If a Pro-Poker Bill Passes -- Will this Help Sports Bettors?

[ritehook]

USA Today -as I noted in another thread - had a story on the three bills pending in the US Congress that would legalize online poker playing.

I haven't read these bills, so I don't know the details of them.

But consider: many (most?) offshore sportsbooks also have casinos,and I guess that their online casinos offer interactive poker, playing against other players.

So if that becomes OK in the eyes of US law, it would also be OK to transmit money from here to there, and reverse.

Since the US has chosen to crack down on the banks who process the book transfers, how would they distinguish between money sent to Joe's Offshore Book and Poker Room that is for poker, and that which would be used to bet sports?

In reality, no way. But if betting poker would be legal, then transmitting money back and forth to the book/casino would likewise be also.

It is possible that the pending poker-friendly bills will specify that only domestic (US based) poker sites would be valid under the law (ie, the big Vegas entities, which have been raady to go for this for years), but if the US thinks they have a problem now with the Antigua WTO complaint, that kind of restrictive US only action would bring a hailstorm

So, one of the pro- poker bills goes through, becomes law. The govt cannot then prevent money transfers to the now legal entities.

(Oh wait --- just thought of what they may do. In the law it will state something like: The online poker entity may NOT also be conducting online gambling that violates other US laws.)

[Seattle Slew]

They'll never pass. Even if they did, they don't help sports betting because it allows the leagues to op-out, which they all would do.

I wouldn't waste my time reading/following this stuff. It's all nonsense. The media talks it up because that's what they do, and in reality, they have no idea what they're talking about in many stories.

Example: How many stories start with "since the U.S. banned online gambling in 2006." What they banned was payment to/from sites.

[louis]

Absolutely it helps sportsbettors. This opens the door for payment processors like neteller to come back in. The processor can now send money to a sportsbook's poker room website. Then we can send money from the poker room to the sportsbook. It also makes it near impossible to procesecute a player for sportsbetting, unless the sportsbook releases its records showing the player bet sports as well as poker. Also, once the public sees that allowing poker did not create problems, they may be more willing to accept other forms of gaming.

[Dark Horse]

True. And it would allow the US government to save face towards the anti-gamblers, while getting the WTO off its back. All sportsbooks would have to do is set up a poker room. But this government would rather break than bend, so don't hold your breath.