Fight for Online Gaming!! -- Weekly action thread

[Ron Burgundy]

Dude, don't spam one site too much, that's counterproductive. One long, well thought out response will get the point across better, without making yourself look like a shill for the gambling lobby.

[TheEngineer]

[ QUOTE ]
Dude, don't spam one site too much, that's counterproductive. One long, well thought out response will get the point across better, without making yourself look like a shill for the gambling lobby.

[/ QUOTE ]

Me? I post there all the time. They know me.

[TheEngineer]

Fight for Online Poker!! Week of 11/12

1. The House Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on Internet gaming on Nov. 14th at 10 am. Please write and call your congressman in support of this important hearing both before the hearing and after. And, please email the committee at http://judiciary.house.gov/contact.aspx. It won’t be the cakewalk the June 8th hearing was. That’s a good thing – it means we’re being taken seriously. It also means we’ll have to work harder.

2. We have one more month to get our UIGEA comments submitted. We have until Dec. 12th, so let's make a lot of comments between now and then. This still hasn't shown up on the FoF action plan (released a couple of days ago), so we may have a head start here. Please go to https://pokerplayersalliance.org/new...le.php?DID=293 for instructions on submitting your comments.

3. As a result of the Fly-In and our hard work this year, we have good momentum now. If you haven't written to Congress in the past 45 days or so, please do so. The letter we all co-wrote with PPA is at http://capwiz.com/pokerplayersallian...46&type=co; sending that takes less than one minute. Regardless of when you last called, let's call this week and next. Phone numbers are at http://capwiz.com/pokerplayersalliance/dbq/officials.

4. If you have ANY connection to MA, please contact Gov. Patrick and tell him you won't tolerate a ban on Internet poker. Also, contact Barney Frank for help. He is powerful in the Mass. Democratic party.

5. If you have ANY connection to KY, please contact governor-elect Steve Beshear and ask him to ensure that Internet poker is not excluded in his proposal to legalize casino gaming in the state.

6. Regularly write to newspapers and post to blogs. A few posts here and there can start to put us in the national zeitgeist.


Thanks everyone! [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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Contact Info:

Your senators: www.senate.gov
Your representative: www.house.gov

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)
528 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-3542
http://reid.senate.gov/contact/email_form.cfm

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
United States Senate
361-A Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-2541
http://mcconnell.senate.gov/contact_form.cfm

Michael Duncan (from Kentucky)
Chairman, Republican National Committee
Republican National Committee
310 First Street, SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
email: Chairman@gop.com

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)
Office of the Speaker
H-232, US Capitol
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-0100
http://speaker.house.gov/contact/
email: AmericanVoices@mail.house.gov

Rep. Steny Hoyer
House Majority Leader
H-107 Capitol Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
(202) 225-3130

Rep. John Boehner (R-OH)
Office of the Republican Leader
H-204 The Capitol
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-4000
Fax: (202) 225-5117

Pres. Bush: comments@whitehouse.gov

Horse tracks: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...=0#Post12335695

Democratic National Committee: http://www.democrats.org/contact.html

Letters to the editor, Washington Post: letters@washpost.com
Letters to the editor, New York Times: letters@nytimes.com

[TheEngineer]

As an example, here's the letter I sent to Rep. Bachus after the June 8 House Financial Services Committee hearing:

June 13, 2007
The Honorable Spencer Bachus
2246 Rayburn Building
Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Congressman Bachus:

I’m writing in response to last Friday’s House Financial Services Committee hearing on Internet gambling (June 8, 2007: Can Internet Gambling Be Effectively Regulated to Protect Consumers and the Payments System?). I was very impressed with quality of the hearing, especially with the witnesses who testified in favor of regulated Internet gambling. I felt the expert testimony of Michael Colopy of Aristotle Inc, Jon Prideaux of Asterion Payments, and Gerald Kitchen of SecureTrading Ltd. proved that Internet gambling can be regulated effectively (and has been successfully regulated in Britain). This pleased me, as I do share your concerns for underage gambling, compulsive gambling, and other issues. Fortunately, this is an issue we can effectively address with technology and regulation, rather than with a “feel good” unconstitutional prohibition. America is far better off with effective regulation than with a prohibition that relies on banks to snoop through our financial transactions and Internet service providers to snoop through our Internet usage history.

Further, I concurred completely with Radley Balko of Reason Magazine (and a regular Foxnews.com contributor) in that what Americans do in their own homes with their own money is their own business. As a limited-government conservative in the tradition of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan, I am distressed by the amount of government intrusion in our daily lives. I think many Americans feel the same way. In fact, it pains me to see our party acting as the agent of big government. I imagine you will consider the validity of Mr. Balko’s points relative to our freedoms and liberties, as I know you are a man who believes in these core American values regardless of your personal opinions concerning Internet poker.

