GOOD Wall Street Journal Story

[I dunno]

First of all, is it even true we have any
[ QUOTE ]
laws that banned foreign firms from offering Internet gambling services in the U.S.


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[oldbookguy]

By simply saying 'gambling services' probably yes, sports betting. Everyone has jumped on this, if it had said poker, the answer would /should be no since federal courts have ruled to the contrary. The UIGEA does include 'games of chance' but, since many 'skill' games have an even greater element of chance......As Sen. Kyl suggested, have a court say poker is included as well or we can hope for the Wexler Bill.

obg

[mntbikr15]

Engineer,

Can we use your letter straight up, or should we be writing our own?

[TheEngineer]

[ QUOTE ]
Engineer,

Can we use your letter straight up, or should we be writing our own?

[/ QUOTE ]

You can use it however you'd like.

Thanks for writing.

[TheEngineer]

August 24, 2007

Motion Picture Association of America
Dan Glickman, Chairman and CEO
Washington, DC
1600 Eye St., NW
Washington, DC 20006

Dear Mr. Glickman:

I read with great concern articles in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal concerning upcoming WTO sanctions on U.S. businesses to compensate for the government’s restricting of access to our Internet gaming market. [The articles are available online at www.nytimes.com/2007/08/23/business/worldbusiness/23gamble.html?ref=business and at http://online.wsj.com/public/article...870406171.html.] The articles are very troubling, as it appears the U.S. is already preparing to give billions of dollars in trade concessions, which include copyright and intellectual property rights, to the EU, Antigua & Barbuda, and other nations to keep its Internet gaming restrictions. Also, the U.S. is willing to weaken the WTO by backing out of a previously agreed-upon sector of GATS. While it is bad enough that the Bush administration would choose to not allow people the freedom to choose to play poker in their own homes with their own money simply to appease Focus on the Family, expecting our most successful industries and our largest employers to finance this decision to the tune of billions of dollars per year in trade concessions is egregious.

What makes this even worse is that, had Congress truly felt Internet gaming was wrong, they could have avoided this trade issue by simply banning all Internet gaming. However, this was not the case. Congress specifically allowed interstate horse racing and fantasy football to be wagered over the Internet (apparently these are more moral than poker to someone in Congress). So, in essence, our motion picture industry is being asked to subsidize these two activities, which I’ve nicknamed the Mitch McConnell Horse Racing Subsidy and the NFL Fantasy Football Tax.

Negotiations with the European Union over this issue are scheduled for next month. I urge you to speak up before the United States Trade Representative places these taxes on your shoulders.

Sincerely,

TheEngineer

[YoureToast]

[ QUOTE ]
August 24, 2007

Motion Picture Association of America
Dan Glickman, Chairman and CEO
Washington, DC
1600 Eye St., NW
Washington, DC 20006

Dear Mr. Glickman:

I read with great concern articles in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal concerning upcoming WTO sanctions on U.S. businesses to compensate for the government’s restricting of access to our Internet gaming market. [The articles are available online at www.nytimes.com/2007/08/23/business/worldbusiness/23gamble.html?ref=business and at http://online.wsj.com/public/article...870406171.html.] The articles are very troubling, as it appears the U.S. is already preparing to give billions of dollars in trade concessions, which include copyright and intellectual property rights, to the EU, Antigua & Barbuda, and other nations to keep its Internet gaming restrictions. Also, the U.S. is willing to weaken the WTO by backing out of a previously agreed-upon sector of GATS. While it is bad enough that the Bush administration would choose to not allow people the freedom to choose to play poker in their own homes with their own money simply to appease Focus on the Family, expecting our most successful industries and our largest employers to finance this decision to the tune of billions of dollars per year in trade concessions is egregious.

What makes this even worse is that, had Congress truly felt Internet gaming was wrong, they could have avoided this trade issue by simply banning all Internet gaming. However, this was not the case. Congress specifically allowed interstate horse racing and fantasy football to be wagered over the Internet (apparently these are more moral than poker to someone in Congress). So, in essence, our motion picture industry is being asked to subsidize these two activities, which I’ve nicknamed the Mitch McConnell Horse Racing Subsidy and the NFL Fantasy Football Tax.

Negotiations with the European Union over this issue are scheduled for next month. I urge you to speak up before the United States Trade Representative places these taxes on your shoulders.

