not illegal in your own nation. The US will either have to outlaw gambling altogether, which won't happen, or suck it up. This is good news, though, since it will have a positive effect on Canada's gaming industry and all that goes with it.

X, Not just Vegas and Atl Cty. Throw in the dozens of race tracks, off-track betting, bingo halls and Indian casinos, state sponsored lotteries, riverboat gambling, tunica (ms),....

Real simple: this country's so called "moral" crusade is spearheaded by hypocrites. I believe that you are correct. The special interests have a hold of most politicians who preach morals then act as if none ever existed.

Doc, good points.....I have never seen any of the Shrub boot-lickers ever address the immoral or unethical behavior of their leaders. They choose to avoid or ignore a substative discussion always. Pathetic lot.:kicking:

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Cussin it:

How bout this one?´´If President Clinton is allowed to serve out the remainder of his term, it will have profoundly negative cultural consequences. ... This corrupt and corrupting president must be repudiated.´´ --Bill Bennett ..... I wonder if the family of Bill Bennett would like to repudiate any of the reported eight million he gambled away?

cussin'it · Nov 11, 2004

precisely. If gambling is a sin, as the "moral values" evangelicals should know, then for one sinner to throw stones at another, (while hiding his own) is nothing but hypocracy and holds no credibility. Albeit an intelligent man, Bennett is a garden variety phony.

You righties better get the message. Sometimes the treatment is worse than the disease.

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Cussin .. more examples of how the Repubs "tout" Morals but have no room to talk:

Quick now, has anyone heard of Randy Ankeney? He was a rising star in Colorado Republican circles who held a $63,000 position in the Governor’s Office of Economic Development until he was arrested in 2001 and accused of trying to have sex with a 13-year-old girl he met through the Internet. 47

Police said Ankeney even warned the girl he’d ruin her life if she told anyone. Does that sound familiar? That’s how many of these Republicans keep their affairs quiet - they threaten a bunch of people.

Another 17-year-old girl said Ankeney sexually assaulted her while working on a political campaign. In 2002, he pleaded guilty to attempted sexual assault of a child. He was sentenced to 22 years in prison in 2003. 48

How about Parker J. Bena, a Virginia Republican activist who proudly cast one of his state’s electoral vote for Bush in 2000, being indicted for possessing child pornography in 2001? Bena was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison and fined $18,000. 49

Long-time Virginia Republican fund-raiser Richard Delgaudio, 50, was more fortunate. He only received two years probation in 2003 after pleading guilty to taking sexually-related photos of a 16-year-old girl in a motel room. In 2001, Delgaudio was picked up by police in Baltimore’s Patterson Park, an area police said was known for prostitution. 50

Does Republican Marty Glickman, one of those rabid dog conservative talk radio commentators in Florida who was arrested in 2001 and charged with giving drugs like LSD and money to underaged girls in exchange for sex, ring a bell? 51

Anyone hear of Kevin T. Coan, a Republican who formerly directed the St. Louis Election Board? He was charged in 2001 with trying to solicit sex from a 14-year-old girl in cyberspace. As of 2003, his case hadn’t been resolved. 52

Then there was Philip Giordano, the former Republican mayor of Waterbury, Conn., who was sentenced in 2003 to 37 years in prison for soliciting sex with underaged girls and violating their civil rights. It’s more likely you’ve heard of him since this case received ample media coverage. 53

Another case that got some attention involved Beverly Russell, a leader in the South Carolina Republican Party and the local Christian Coalition who campaigned for presidential candidate Pat Robertson, who allegedly molested his step-daughter, children-drowner Susan Smith. 54

I’ve been told that numerous Religious Right nuts read sexual material under the guise of knowing what’s in it so they can keep it from their children. Many Religious Rightists also believe a man can have sex with his wife anytime he pleases, whether she wants to or not. Some would call that rape, but I’m sure these nuts have another word for it.

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Dont forget Jeb Bush:

Jeb Bush reportedly had an affair with Cynthia Henderson, a former Playboy bunny who he put in charge of the Florida Department of Management Services at a salary of $114,000 a year in 1999. Bush also appointed Henderson to run the Department of Business and Professional Regulation in 1999.

But he had to transfer her after a state ethics investigation into her accepting personal favors - including a private plane ride to the Kentucky Derby - from Outback Steakhouse, a company her office was supposed to regulate. Henderson also reportedly helped obtain state jobs for her nanny and the nanny’s boyfriend, and she was also sued by a state employee who alleged that Henderson grabbed him by the throat and threatened to choke him to death. 11

While some Bush advisors and newspapers called on Henderson to be fired, Bush refused and publicly denied in May 2001 that he had as much as been in a room alone with Henderson after mostly alternative media published the allegations. Unlike with Clinton, Condit, and other Democrats like potential 1988 presidential candidate Gary Hart, the major media did not aggressively pursue the story and check out whether Bush was telling the truth. In former Sen. Hart’s case, the media even staked out his Washington home to report an alleged affair he had with model Donna Rice. As late as 1998, Hart called the media frenzy surrounding him “fascist.”

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Cussin: One more fine example of the Outstanding "Morals" the Republican party stands for!!

