Is this important to us?

[tangled]

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15143692

Heard this story on NPR this morning. Although it is about a death penalty case, it sounds (eerily) like it deals with identical issues present in the IMEGA civil case and the betonsports criminal case. Specifically: Bush withdrew our commitments to a signed treaty, and the question of supremacy of international treaty vs. domestic statutes. The cool thing is that it is the Bush administration that is arguing that international treaty should trump domestic law -- at least up until the time that the US withdrew from the treaty.

Of course, I could be wrong about its importance to us, but still its fun banging on this typewriter.

[DeadMoneyDad]

[ QUOTE ]
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15143692

Heard this story on NPR this morning. Although it is about a death penalty case, it sounds (eerily) like it deals with identical issues present in the IMEGA civil case and the betonsports criminal case. Specifically: Bush withdrew our commitments to a signed treaty, and the question of supremacy of international treaty vs. domestic statutes. The cool thing is that it is the Bush administration that is arguing that international treaty should trump domestic law -- at least up until the time that the US withdrew from the treaty.

Of course, I could be wrong about its importance to us, but still its fun banging on this typewriter.

[/ QUOTE ]

It is very important for anyone who thinks words spoken or even on a piece of paper mean a single thing is they suddenly put someone in power at a disadvantage.

Treaties don't mean a thing unless the parties all get thier fair meausre, see the WTO mess.

We have the UIGEA today not because of the ever powerful Christian Right, but becuase the Banking system leveraged that noise to solve a customer service and debt collection problem. Can you imagine how many letter and phone calls they have gotten like the idiot woman who's boy friend gambled money from their joint account? I someone was stupid enought to post that question in a poker forum you get some idea of how many calls they received. If the banks could find a way to even make a dime a transaction they would be our biggest allies.

If we don't make the banks see the cost of attempting to slide by with unconstitutional "safe harbor" protections from their attempt to be the judge and jury of on-line gaming transactions to solve this little collections problem we deserve what we get!


D$D<--not afraid to spit in the face of power!
I may even piss on thier shoes.

[tangled]

not to keep beating a dead horse, but there is a f/u story out at NPR on this story. The WTO is briefly mentioned.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15160958

[JPFisher55]

The issue of supremacy of federal statute v. international treaty is unsettled. Online gambling situation may lead to litigation over this issue. This case is about state law v. international treaty. Usually, the latter is supreme, but it seems that Texas is arguing that either some foreign court misinterpreted the treaty or that the treaty was not enforced by a federal statute, but by a Presidential order.
Still I would think that Texas will lose this case, but who knows.
It would be important, in a very bad way, if the Supreme Court decides that a state can ignore a properly ratified treaty.

[JPFisher55]

I just listened to a summary of this case on the O'Reilly show. It is not about the supremacy of international treaties. The defendant failed to raise his rights under a treaty during the judicial process in his murder case. After he lost in the state and federal courts, he sued in International court on the failure of Texas to honor his rights and won. Then Pres. Bush got involved by ordering Texas to obey the international court judgment. The issue is whether the international court had any right to hear the case and whether Texas has to obey the ruling.
The problem is that while Texas failed to honor the treaty, the defendant never raised the issue in his federal judicial process. So the case is about the rules in US court v. an international court order. A decision either way will not affect online gambling. The parties agree that had the defendant properly raised his rights in federal court, he would have been entitled to some redress for Texas' failure to honor his rights under the treaty.