Update - Week of September 25th
 

As the Congress moves into the last week of work before departing for elections, the internet gambling legislation is still being battled over.

Monday was filled with what some view as good news as House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) is making his own push to add unrelated items to the Department of Defense Authorization legislation currently in conference committee. Ultimately, this may hold up the bill or it could muddy the waters to allow other unrelated items to get in.

Discussion Thread

NROG firmly believes that the Internet gambling legislation or similar language will not be inserted into the DoD Authorization bill. See above link and discussion.

However, Monday night The Hill, a reputable newspaper of record for actions in Congress carried a different tune.

Hill Article Discussion

Please use this tread for substinative discussion for actions over the week.

Nothing is certain until Congress adjourns for the year, but the major threats of this week deal with attaching the IG language to the DoD Authorization (or other must pass bills) legislation. Remember that things change hourly, conference reports can be changed up until the minute they are filed and we may not know until the last moment if something is in or out.

Please do your best to keep this thread on topic and full of useful information for the week. I will also be jumping in and deleting what I feel are posts that are not useful, wrong, etc.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

is it possible that we could benefit from frist getting the internet gaming language into the dod authorization bill. if this happened and house speaker hastert held to his word is it possible that this bill would simply die. if that were to happen i assume senator frist would not be able to go back and add the language to a later bill (ie omnibus)-- is that a correct assumption? and is the department of defense authorization bill a must pass bill or could hastert prevent it from ever passing?

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

I think that the DoD bill will almost definitely pass, but likely not until the lame duck session. I thought Hastert had said he would not bring it up for a vote THIS week if those extra issues were not included.

In other news - a guy on RGP (rec.gambling.poker) is reporting that Hillary Clinton plans on introducing even stricter anti-online gambling legislation with harsher penalties. That doesn't make much sense if it's already going to pass - I have no idea if the guy is joking around or not.

Edit: The Hillary Clinton guy was joking.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Redbeard,

Getting language inserted in the DoD Authorization bill and it not moving does not preclude Senator Frist from adding the exact same language to another legislative vehicle such as a year end omnibus spending bill.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

I think the DOD bill HAS to be passed by some date or other. I don't know when, possibly Oct 1. Several years ago, they failed to pass the DOD appropriations bill on time and the military service personnel, gs people, etc did not get paid until they did pass it. So this is not an option, although they may still have until some specified date to get it done.

Doc

Edit by Berge20 - DoD Appropriations bill (spending) will be passed this week without IG language. DoD Authorization is a different bill entirely.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Berge - I did not quite understand something you said in another thread. Were you saying that the Authorization bill might be held up past elections, or that it might not pass at all this year?

Not that it matters all that much since he'll just put it on something else.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Allow me one very premature question:

Assuming that nothing this year gets passed, is there any reason to believe that the legislation will not promptly be resubmitted in the next session?

I'm not asking whether Frist and company will make this a priority, because I think their intentions are now clear. Rather, I'm asking about scheduling at the start of the new session.

Assuming that the Republicans retain control of each house, are there certain matters that invariably take priority at te beginning of each session, meaning that new anti-internet gambling proposals could not be considered for at least several months?

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Berge - I did not quite understand something you said in another thread. Were you saying that the Authorization bill might be held up past elections, or that it might not pass at all this year?

Not that it matters all that much since he'll just put it on something else.

[/ QUOTE ]

I can't claim to know what Berge was talking about, but yes, it is possible that the DoD Authorization may not pass before elections, and in fact it may not pass all year. It almost didn't pass last year or year before (I forget). I still think it will pass at some point, though. Of course the question remains of what ends up in the conference report and what ends up left on the cutting room floor, so to speak.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Allow me one very premature question:

Assuming that nothing this year gets passed, is there any reason to believe that the legislation will not promptly be resubmitted in the next session?

I'm not asking whether Frist and company will make this a priority, because I think their intentions are now clear. Rather, I'm asking about scheduling at the start of the new session.

