Anti-online gambling body to hold RAWA press conference today
News on 28 Oct 2015
News on 28 Oct 2015
It looks as if supporters of the Adelson-inspired and drafted Restoration of America’s Wire Act are poised for another push on the controversial online gambling ban bill, currently languishing at committee stage in Congress (see previous reports).
On Tuesday the main campaign vehicle for the bills, the Coalition to Stop Internet Gambling began touting a Washington press conference scheduled for today (Wednesday 28 October) which will “discuss” the House version of the bill and feature its principal driver, Utah Republican Representative Jason Chaffetz, along with other CSIG luminaries.
The press release uses the opportunity to justify the RAWA ban by reiterating its concerns about the “…importance of protecting the right of families to keep online casinos out of their homes and off their children’s mobile devices.”
Participating groups at the conference show that it hardly likely to be a balanced affair; they include:
Concerned Women for America
Let Freedom Ring
Focus on the Family
Frontiers of Freedom
Network of Politically Active Christians
Latino Coalition
Advance USA
Liberty Counsel Action
The release also regurgitates the fear-mongering and half-truths which the the industry has come to expect from the CSIG, giving its version of the history of the Wire Act and the (in its view) flawed decision that it does not apply to online gambling arrived at by the Department of Justice after a two-year legal study.
“Since it’s (sic) implantation (sic) in 1961, various Administrations have held that the federal Wire Act bars Internet gambling,” the curiously inept author of the press release declares.
“That position has enjoyed bipartisan support from the public, their representatives and from the attorneys general of most states. But without any notice, consultation with Congress, or public input, the Justice Department on December 23, 2011 [actually it was September of that year], issued a legal opinion reversing that interpretation. The reversal unleashes the potential for an unregulated gambling industry to be imposed nationwide.”
The press release does not offer any explanation regarding how lawmakers in the ‘sixties could possibly have envisaged the internet, let alone gambling on it, decades before the Internet even existed.
This press conference is unlikely to provide fresh, balanced information but it is perhaps an indication that Adelson’s allies are gearing up for another push on RAWA.
