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Ultra conservative Republican Joe Barton and Liberal Barney Frank are working on a bill that would legalize Internet poker. They are in the process of presenting their measure to a subcommittee in charge of slashing the deficit.
Ironically, a member of this chosen subcommittee is none other than Jon Kyl, the Republican outgoing Senator from Arizona who authored the current online gambling prohibition.
Politico.com couldn’t help but notice the irony in such bipartisanship when it comes to legalizing a multi-billion dollar industry.
While the odds are long for getting the panel to include a provision for online gaming, or even just online poker, as part of its final deficit-reduction package, the stunning depth and breadth of support for a niche industry, particularly one recently embroiled in a legal scandal, reveals the political payoff of an industry’s sustained lobbying effort.
“Several of us are trying to get it into the supercommittee,” Frank told POLITICO. “It would create $40 billion [in revenue] over 10 years.”
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- Chris Costigan, Gambling911.com Publisher