Assuming that the Republicans retain control of each house, are there certain matters that invariably take priority at te beginning of each session, meaning that new anti-internet gambling proposals could not be considered for at least several months?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, if the bill doesn't pass this time, I guarantee it will be resubmitted next year. The thing is, even if they move at light speed on it, it would be May or June before they really actually got going on it. That's just the way things go when you start both a new year and a new Congress (the 109th Congress ends this year, and the 110th Congress will start in January with all the newly elected members).

At the start of the new year/new Congress they have to "reorganize," which means allocating committee seats and such, and then pass a budget (painful), do a supplemental appropriations bill (usually, often military focused), and do some other housekeeping that takes months. Only after all that crap is out of the way do other items on the agenda start to emerge -- not by rule, but rather by practice.


EDIT: Tuesday gossip from Capitol Hill...

Looks like people are saying now that the DoD Authorization is "dead in the water" for the time being, partially due to Hastert's insistence on attaching those two measures (court security and the immigration enforcement measure), partially due to an ongoing stalemate on the prayer provision, partially due to scheduling pressures, and partially due to some other lingering differences between House and Senate negotiators.

Apparently Chairman Hunter (from the House) is under some pressure from his own committee members to drop his insistence on the prayer language and move the bill, but he has not yet relented. He has, however, apparently caved at least to a degree regarding nongermane add-ons. I don't really know to what degree, though. Warner, on the other hand, has been said to remain against nongermane addons that do not have unanimous or nearly unanimous bipartisan support. Again, I don't know how hard and fast his position is, and I have to believe that as Chairman of SASC, he wants his bill to move and will cut deals to accomplish as much.

So, that's the latest. All of it subject to change on a moment's notice. This afternoon's news should be interesting following the weekly party luncheons in the Senate, as we usually get a better idea of that chamber's roadmap for the week after those meetings. Also, I'm standing by my Saturday adjournment prediction. Heck, maybe even Sunday, but 99.9% not Friday.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Update from Roll Call:

http://www.gambling911.com/bill-to-b...ss-092606.html

Cliff notes: Anything is possible

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

First, off I love this sticky thread. There are many of us who are interested in the daily/hourly updates but don't like digging thru the many looong threads here to find tidbits of new info. This was a great idea!

Now I know this is hashed out over and over on other threads but I thought it might be a good idea to include in this thread the names of the elected officals we need to contact. Do I just need to contact MY Senator or do I need to contact all of them or a certain few? Also, what is the offical name of the poker ban legislation so we can make sure they know exactly what we're talking about?

Just an idea, I know it would help me out and probably others who are interested enough to poke our heads in here and check for updates. Thanks

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

“It’s Kyl-style, with a Frist twist,” said a senior aide to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) of attaching the Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) bill designed to bar Internet gambling by preventing credit card companies from honoring charges on gaming Web sites.

The aide said the Internet gambling bill has been tweaked slightly to ensure optimum support in the Senate, though details of the changes to Kyl’s original bill were not available.

------------------------

I'll take a crappy figurehead of a bill now over something with actual teeth say during the lame duck session.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
“It’s Kyl-style, with a Frist twist,” said a senior aide to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) of attaching the Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) bill designed to bar Internet gambling by preventing credit card companies from honoring charges on gaming Web sites.

The aide said the Internet gambling bill has been tweaked slightly to ensure optimum support in the Senate, though details of the changes to Kyl’s original bill were not available.

------------------------

I'll take a crappy figurehead of a bill now over something with actual teeth say during the lame duck session.

[/ QUOTE ]

If it banned only credit cards it would be phenomenal, but it's likely that the article is slightly inaccurate with respect to that.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
“It’s Kyl-style, with a Frist twist,” said a senior aide to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) of attaching the Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) bill designed to bar Internet gambling by preventing credit card companies from honoring charges on gaming Web sites.

The aide said the Internet gambling bill has been tweaked slightly to ensure optimum support in the Senate, though details of the changes to Kyl’s original bill were not available.

------------------------

I'll take a crappy figurehead of a bill now over something with actual teeth say during the lame duck session.

[/ QUOTE ]

If it banned only credit cards it would be phenomenal, but it's likely that the article is slightly inaccurate with respect to that.

