U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#131

Post by tkxxx7 » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 10:59 PM UTC

shkkmo wrote: post #110

tkxxx7 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So how is that different from hedging your bets? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think the difference is, no one is betting that you actually do have an unforeseen incident, so there is no bet to hedge against.

> I think the difference is, no one is betting that you actually do have an unforeseen incident, You are. When you buy insurance, you are betting that you will have an unforeseen incident and will utilize your insurance. The fact that you are doing so to offset some financial risk doesn't change the fact that you are gambling. I don't see why source of a risk matters here. I believe the position I am arguing against…

> You are. When you buy insurance, you are betting that you will have an unforeseen incident and will utilize your insurance.

Almost, but I don't feel like this is 100% accurate, because neither involved party wants an unforeseen incident to occur - the 'win' situation, if you could call it that, is the same for both parties. I can sort of see the argument that you are betting you "won't win", but I can't see it as gambling behavior:

> I don't see why source of a risk matters here.

Gambling implies taking a risk for possible gain, no? To me, part of the difference is that the risk/chance involved (life) is not intrinsic to the transaction - it is more or less known what your returns will be, and under what conditions. Contrast this to, say, a slot machine, where the 'win' conditions are owned by the house and unbeknownst to you. There is no situation where you can know you will be paid out for any given parameters.

What about flight insurance? Is that a gamble because no one knows if you'll make your flight? Are you betting that you won't make your flight because you purchased it, or are you paying for a conditional service?

(mostly not serious) aside: if what you posit is true, is the peace of mind one gains from having insurance akin to gambling addiction?

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#132

Post by Passthepeas » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:14 PM UTC

the_watcher wrote: post #115

Congress could moot all of this by simply passing (or repealing existing law) a law that leaves the issues to the states in question. While online gambling poses issues when not all states adopt the same rules, just treat it like sales tax and require the vendor (and gambler) to obey the laws of the state of the gambler. Sure, there would be vendors and gamblers who don't obey this, but there are already gambling pro…

It has always perplexed me why there is a desire to deal with kind of thing at the federal level in the first place. States being able to decide these things for themselves is supposed to be what makes such a massive country stay functional.

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#133

Post by dgzl » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:15 PM UTC

the_watcher wrote: post #115

Congress could moot all of this by simply passing (or repealing existing law) a law that leaves the issues to the states in question. While online gambling poses issues when not all states adopt the same rules, just treat it like sales tax and require the vendor (and gambler) to obey the laws of the state of the gambler. Sure, there would be vendors and gamblers who don't obey this, but there are already gambling pro…

> Congress could moot all of this by simply passing (or repealing existing law) a law that leaves the issues to the states in question.

You mean like your 9th and 10th Amendment rights from the Bill of Rights?

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#134

Post by int_19h » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:17 PM UTC

pnw_hazor wrote: post #114

cphoover wrote: post #43

Sheldon Adelson = Big GOP money. "Adelson's newspaper, the Las Vegas Review-Journal, was the only major newspaper nationwide to endorse Trump.[42][43] Adelson was also the largest donor to Trump's inaugural celebrations, with a $5 million donation to the celebrations.[44]" -- Wikipedia

Well it has been a felony for years in Washington state. Not really a Trump stronghold. "For Washington State residents, all gambling on the Internet is illegal, including all types of sports betting. " https://www.wsgc.wa.gov/about-us/frequently-asked-questions/... edit: quote+link

Anti-gambling sentiment and related laws in US date back to the 19th century. But those laws didn't discriminate between various types of gambling, it was all illegal. Washington is one of the states that never relaxed it fully. To this day, casinos are only legal on reservations, for example.

https://statelaws.findlaw.com/washington-law/washington-gamb...

So this all is separate from the Federal Wire Act, and the even more recent discussion on how to interpret it wrt online gambling.

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#135

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:19 PM UTC

Passthepeas wrote: post #132

the_watcher wrote: post #115

Congress could moot all of this by simply passing (or repealing existing law) a law that leaves the issues to the states in question. While online gambling poses issues when not all states adopt the same rules, just treat it like sales tax and require the vendor (and gambler) to obey the laws of the state of the gambler. Sure, there would be vendors and gamblers who don't obey this, but there are already gambling pro…

It has always perplexed me why there is a desire to deal with kind of thing at the federal level in the first place. States being able to decide these things for themselves is supposed to be what makes such a massive country stay functional.

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#136

Post by RugnirViking » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:20 PM UTC

coralreef wrote: post #7

In contrast: "The Supreme Court cleared the way on Monday for states to legalize sports betting, striking down a 1992 federal law that had prohibited most states from authorizing sports betting." https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/14/politics/sports-betting-ncaa-...

Am I understanding you right? You are not currently allowed to bet on the outcome of sporting events anywhere in the US? That's fascinating news to me

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#137

Post by int_19h » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:22 PM UTC

EpicEng wrote: post #103

leetcrew wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> surely society benefits if we prevent a large number of our members from falling prey to addiction. how does society benefit from prohibiting people from doing things that only hurt themselves?

