The American Spectator

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Off-shore sports books, casinos, and poker sites are armed with a 2002 Federal Appellate Court ruling from New Orleans that the Wire Act has nothing to do with on-line gambling. The rule said non-sports events did not fall under the rule and gaming lawyers have since concluded the ruling also means sporting events.

But there is more.

There is the on-going battle in the World Court over the federal government's attempt to force the legal, licensed sports books of Antigua to stop taking bets from the United States. The World Court has ruled in favor of the government of Antigua on this issue, noting the attempt is a classic example of restraint of trade, but the feds are still swatting windmills.

While I do not wish to even pretend I speak for the millions of people who bet sports, I believe they have had it up to their eyeballs with the federal government's anti-sports betting stance -- something fueled and driven by Bible belt snake-handlers anointed by The Holy Ghost, and by the professional sports leagues.

The hypocrisy of it all would make a buzzard puke.

The U.S. House of Representatives and the United States Senate carry water for this small minority of religious zealots and for the National Football League, the National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball.

In the meantime, the American public is permitted to bet on state-run lotteries, which are the biggest swindles in the history of gambling. Think about it -- you have an even money chance to win a football bet but buck odds of up to 127 million-to-1 to win the lottery.

The NFL is the biggest hypocrite in sports. It opposes all sports betting in the United States but is working night and day to make a go of NFL Europe, where sports betting is legal and conducted in every single country where it fields a team. Yes, folks, a bookmaker on every European corner -- and the NFL does not object.

The NBA owes its life to those who bet on it, but in the United States the league says, no to it all. Yet, in Europe, where it hopes to expand, sports betting is legal.

As for Major League Baseball, it too opposes sports betting but is too busy right now trying to confiscate the gallons of steroids being pumped into its playgrounds.

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Education, Trade, John McCain, Sports, Islam, Books, Law, Supreme Court, Iraq, Israel, NATO, Fascism