[/ QUOTE ]


Every single source talking abut this for weeks has been strictly talking about credit cards, and we keep on saying they are wrong. Isn't it possible that this is actually accurate? If so, then I hope they pass this thing because it will make future legislation less likely. That would be a big victory for us.

Think about it. CC only language allows frist to say he did something, heck his base wouldn't know how irrelevant it actually is. Perhaps our lobbyists have made enough inroads to get this language so watered down to be irrelevant.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Yes, if the bill doesn't pass this time, I guarantee it will be resubmitted next year.

[/ QUOTE ]

i'm sad to hear that. i had thought that if the bill were going to pass, it was going to be this year. frist is the one really pushing it, and he'll be gone, and the ridiculous anti-abramov backlash will not be there next year (or at least it won't be as strong).

Post deleted by Mat Sklansky
 

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Until the DoD bill comes out of committee, we won't know the exact wording.

Right now, people are parsing second-hand news accounts with rose-colored glasses on.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

wishful thinking (clap, clap, clap clap clap)

(done in the same style and cadence of the "over-rated" cheer at sports games)

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Right now, people are parsing second-hand news accounts with rose-colored glasses on.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yup.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I'm a novice C-SPAN watcher. A short time ago, the announcer/narrator (whoever that is) said that the Defense authorization bill was coming up later today (in the House). Where does he get that information, and does it mean there's been some movement of the bill out of conference? Seems unlikely, but I don't know how else the bill could be coming up.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I'm a novice C-SPAN watcher. A short time ago, the announcer/narrator (whoever that is) said that the Defense authorization bill was coming up later today (in the House). Where does he get that information, and does it mean there's been some movement of the bill out of conference? Seems unlikely, but I don't know how else the bill could be coming up.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is very likely the defense appropriations bill, not the authorization bill.

http://www.majoritywhip.gov/whippost.asp

"One Minutes

H.Res. 1038 - Rule providing for consideration of H.R. 2679 - Public Expression of Religion Act of 2005 (Sponsored by Rep. Gingrey / Rules Committee)

H.Res. 1039 - Rule providing for consideration of S. 403 - Child Custody Protection Act (Sponsored by Rep. Gingrey / Rules Committee)

H.R. 2679 - Public Expression of Religion Act of 2005 (Closed Rule, One Hour of Debate) (Sponsored by Rep. Hostettler / Judiciary Committee)

H.Res. 1037 - Rule providing for consideration of Conference Report on H.R. 5631 - Department of Defense Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2007 (Sponsored by Rep. Cole / Rules Committee)

S. 403 - Child Custody Protection Act (Closed Rule, One Hour of Debate) (Sponsored by Sen. Ensign / Judiciary Committee)

Conference Report on H.R. 5631 - Department of Defense Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2007 (Rule Waives all Points of Order, One Hour of Debate) (Sponsored by Rep. Young (FL) / Appropriations Committee)

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
This is very likely the defense appropriations bill, not the authorization bill.

[/ QUOTE ]
That could be, and it makes sense, but I was listening and I thought I clearly heard "authorization." Otherwise I would not have posted.

Could have been a slip of the tongue, I suppose. Either that or I need a hearing check and/or brain scan.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This is very likely the defense appropriations bill, not the authorization bill.

[/ QUOTE ]
That could be, and it makes sense, but I was listening and I thought I clearly heard "authorization." Otherwise I would not have posted.

Could have been a slip of the tongue, I suppose. Either that or I need a hearing check and/or brain scan.

[/ QUOTE ]

Who knows. It's a crazy week and anything is possible. But I don't think it's terribly likely that the damned C-SPAN narrator has the rest of the country scooped on this. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

It is appropriations, not authorization. Slip of the tounge from CSPAN team or bad ears [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Good to hear you're watching C-SPAN -- a very good, direct source for what's going on at any moment in the House and Senate.

The thing you raised is an easy one to screw up. I'll bet the announcer said the Defense Appropriations bill is coming up soon in the House, not the Defense Authorization bill. Sometimes even Washington insiders mix the two up, and I think you heard one and thought another when you were watching CSPAN. The first one, the appropriations, provides the money. The second one, the authorization, sets a plan to spend that money. Only the first one is actually needed, since DoD will come up with a plan if we don't tell them one via law.