Speaking of Mr. Balko, I was perplexed by your question to him concerning Ross Boatman and his biography on the FullTilt Poker web site. You seemed very concerned that, as a youth, Mr. Boatman played poker with his brother at the kitchen table, likely for pennies, baseball cards, or valueless chips used simply to keep score. Certainly you were not suggesting passing federal legislation to prevent brothers from playing poker at the kitchen table, were you? I certainly hope not, but one never knows, given recent Congressional history. Were you suggesting that Mr. Boatman was playing on the Internet with his brother when he was twelve? Aside from the age verification software present on all online gaming sites, certainly you understand no site ever permitted more than one player from the same IP address to play in the same poker game, due to collusion. I assume you do, as you claim expertise in this area. Also, as Mr. Boatman is in his 40s, he would have been twelve back in the pre-Internet 1970s. Anyway, regardless of the point you were trying to make, fortunately for Mr. Boatman this was prior to the current era of big government Republicanism. Also fortunate for Mr. Boatman, he grew up in England, where poker is not seen as something the national government has any business trying to prevent its citizens from enjoying. As such, he was able to play poker for pennies at his kitchen table with his brother without federal intrusion.

As for the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, you noted that it does not make any gambling illegal that was not already illegal. Rather, it provides legal mechanisms for enforcement of existing state and federal gambling laws. Well, Internet poker is not illegal under existing federal law. As for state laws, very few states have outlawed Internet poker. Conversely, the vast majority of states permit online “games of skill” (such as the money skill games on yahoo.com and other sites that are not affected by UIGEA), and I think we can agree that professional players like Doyle Brunson are certainly skilled. It seems that if states wished to ban Internet poker, it seems they would have done so in an unambiguous fashion … especially if they wished to have the federal government enforce it.

HR 2046 provides real regulation, rather than a porous prohibition. A regulated Internet gambling environment will facilitate age verification and collection of federal and state taxes. It will also reduce any potential vulnerability of gambling websites to being used for money laundering, drug trafficking, or terrorist financing. With regulation, potential problems can be controlled without taking freedoms from Americans. After all, Russians and Eastern Europeans can gamble online; it seems the U.S. should trust its citizens at least as much as Russia trusts theirs, right?

Proponents of online gambling prohibition often mention endorsements UIGEA received from some in the religious community, some family groups, some financial services groups and some professional sports organizations. I hope you’ll consider the fact that these groups do not necessarily represent the majority of voters in our nation (or even the majority of Alabama Republicans). As for religious and family groups, there is no prohibition against gambling in the Bible, as was noted at the hearing. As a Christian, I personally find it offensive that some in the religious community are willing to give away our freedoms in pursuit of a goal not even defined in the Bible. As for financial services groups, some credit card issuers may like UIGEA (due only to the risk of losing players refusing to pay up), but I do not believe banks wish to be the enforcers of UIGEA. As a result, I think you’ll find financial services groups to be net losers as a result of UIGEA. Finally, I believe the concerns of the major professional sports organizations you mentioned relate only to sports betting. As HR 2046 permits them to opt out, this concern has been addressed.

In closing, I urge you to reconsider your strong opposition to allowing Americans to make their own decisions concerning playing poker in their own homes via the Internet. Online gambling will continue to exist with or without the participation of the United States. We’re losing our opportunity to control the games via regulation as well as the opportunities for U.S. companies to operate the games both domestically and internationally. This is costing America jobs and tax revenue.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

TheEngineer

[TheEngineer]

Additional House Judiciary Committee Contact Info:

2138 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-3951

Let's try to call once before the hearing. Thanks.

[TheEngineer]

Fight for Online Poker!! Week of 11/19

Based on our discussions and posts here, let's do the following:

1. The House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on Internet gaming on Nov. 14th. Please write and call your congressman to remind them of our victory. The letter we all co-wrote with PPA is at http://capwiz.com/pokerplayersallian...46&type=co. Sending that takes less than one minute; adding info about the hearing takes only a few extra minutes. Regardless of when you last called, let's call this week. Phone numbers are at http://capwiz.com/pokerplayersalliance/dbq/officials. And, please contact the committee at http://judiciary.house.gov/contact.aspx to express your support for online poker. We won -- let's make sure we continue to be heard.

2. We have three more weeks to get our UIGEA comments submitted (Dec. 12th) so let's make a lot of comments between now and then. Please go to https://pokerplayersalliance.org/new...le.php?DID=293 for instructions on submitting your comments and for ideas on what to submit.