Sincerely,

TheEngineer


[/ QUOTE ]

You're ridiculously awesome.

When online poker is finally legalized, I will seek you out whereever you live (or in Vegas at some high limit table we are both bankrolled for due to online poker winnings) to give you a big hug, buy you a beer and if things are really going well in my life, maybe even a brand new car (or a girl, or whatever you want).

Seriously, thanks for everything you're doing.

Toast

[TheEngineer]

I posted this topic at eog.com, if anyone's interested, at http://forums.eog.com/online-sportsbooks...city-97659.html .

[TheEngineer]

[ QUOTE ]
You're ridiculously awesome.

When online poker is finally legalized, I will seek you out whereever you live (or in Vegas at some high limit table we are both bankrolled for due to online poker winnings) to give you a big hug, buy you a beer and if things are really going well in my life, maybe even a brand new car (or a girl, or whatever you want).

Seriously, thanks for everything you're doing.

Toast

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for the compliments! [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] I may take you up on that beer, once we have our final victory.

I'm glad we're all fighting back together.

[TheEngineer]

I emailed every Democratic senator this morning (they all accept email from everyone), plus Rep. Pelosi, with a tweaked version of the email I posted above (I like to reuse these as much as possible, as should we all, I think). I sent Sen. Reid a hardcopy as well:


August 25, 2007

Senator Harry Reid
528 Hart Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510

Dear Senator Reid:

I read with great concern articles in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal concerning upcoming WTO sanctions on U.S. businesses to compensate for the government’s restricting of access to our Internet gaming market. [The articles are available online at www.nytimes.com/2007/08/23/business/worldbusiness/23gamble.html?ref=business and at http://online.wsj.com/public/article...870406171.html .] The articles are very troubling. It appears the U.S. is already preparing to give billions of dollars in trade concessions, which include copyright and intellectual property rights, to the EU, Antigua & Barbuda, Japan, China, and other nations in order to keep our federal Internet gaming restrictions. Also, the U.S. is willing to weaken the WTO by backing out of a previously agreed-upon sector of GATS. While it is bad enough that the Bush administration and Congressional Republicans would choose to use the power of the federal government to keep people from choosing to play poker in their own homes with their own money simply to appease Focus on the Family, the fact that they now expect our most successful industries, our largest employers, and the our workers to finance this decision to the tune of billions of dollars per year in trade concessions and even more offshored jobs is egregious.

What makes this even worse is that, had Congressional Republicans truly felt Internet gaming was “wrong”, they could have avoided this trade issue by simply banning all Internet gaming. However, this was not the case either. With a bold display of hypocrisy (even by their standards), they specifically allowed interstate horse racing and fantasy football to be wagered over the Internet. So, in essence, American workers and businesses are subsidizing these two activities, which I’ve nicknamed the Mitch McConnell Horse Racing Subsidy and the NFL Fantasy Football Tax.

As for issues with Internet gaming itself, the June 8, 2007 House Financial Services Committee hearing on the subject conclusively proved that Internet gaming can be effectively taxed and regulated for fairness, age and identity verification, and control of compulsive behaviors. The rest of the democratic world permits its citizens to make their own decisions regarding playing cards on the Internet. It seems Americans should be as free as Eastern Europeans and Russians.

Negotiations with the European Union over this issue are scheduled for next month. I urge you to speak up before the United States Trade Representative places these taxes on the shoulders of your constituents.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,



TheEngineer

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

EU Service Firms Could Gain U.S. Access Thanks to Internet Gambling Case
By JOHN W. MILLER, Wall Street Journal
August 23, 2007; Page A2

BRUSSELS -- The Bush administration, pressured by an unfavorable ruling by the World Trade Organization, plans to push for legal changes that could make it easier for European service companies, from engineering firms to law firms and shipping companies, to do business in the U.S., officials say.

The U.S. is required to offer trading partners greater access to the American market because in May it lost a long-running dispute at the World Trade Organization over laws that banned foreign firms from offering Internet gambling services in the U.S.