Frist wants to attach the gambling bill to the second one -- the authorization -- and as far as I know that one is still in a holding pattern and unlikely to hit the floor any time in the immediate future. As always, this is subject to change...

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Nate, Berge... great minds think alike.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

LOL at 3 best posters making the same post all in a row.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Until the DoD bill comes out of committee, we won't know the exact wording.

Right now, people are parsing second-hand news accounts with rose-colored glasses on.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or morose-colored glasses, depending on the poster.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Until the DoD bill comes out of committee, we won't know the exact wording.

Right now, people are parsing second-hand news accounts with rose-colored glasses on.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or morose-colored glasses, depending on the poster.

[/ QUOTE ]

[img]/images/graemlins/mad.gif[/img]

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

I'm in my CongressDaily free trial period too, so let me be the first to post the PM update.

"The fate of the FY07 defense authorization bill remained uncertain today as House Speaker Hastert refused to back off his effort to attach unrelated, non-defense legislation to the measure. Senate Armed Services Chairman Warner has opposed making the defense bill a Christmas tree for other legislation, leading to a standoff with the speaker. Specifically, Hastert has threatened to shelve the bill unless Warner agrees to the addition of federal court security legislation and a Republican measure aimed at detaining and deporting immigrant gang members. Today, Hastert said he had received assurances from Senate Majority Leader Frist that Congress would consider both measures this week, perhaps as part of the defense authorization bill. "These promises have not been kept," Hastert said. [...]

House Majority Leader Boehner suggested today that the defense authorization measure is not a must-pass piece of legislation for lawmakers to consider before leaving to campaign for the midterm congressional elections. The House will vote tonight on the Defense appropriations bill, ensuring that FY07 funds are available to the military at the Oct. 1 start of the fiscal year. "Getting the authorization bill finished in the same time frame would be good for us," Boehner said. "It is not essential."

tl;dr: No movement yet, and if anything it sounds like the princpals in the matter are becoming resigned to this bill waiting until the lame duck session. But as with everything else this week, it's far, far, far from over until the fat gavel sounds.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Are we assuming the gambling bill has been attached or do we still have no idea? Or does it really matter because it may be added later or scratched from the DOD later?

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Are we assuming the gambling bill has been attached or do we still have no idea? Or does it really matter because it may be added later or scratched from the DOD later?

[/ QUOTE ]

Adding to his question: If it is on the DoD Authorization Bill how likely is it, it gets scratched off.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

I am not nearly as well-connected as Mr.K and Berge, but I do have some personal contacts with Sen. Warner's office and an intermittant need to discuss issues with my friend. I spoke to my friend today and he said that it was his understanding that Warner was steadfast on blocking extraneous junk from the bill. I asked if this was due to philospohical opposition to that approach or because it would diminish the chance of it passing and he laughed at me. I believe that they consider certain proposals from the House (especially the immigration changes) to be a poison pill that will block adoption of the bill. I don't get the impression that the gambling provisions are really that important to them, because they don't seem to think that they will absolutely block the bill. If the House Rs would agree to a reduced package of ammendments that everyone thought would pass, I think Warner would let it go to the floor. My friend said that it isn't his direct issue to work but that his understanding was that no one was close to an agreement on a reduced set of changes and that he was fairly sure Warner would never allow the full slate of crap that Hastert wants to go through. He did caution me that as it got down to the last minute someone might blink, but his best guess was that the authorization would not pass until the lame duck session.

I used whatever leverage I had to argue against the gambling provision in any form. He more or less told me that if they got the thing packaged right it would most likely pass the Senate in some form. He thought Warner was typical of most Sentors who don't really have a bug up their butt about gambling, but have no particular reason to step up and defend it either. He also said that the authorization bill was probably irrelevant to us if it doesn't get added now. He said once they got to the lame duck session there were a million different ways they could try to get the thing passed, with or without involving the authorization bill. He said if Frist really wanted to get it done in the Lame Duck session, he probably would. He did point out that its political value will go way down after the elections and that everything might look very different then. He did say that they had been receiving calls from poker players, so I guess that is a good thing.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Are we assuming the gambling bill has been attached or do we still have no idea? Or does it really matter because it may be added later or scratched from the DOD later?

