The rationale behind trying to outlaw Internet gambling is that gambling is an addictive behavior, and by making it easily accessible in the home, you're going to increase the number of gambling addicts out there. There is also some nonsense about online casino accounts being used to launder money, but I've never seen anything credible written about that rationale. I'm going to try to explain why this is an invalid rationale for outlawing gambling, especially video poker gambling.

First, I'm not entirely sure that I agree that gambling is an addictive behavior. IMO, the USA has become a painfully victimized culture, and we're constantly looking for others to blame for our mistakes and our faults. The claim of addiction makes it easy to blame something else for our mistakes. The bottom line is that if you don't have the money to lose, you shouldn't play. That's YOUR responsibility. It shouldn't prevent ME from doing what I want to do.

Second, lottery games are available in almost every state in the Union now. These are games are incredibly accessible at just about every gas station and grocery store you can find, and this is government-sponsored gambling. If the government wants to make gambling illegal, shouldn't it ALL be illegal? I don't think that during Prohibition the states were allowed to run state-owned bars were they?

On top of that, do you know what the payback percentage is on a lottery game? It's 50%. That means if you had a million dollars, and you spent it all on lottery tickets one day, you'd probably have about $500,000 the next day. If you continued to reinvest that money every day for 30 days at a loss of 50% per day, in 30 days you'd have no money left.

Most video poker games offer paybacks of 99% or so. At least the good ones do. It seems to me that if the government were seriously concerned about the welfare of gamblers in the USA, they'd ensure that the payback percentages on the games they themselves offered were a little better. Maybe the government should be running video poker games instead of the lottery in fact.

I'd love to see a nationwide boycott of lottery games until the government got its act together. Spend that money playing video poker instead, I say.

(Please note that this post is for entertainment purposes only and shouldn't be construed in any way as legal advice.)

Nice post. Don't hold your breath on that lottery boycott, though. I think lots of people would just die if they couldn't get their pack of smokes and lottery ticket.

The money laundering angle and lame attempt to somehow conjure up images of terrorists is particularly despicable IMHO.

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