So the message was if you have an affair and you’re a Democrat, you get impeached. But if you have an affair and you’re a Republican, you get applause and support.

Conservative hypocrites who castigated Clinton for sins they committed themselves included Congressman Dan Burton, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, presidential candidate Bob Dole, and Sen. Strom Thurmond.

Burton, who once called Clinton a “scumbag” in the midst of the public sexual witch hunt, admitted during the 1998 proceedings against Clinton that he had an extramarital affair and fathered a child out of wedlock when he was a state senator in the 1980s. Burton said on PBS, “This is something that happened a long time ago.....The boy and the mother and my wife and my family and I have all reached an agreement about this a long time ago.” 30

Well, isn’t that special? So we should all forget about Republican affairs as long as the parties involved reach a private agreement?

Gingrich was known to force oral sex with interns and reportedly cheated on two of his three wives. He even served his first wife with divorce papers while she lying in a hospital bed fighting cancer so that he could marry a mistress. 31

Then, Gingrich divorced wife number two, reportedly for Callista Bisek, a much younger Congressional employee, and had sex with her in his Capitol Hill office during the Clinton witch hunt. 32

As columnist Robert Scheer pointed out, “As House speaker, Gingrich had ultimate power over the woman’s career, raising questions of sexual harassment.” 33

Gingrich married Bisek a few months after divorce number two was finalized in 2000. He got his second marriage annulled by the Catholic Church, even though Gingrich was not Catholic - Bisek was. That meant that the church declined to formally recognize the 19 years of Gingrich’s second marriage. How’s that for family values?

Dole, who lost big-time to the “Big Dog” in 1996, reportedly had an affair with a woman who was not his wife in 1968. The Washington Post wrote that the paper and Time both interviewed the woman at length, then decided not to run the story before the 1996 election. The National Enquirer ran the story, instead. 34

The late Thurmond, for his part, had sex with the late Carrie Butler in 1925, when he was 22 and she was a 16-year-old African-American housekeeper in Thurmond’s home. The act wasn’t a crime back in the early 20th century, but it would be now. Thurmond reportedly helped pay for the college education of his part-black daughter, Essie Mae Washington Williams, even as he referred to African-Americans as “niggers” and became one of the country’s leading proponents of segregation.

That action was deceitful in more ways than the obvious hypocrisy; if white America had heard about Thurmond’s black child, his political career would have been over. While articles appeared about the tie as early as 1972, Thurmond, Williams, and Butler kept quiet about the matter until Williams spilled the beans in 2003. 35

I AINT DEFENDING THE DEMS AS THEY HAVE PLENTY OF SNAKES ... TIRED OF HEARING THE "MORAL CRAP" THE REPUBS SUPPOSEDLY STAND FOR!!

xpanda · Nov 11, 2004

It's the same bullcrap as the 'family values' rhetoric. Family values, in politic-speak, means 'man breadwinner, woman no independent.' Of course, people forget that women used to get smacked around alot in those times, and had no means to leave, but hey, at least the divorce rate was lower.

All of this moral crap is about protecting the white male society from anything and everything that could impede on its power. That which is deemed 'immoral' is carefully chosen precisely by its ability to undermine this segment of the population, not for its own justification or lack thereof.

Where is the moral majority when their country pays tons of money to known warlords and murderers in Afghanistan and Colombia, just to name a couple? Where are they when 'foreign aid' is largely given to Israel's munitions agenda? Where are they when Halliburton and Enron are engaging in extra-marital relations with the Feds?

Very selective, these folks.

cussin'it · Nov 11, 2004

Wonderful job Doc! Shine the light on 'em and see how quickly they wilt.

Bunch of goddam hypocrites.
Let me say this, none of us is free from sin or transgressions. It takes a humble and principled individual to admit to these mistakes and to try hard to not continue the same behavior.

The hypocrites are those who deny any wrongdoing and/or admit, yet contine down the narrow path of self-serviance.

docmercer--banned · Nov 11, 2004

Cussin:

I know I aint .. and that is why I said it goes both ways are Clinton and his "I did not have sex" statement was a bit too much to "SWALLOW" for me

The Bushies will claim this is all BS and I am nothing but a sore loser .. and thats fine

charleslanger · Nov 11, 2004

No one in this thread, under threat of a zap from a lightning bolt--- can deny that they NEVER, EVER failed to pay their rightful share of taxes, commited adultery, sucked a big one-- & having been a minor at the time of the transgression does not mean it doesn't count!!!!!!

but i do agree @ the hypocrisy re gambling in this country......:toothless

stacilu · Nov 11, 2004

Wonderful posts, I am anxiously awaiting the defense from
gives face, the blighted one, shortgun blast to the brain,
the unamerican, and bill the idiot.

cussin'it · Nov 11, 2004

1. I was metally incapacitated at tax prep time

2. Never--never been married. Perhaps you meant For-ni-ca-tion.

3. Sorry bonesmokin' ain't my thing. Can't say that when it comes to hooters though. Sorry gals to be so sexplicit

TomKing · Nov 11, 2004

This is one of the places the Republicans lose me. They want to take away my rights and want to look after my morality that and the border deal....and the Bush fiscal policy....yes I voted for him and would again but that doesn't mean I don't have some serious issues with the right.