Hold ‘Em

Since its inception, the Internet has been shaking things up due to its global reach. We predict that it will continue to do so in stronger and stronger ways. Beware repressive governments; your people see freedom across the border. The latest example is the unfortunate indictment of the founders of three leading gambling websites. These are legal businesses located in other countries, but which take bets from US citizens. The US has seized their domain names and bank accounts, charged them with wire fraud, and sued them in a civil action for $3,000,000,000, all for conducting a legal business in the country in which they are located. The US is in a minority of countries that have made online gambling illegal. As the Buzz’s father used to say, “The Government prosecutes the Mafia because it hates competition.” The regressive tax on people bad at math called the lottery is OK but not online gambling. The US has even gone so far as to arrest gambling site execs as they visit the US. We guess multiculturalism is bad only when it involves things you decided to make illegal.

-- Paul Marotta