[Nate tha\\\' Great]

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Even if we manage to dodge this particular bullet (the DoD bill), aren't we still in huge trouble if/when the Senate considers an omnibus spending bill after the elections? People are resistant to adding extraneous stuff to the DoD legislation, but the omnibus bill is all about lumping extraneous stuff together in one big opposition-proof package. It will be loaded with pork, so it's unlikely to be blocked/stalemated, and the process-based arguments about how wrong it is to tack iGaming stuff into a defense bill won't carry any weight when it comes something like that.

Maybe Berge or K can comment further, but I'm actually very pessimistic about our overall chances here regardless of what happens with the DoD Authorization. Frist has demonstrated that he's willing to fight for this thing, and even if he can't succeed in hitching in onto this particular piece of legislation, he shouldn't have a problem attaching it to some other bill.

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The bill will remain a serious threat until the gavel sounds on the lame duck session, although if there's a 1994-like Democratic sweep of the midterms, it might be on life support.

Just how serious is something we can speculate about later. The thing it's important to remember is that the political tides shift very quickly -- just think about how much drama there has been on this one small issue (internet gambling) in the past 2-3 weeks -- so there's definitely some gain to be had by getting the issue off the table at a time when Frist appears to be hot & bothered about it. By November, he could well decide to spend his political capital elsewhere.