[rolemand]

CBS 60 minutes has a story on this right now

[Illusion]

Thanks for the heads up. I would have missed it.

[LVHerbie]

I came in the house this afternoon and my wife was watching it... I really liked the segment where the underage kid is using his dad's CC to lose a bill on some online casino (goldenpalace I believe)... I'm sure he couldn't steal the card and go buy a damn pair of nikes at the mall, huh? Between my wife and I I think we have about 5 check-cards and ************ and none of them work on online sites...

Anyhow, I think my wife is now sure I'm going to jail sometime soon... But then again I'm sure there are more then one congressman who would love to turn me into an overnight felony, if they have their way, for betting some sports games online...

[bigboydan]

This was a repeat from a few months back. The only thing any different on this airing was the BOS part at the end of that segment.

[pags11]

they just had to get that BOS part in didn't they...they can't, of course, mention the pinny's of the world...typical media...

[MY BUM]

Just curious fellas as to what was said about BOS? My friend has money there.Thanks.

[bigboydan]

Just curious fellas as to what was said about BOS? My friend has money there.Thanks.

All they said about them really was that they don't accept players from the U.S. anymore.

[rolemand]

All they said about them really was that they don't accept players from the U.S. anymore.

Correct me if I'm wrong here but aren't they completely shutdown and not accepting wagers from anyone excluding Easybets. My point is they reaired the episode, included a couple sentences on BOS and seemingly didn't even get the whole truth out there. Just a piece of it.

[Dark Horse]

Corporately owned media. That's why this re-aired now. Nothing but propaganda.

Votes don't mean a thing in a totalitarian regime. Fits perfectly with Frist's initiative to slip this in with a defense bill. If this passes, it will pass without having been voted on.

Time to stand up. Fascists are no longer at the gate. They're in the house. And they don't care what anybody else thinks.

[Jay Edgar]

I like this point (by Jim Suriowiecki in this week's New Yorker):
the completely schizoid U.S. public policy discriminates wildly in favor of the dumber forms of gambling and stifles the scientific value of futures markets . . .

=======
Incoherent public policy is nothing new in Washington, of course. But our crazy-quilt approach to gambling leads to a raft of perverse consequences. In the first place, it means that the worst forms of gambling—from an economic perspective—are legal in most of the country, while a better form is outlawed. Lotteries and most casino games are games of pure chance; the house has an ineradicable advantage and, over time, the inevitable outcome is that gamblers lose. Mathematically speaking, as the saying goes, no one wins the lottery. Sports betting, by contrast, involves skill, and it is possible, although very difficult, to consistently win money on it. Sports bettors are closer to stock or commodities buyers than to people who buy lottery tickets. How much difference is there, after all, between betting on the future price of wheat (an activity banned in some states in the nineteenth century) and betting on the performance of a baseball team?

Furthermore, the ban on online betting is hindering the development of new markets that could predict far more important outcomes than that of the N.B.A. finals. In the past few years, a host of prediction markets, as they’re usually called, have appeared online, offering people the chance to speculate on subjects ranging from the box-office performance of Hollywood films to the outcome of Presidential elections and the spread of bird flu. These markets’ forecasts have proved remarkably accurate—just as bettors collectively do an exceptionally good job of predicting sports results. (In 2004, for instance, Tradesports, a Dublin-based prediction market, called thirty-three out of thirty-four races in the Senate correctly, and called all fifty states correctly in the results for the electoral college.) But in the U.S. these markets have to use play money, because using real money would constitute gambling. The online gambling ban prevents these markets from getting bigger and more accurate.

==========================

[Dark Horse]

Hey Jay Edgar! Been a while! Nice article...

I get so pis*ed off when I think about the regime in this country.

[Jay Edgar]

Has been a while, DH.

Glad to see a familiar face in here, making quality posts and fighting the good fight.

(And BTW, I love your "X-factor" capping tool in the other thread. A great concept -- there's a variation that's gotten very solid historical results in the college bowl season. I'll try to post it when the time comes.)

[Dark Horse]

Hope you hang around. We had some fun in here with March Madness.

[pags11]

yeah we did Darkhorse...