• The News: The White House plans to push for changes that could make it easier for European service companies to do business in the U.S.
• The Background: After the U.S. banned foreign gambling Web sites, EU trade officials sought compensation for billions of euros in lost income. The U.S. has been in a trade dispute over online gambling since 2003, mainly with Antigua and Barbuda.
• What's Next: EU and U.S. negotiators are working out details of a compensation offer to open some sectors of the U.S. services market to greater foreign competition.Europe's online gambling firms were hit particularly hard and complained to the European Union's executive arm in Brussels. EU trade officials took up the matter with the WTO, seeking compensation for billions of euros in lost income. The EU invoked a rarely used WTO rule that requires a country that closes one market to foreign companies to open others to compensate trading partners.

A host of countries, including India, Japan and Canada, have filed similar claims for compensation, but the talks with the EU and its $8 trillion service sector promise to have the biggest financial impact. As a result, while any affected sectors would be opened to all 150 WTO members, European companies stand to gain the most.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative this month began talks with EU officials on opening some sectors of the U.S. services market to greater foreign competition.

To be sure, the issue will be contentious and subject to fierce lobbying. Congress and state legislatures would have to sign off on changing laws that now protect American service concerns. States generally control access to sectors like insurance, engineering and legal services. The federal government controls foreign access to activities like shipping, telecommunications and postal services.


The U.S. Internet gambling market is valued at more than $15 billion, so the outcome of the U.S.-EU negotiations will likely be worth billions of euros to European companies. "We have to offer something substantive," says a senior U.S. official.

Global trade in services is growing quickly. U.S. consumers bought $314.6 billion of foreign services in 2005, twice as much as in 1997, including banking, insurance and airplane trips. The areas in which European companies hope to gain greater access include insurance, legal services and mail delivery, says Pascal Kerneis, secretary-general of the European Services Forum, a Brussels lobbying group.

One example of the kind of practice the EU could seek to change: Today, a foreign lawyer or law firm can't practice law in New Jersey without residing in the U.S. (though they can in Maryland). Foreign companies are also prohibited from offering some forms of legal services in Delaware, a lucrative market because of the high number of corporate registrations in the state.

This means U.S. trade officials have to include states in their negotiations. Setting policy on trade in goods, by contrast, is relatively simple because the federal government controls tariffs on all imports.

According to several legal experts, the states might not be easy to win over. "Frankly, I'd be very surprised if the Bush administration pushes for federal legislation that would affect access to U.S. markets for foreign lawyers," says Laurel Terry, a professor at the Penn State Dickinson School of Law and an expert in the regulation of the legal industry. "The issue of lawyer regulation is very sensitive and has traditionally been handled by the state judiciary."

The U.S. is required to submit a formal offer of market access to the EU by Sept. 22. If the sides disagree, a WTO panel will arbitrate. That has never happened in a case on services, so the outcome would set a precedent. In the end, the U.S. could hope to mollify the EU by offering trade concessions in other protected areas where the EU and U.S. disagree, including agriculture, military contracts or subsidies to aircraft makers.

British gambling companies such as 888 Holdings PLC and Party Gaming PLC -- which drew more than half their revenue from the U.S. -- lost billions in stock-market value after a new U.S. law banned credit-card companies from receiving payments from foreign gaming Web sites.

The USTR could be bailed out by Congress were it to change the law to again allow foreign firms to offer online gambling. Several such bills are on the table.

"The U.S. could make this all go away by passing legislation," says Nao Matsukata, a former senior U.S trade official and a policy adviser at Alston & Bird, which represents clients on online-gaming issues.

So far, none of the bills have garnered enough support. European gambling companies say they have given up hope of doing business in the lucrative U.S. market for now.

The forced concession to the EU on services marks the end of a losing battle the U.S. has fought at the WTO, mainly with the Caribbean nation of Antigua and Barbuda. In 2003, the country challenged U.S. prosecution of foreign online-gambling companies. The U.S. argued it was entitled to ban foreign gambling companies because it couldn't have foreseen the rise of the Internet when it first pledged to open part of its services market in 1994.

[TheEngineer]

I was able to email every Democratic senator, plus Rep. Pelosi, in under an hour. In case anyone's interested, it can be done by going to http://www.senate.gov/general/contac...nators_cfm.cfm for the alphabetical list of senators, then by opening each senator's contact site (I was opening two or three at a time in separate tabs). If the AutoFill function on your particular browser doesn't seem to work, refresh the page...it will always come back. Start with the letter to be sent on the clipboard, then paste the note, add the senator's last name, and hit the send button. Three Demomcratic senators use real email. Just do those last (I clicked the link to start the new message, then minimized until done with the others).