3. Write to your governor. If you have ANY connection to MA, please contact Gov. Patrick and tell him you won't tolerate a ban on Internet poker. If you have ANY connection to KY, please contact governor-elect Steve Beshear and ask him to ensure that Internet poker is not excluded in his proposal to legalize casino gaming in the state.

4. Regularly write to newspapers and post to blogs. A few posts here and there can start to put us in the national zeitgeist.


Thanks everyone! [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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

Contact Info:

Your senators: www.senate.gov
Your representative: www.house.gov

House Judiciary Committee:
http://judiciary.house.gov/contact.aspx
2138 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-3951

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)
528 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-3542
http://reid.senate.gov/contact/email_form.cfm

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
United States Senate
361-A Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-2541
http://mcconnell.senate.gov/contact_form.cfm

Michael Duncan (from Kentucky)
Chairman, Republican National Committee
Republican National Committee
310 First Street, SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
email: Chairman@gop.com

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)
Office of the Speaker
H-232, US Capitol
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-0100
http://speaker.house.gov/contact/
email: AmericanVoices@mail.house.gov

Rep. Steny Hoyer
House Majority Leader
H-107 Capitol Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
(202) 225-3130

Rep. John Boehner (R-OH)
Office of the Republican Leader
H-204 The Capitol
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-4000
Fax: (202) 225-5117

Pres. Bush: comments@whitehouse.gov

Horse tracks: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...=0#Post12335695

Democratic National Committee: http://www.democrats.org/contact.html

Letters to the editor, Washington Post: letters@washpost.com
Letters to the editor, New York Times: letters@nytimes.com

[TheEngineer]

pre-hearing letter:

November 12, 2007

House Judiciary Committee
2138 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Chairman Conyers and the House Judiciary Committee:

I am writing in regard to the upcoming “Hearing on Establishing Consistent Enforcement Policies in the Context of Online Wagers” to request that the committee review the unintended consequences of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA). Specifically, I request that the committee review the impact of the failure of UIGEA to define what types of Internet gaming are illegal to banks and to legal online gaming services.

Our nation’s banks have been deputized by the federal government to enforce UIGEA. However, they have not been told what exactly they are to enforce. The draft UIGEA regulations specifically state that the regulation authors do not know what is illegal and what is not. If the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve are unable to determine what constitutes illegal Internet gambling, how can banks and other financial institutions be expected to? Surely this is an unfair burden to place on our nation’s financial institutions. After all, they are in the business of providing financial services, not of enforcing ambiguous gaming bans.

Banks may choose to comply with these regulations by blocking all Internet gaming transactions. Foreseeing this, the regulation authors actually devised a term for this – “overblocking”. This overblocking could cause many problems for legitimate businesses, including the domestic horse racing industry, despite its specific exclusion from the provisions of the Act. Additionally, banks could overblock offshore poker sites that are not in violation of any federal or state law. As the United States recently lost its trade dispute (and its final appeal) with Antigua and Barbuda with regards to providing of cross-border betting services, additional restrictions via overblocking resulting from these regulations could result in increased WTO penalties, especially as domestic financial transactions are largely excluded from these regulations.

I urge the committee to review this situation during the Internet gaming hearing and to carefully consider the need for clarifying legislation. There are two bills currently in the House that correct this situation. HR 2610, the Skill Game Protection Act, clarifies federal law by expressly exempting games of skill like poker from UIGEA. HR 2046, the Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act, regulates online poker via stringent licensing regulations for poker site operators. Both bills have rigorous safeguards against underage and compulsive gambling. And, neither bill forces any state to permit online poker; states can opt out if they wish. I urge the committee to recommend passage of these bills to clarify UIGEA and the Wire Act. Our financial institutions deserve to know exactly what they are required to prevent.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

TheEngineer

[TheEngineer]

Here's a good article by our friends at CATO (Radley Balko testified at both the June 8 Frank hearing and during the Fly-In) on the fact that it's limited government conservative defections that imperil the Republican Party's chances in the next election: www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,312356,00.html .

[ QUOTE ]
...it was the Republicans’ big-spending, big-government ways that helped ensure their defeat in the 2006 midterm elections. It wasn’t evangelical Christians or so-called "values voters" who deserted Republicans. Roughly 70 percent of white evangelicals and born-again Christians voted Republican in 2006, just a fraction less than in 2004.

[/ QUOTE ]

Michael Duncan, RNC chairman, may be interested to hear your opinion on this. Let's send him some emails telling him how we'll respond if the Republican Party platform contains calls to ban Internet poker like the last one did. He's from Kentucky, so I'm sure he noticed what appealing only to social conservatives got him in this month's statewide election.

[TheEngineer]

www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,312356,00.html

[Legislurker]

BAD URL.