Leave the Gamblers Alone

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On Fox Business News show titled "Leave the Gamblers Alone" host John Stossel and poker player Andy Bloch took on some powerful personalities who are in the forefront of the opposition to online gambling. One was Chad Hills of Focus on the Family and the other was Republican Senator Jon Kyl from Arizona.

Bloch set the ball rolling by pointing out that banning an activity, like gambling, does not eliminate it. It simply drives the activity underground, where it is practiced in a more dangerous way. Hills responded, "I'm like, good, drive it underground." He added that driving gambling underground would make it extremely difficult for people to engage in it and only those who were really desperate would take the trouble to break the law. Stossel disagreed with Hills' view point. He opined that those who wanted to gamble would find gambling sites or other means. He added that prohibition would lead to corruption because enforcement officials would take bribes to "look the other way".

The second point that Hills and Kyl made was gambling leading to addiction, which in turn led to bankruptcy, crime and suicide. This danger was greater where kids were the victims. Stossel agreed that children should not gamble and acknowledged that some people do end up with a problem. But in the end it was all about self responsibility. Bloch pointed out that 99% of the American population did not have a problem. "They should have the freedom to gamble if they want to gamble online. There is no casino that is being forced into people's homes." A free country is supposed to treat individuals like self responsible adults.

Hills went one step further. He believed that gambling was immoral and should not be allowed even if there were no undesirable social consequences. "Gambling is the art and the science of deception that feeds on the exploitation of human weakness for the sole purpose of monetary gain." Stossel countered this line of thinking by saying even the stock market and movies fit into the definition propounded by Hills. He asked if these should be banned as well.

Finally Stossel put forward an argument that is difficult to beat. The government runs its own gambling operations in state lotteries and even sells tickets online. And these have a house edge of almost 50%. If this was not enough they use the tax collected from the rich to market the lotteries to the poor. Meanwhile online gambling is declared illegal. Americans gamble at offshore web sites and America loses revenue.

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