Puritanism, Protectionism and Ramblings on the American Way
The time of Armageddon has arrived. The Four Horsemen wait eagerly with anticipation. Carnage and destitution are inevitable. It’s the end of the world as we know it and things sure don’t look like they will be all that fine. The moment of reckoning has arrived.
For those with significant financial interests in the world of online gambling, the future looks bleak. Bad days lay ahead and those trawling the streets chasing a free soup and mumbling about teasers and the day the dream ended will soon be on the rise.
Those in the business of the punt have been hurled into the turnbuckle. They wait, eyes glazed with panic, for the massive elbow-to-the-jaw which is sure to follow.
This is the optimistic view of those online betting companies with exposure to the U.S market after a bill that is aimed to prohibit online gambling in the United States passed through, among much politicking and trickery, the House and Senate and awaits only the President’s John Hancock before it is etched in stone among the hallowed pages of American law.
To a certain degree they are right. Shares have plummeted. Billions of dollars have been lost. Many are on the dole queue or are at the very least doing some research into where said queue may be.
But in the end, nothing is going to change. It can’t. And it won’t. The practicalities of the whole messy legislation will see to that.
To those who understand American politics and history, this comes as no surprise. Moralising politicking is The American Way.
Avid Reader, I can feel you shudder now, your mind on the seemingly inevitable upcoming realisation. Another Anti-American tirade from a poor, ill-informed hack. More American hating propaganda. Do not fear. Some writers- admittedly stark in number- can call the American scene the way it is. Mark Latham-style thoughtless and loony American bashing will not be found in the words that follow.
To the contrary. Captain Punt is one of the few who embraces American culture, viewing it with the same validity, stature and importance as any other. I am not ashamed to say that I have enjoyed the delicacies at the most recognisable American eating house, McDonalds. That most American of institutions- professional wrestling- is a personal religion that I follow devoutly. Great American sitcoms- The Single Guy, The Facts of Life, Murphy Brown, Sanford and Son, Step By Step, Coach- are the sustenance of substance recovery. Colonel Sanders, Donnie Baseball, Ned Dorsey, Dick Nixon, Dr Gonzo and Johnny Cash are all heroes of the highest order. I am overcome with nostalgia when I read Whitman. I beat down those throwing simplistic arguments on ways to cure the U.S with fact and reality.
Gentle Folk, I am not one to kick America in the balls. Like all issues and all incidents, they are judged on their merit with fairness and equity. I have the poise and ethical nous of a modern day Oliver Wendell Holmes.
On the issue of banning online gambling, I will not be defending the United States. Rather, voracious attacks and penetrating screeds are in the wind.
Attempts by American lawmakers to shutdown online gambling comes as no shock. This is a continuation of the Puritanism that saw witches burned four centuries ago and Communists jailed during the period of McCarthyism. There has always been a strong puritanical streak in American politics and the American way of life and the only way to deal with immoral behaviour is a blanket policy of prohibition.
When the political landscape becomes favourable, the puritanical urges advance from belief to policy to law. Currently, the American political landscape is ripe for those with an anti-gambling slant. The Christian Right, the most tangible, unified and organised political demographic in the United States, have become increasingly powerful and they are firmly in the anti-gambling box. Conservative members linked to tainted lobbyist Jack Abramoff- a man who worked the floor in the name of gambling- are trying to distance themselves from the man and the issue-position. Powerful organisations, such as the NFL, are spending serious money to ensure gambling is essentially prohibited in the United States, despite the fact gambling propelled football from a sport regarded as ridiculous and barbaric to the stature of new National Pastime. Mid-term elections have those with conservative electorates looking for easily graspable issues to hang their hats on. The Right have firm control over most power-bases in Washington and with the possibility of losing some in November, are keen to make hay while the sun shines, as farmers and land-rapists are often heard to say.
These factors, combined with a natural and hypocritical tendency to practical protectionism in the United States, have led us to where we are now: American legislation attempting to ban online gambling, non-directly, effecting most of the online gambling industry, the American banking and finance industries and the rights of every American citizen to spend their income in whatever way they see fit. Said citizens can, of course, purchase a gun and are constitutionally assured of this right yet cannot log on to their PC and wager on a game of football or engage in a game of poker between consenting adults. By God, I have always feared the parlay more than the pistol!
There is no doubt, from the view of not only the punter and the bookmaker, but the view of the free citizen, that this legislation is reprehensible and is hardly in accordance with the certain unalienable rights declared at independence regarding life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. But the world will not end for online gambling proprietors, the saving grace being the impracticalities of enforcement.
Legislators have deemed it illegal for financial institutions to process transactions with organisations in the business of gambling and gaming. The costs, both in a financial and time sense, of such enforcement would be astronomical and will not be borne by the most money conscious industry in the world. Coupled with the fact the United States has no jurisdiction over international transaction firms like Neteller, who can legally transfer funds from American citizens to bookmaking firms, the game is not over for punters and gambling firms alike. And we have not even mentioned the privacy issues which could befell all this. Ye Gods!
It certainly is not time to cash out. Rather, the best bet seems to be to purchase as much cheap stock in as many gambling firms as possible because when the waters calm and the doomsday rhetoric has lowered in volume and voracity, nothing much will have changed from the gambling world we operate in today. This is the fundamental way American politics works. All show and little substance.
When it comes to enforcement of this legislation, just how little substance is actually part of the act will soon be realised and we can all just return to finding winners and drinking with gay abandon.