[/ QUOTE ]

This is an impossible question to answer. At the present, there doesn't exists a formal authorization bill. No one can say for certain what is or is not on the bill until it makes it out of conference. The reports that you read frequently reflect the posturing of one side or the other and cannot be completely relied on. If an agreement was reached, it is likely that only a very small group of people would know exactly what it is and they aren't going to post here. This one is a bit odd in that the conference group is huge, but we still won't know exactly what is in the bill until it is reported out of conference.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

Good afternoon guys. How easy it is to lose faith huh? I want to be clear...NROG is not a news organization...we do not have reporters trying to write stories. NROG is an active group lobbying on Capital Hill in DC. Our information comes from sources far deeper than any reporter could find (other than those at the AP probably...they know everything! Funny how they haven't written another story since their report of Frist failing...hmmm).

The Hill article is nice...it creates panic which I'm for 100%...we should NEVER stop calling and being active. NROG has stood firm with that message. Also...its important that I point out...NROG has never been wrong with the stories we've released.. I know some of you may believe otherwise but our first release last Monday stated that Frist failed at his first attachment attempt. The fact is...He Did...Yet NROG URGED YOU TO KEEP CALLING/EMAILING. We came back last Friday with a new release that said he may have been trying again. He did not. AND NROG URGED YOU TO KEEP CALLING/EMAILING. Find a posting from us that says "We've won...stop calling"...it doesn't exist!

Its unfortunate. Part of the reason we started NROG was to let you guys all know what was going on in real-time. We didn't like that other lobbying groups were hanging you out to dry with no updates. Sadly you misread or misinterpret information we provide and are the first to judge us based on incorrect stories on the internet. Fact is we have never claimed victory and our sources have all been 100% accurate. Just because a newspaper has an outdated story doesn't instantly make US wrong and them right. Guys...we're here to inform you. We don't think you should have to google this topic and hope the information you're reading is accurate. We are reporting direct from our efforts on Capital Hill. There is no better source right now...

Now...as of today at 12:30pm there was no gambling language in the DoD bill and a key aide to Senator Frist confirmed he is not seeking to attach it again before elections. That being said...here's where you guys run away with information...this DOES NOT mean he will not attempt it after elections. It DOES NOT mean he won't eye a bill other than the DoD. What it means is...right now...as of this moment...his office has confirmed that it IS NOT attached and he has no intentions of trying again before recess. Sen Warner has also held true to his original statement that he will not allow non-germane language in this bill and he and Frist are still feuding over the refusal.

This information has been corroborated through multiple sources, other Senators involved in the fight and other lobbying efforts. Sadly they all believe you do not need to know about this. They haven't told you because they feel if this gets too public it may upset Frist and Company and they may try harder. We simply disagree with holding information from you. We think the more you know the more active you become. Call...Email...BE VOCAL and DONT STOP REGARDLESS OF THE NEWS!

So all I can say is ...this is information, direct from Washington DC...not the internet. Use it as you wish but rememebr one thing that we have never chanegd position on...this fight is FAR from over!

Thanks to all of you who are supporting us in our efforts. For those of you who doubt us we hope we can earn your trust and respect as we continue to fight for your rights.

JayB
NROG
www.saveonlinegaming.com

Re: Update - Week of September 25th *DELETED*
 

Post deleted by Berge20

While I appreciate the differing views offered on Nrog, it isn't useful to debate them in this sticky. Please try to keep this updated with information.

Re: Update - Week of September 25th *DELETED*
 

Post deleted by Berge20

Re: Update - Week of September 25th *DELETED*
 

Post deleted by Berge20

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
Jay,

Thanks for the update, and please keep them coming.

[/ QUOTE ]

Re: Update - Week of September 25th
 

[ QUOTE ]
They haven't told you because they feel if this gets too public it may upset Frist and Company and they may try harder.

[/ QUOTE ]
They may have a good point. How about we stop lobbying and confirming victory here and concentrate our efforts on Capitol Hill?