It doesn't only hurt themselves. They are tax paying citizens and the government has an interest in their welfare. They may have dependents. Now Timmy can't go to college because Dad blew their savings. They get a divorce, now mom and dad are depressed and Timmy enters a life of crime (or, less hyperbolic; doesn't make as much taxable revenue as he could have otherwise.) There are all sorts of laws which protect peop…

Seatbelt laws aren't just about protecting yourself. Someone who is not wearing a seatbelt is a threat to others in a crash. For example, a person on the rear seat can actually kill the person in the front seat by blunt skull trauma (hitting the skull from behind with their forehead). And people in the front seats can become projectiles, going through the windshield and hitting people outside.

As far as the general notion that government has an overriding interest in people's welfare - that same logic would trivially justify abortion bans, forced marriage and labor, and all kinds of other nasty stuff.

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#138

Post by pnw_hazor » Tue, Jan 15, 2019, 11:35 PM UTC

int_19h wrote: post #134

pnw_hazor wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well it has been a felony for years in Washington state. Not really a Trump stronghold. "For Washington State residents, all gambling on the Internet is illegal, including all types of sports betting. " https://www.wsgc.wa.gov/about-us/frequently-asked-questions/... edit: quote+link

Anti-gambling sentiment and related laws in US date back to the 19th century. But those laws didn't discriminate between various types of gambling, it was all illegal. Washington is one of the states that never relaxed it fully. To this day, casinos are only legal on reservations, for example. https://statelaws.findlaw.com/washington-law/washington-gamb... So this all is separate from the Federal Wire Act, and the ev…

Making all Internet gambling in WA a felony is a relatively recent thing. Passed by progressives for their political allies the Indian Tribes. (WA doesn't even get any share of the gaming proceeds.)

I know it is separate from the Federal Wire Act, but I present it as a counter to the commenters here that seem to believe restricting online gambling is some kind of a Trump/GOP thing.

Progressive democratic party politicians are more than happy to criminalize online gambling when powerful interest groups that give them money ask for it.

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#139

Post by shkkmo » Wed, Jan 16, 2019, 12:18 AM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #126

shkkmo wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which makes it roughly the opposite of betting, in most uses. In what way is it opposite? How is more betting somehow the opposite of betting? Let's say I bet $10 that team A will beat team B with 1:10 odds (I would win 100) and then team A does really well so at half-time I bet $10 that B will beat team A with 1:2 odds (I would win 20) I have now hedged my bets and I will at least break even. Under your understand…

That's complicated because you're changing your bet as the odds move, which is pretty gambly. If you were doing both bets before the game started, at about the same time, then the second bet would effectively not be gambling. Not because of your motivation, exactly, but because it reduces the variance in how much money you'll have at the end of the game. If you buy a matched pair of tickets so that you guarantee a $6…

I don't get how your argument about time relates. You don't acquire the risk of injury, death or property damage at the same time you purchase insurance. In both cases under discussion, there is existing risk that is mitigated by betting.

> If you were doing both bets before the game started, at about the same time, then the second bet would effectively not be gambling. Not because of your motivation, exactly, but because it reduces the variance in how much money you'll have at the end of the game.

I would agree that if you could make both bets simultaneously that would not be gambling, but I don't see how that is relevant

In my example, both of the second bets reduce the variance in how much money you could gain or lose. 90,-10 after the second bet becomes 80,0 or 70,10

> Let's say you had a bet on team A forced upon you, because of where you live or something. At that point buying a matching bet on team B is an anti-gambling behavior that removes variance from the system. It's the equivalent of insurance.

Why does the source of the risk matter? You have said that gambling is based not on intention, but on effect on outcome variance. Why would the second bet in your example be any different from the second bet in mine?

Let's go with a more real world example. Let's say you have a shop near a stadium in the UK and you place bets so that you win money on outcomes that are likely to lead to vandalism or looting. My understanding of your position is that this is not gambling unless the shopkeeper miss-estimates his risk and bets so much that he gets vandalized and still comes out ahead.

In my view, the distinction between gambling and insurance is purely marketing and public relations.

I might buy a case that insurance companies don't gamble the same way that some bookies don't gamble, because they have the information they need to safely hedge their bets with certainty as they are made.

In my view, consumers generally have much less information about the risks they are hedging, that means they can't have the certainty required for buying insurance to not be gambling

Re: U.S. Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets

#140

Post by dmurray » Wed, Jan 16, 2019, 12:27 AM UTC

Passthepeas wrote: post #132

the_watcher wrote: post #115

Congress could moot all of this by simply passing (or repealing existing law) a law that leaves the issues to the states in question. While online gambling poses issues when not all states adopt the same rules, just treat it like sales tax and require the vendor (and gambler) to obey the laws of the state of the gambler. Sure, there would be vendors and gamblers who don't obey this, but there are already gambling pro…

It has always perplexed me why there is a desire to deal with kind of thing at the federal level in the first place. States being able to decide these things for themselves is supposed to be what makes such a massive country stay functional.

Human hubris. If you're a federal lawmaker, and you know you make great laws, why wouldn't you want all 50 states to get the benefit of your wise decision-making?

In so far as the federal government can unilaterally expand its reach, it will tend to do so, if just because being part of the federal government makes you more likely to think things should be regulated at the federal level. The authors of the Constitution knew this, and drafted it to safeguard the rights of state governments. But "states's rights" has been a dirty word for quite some time.