McCain and sports betting just don't mix

[Qbins Missile Crisis]

I’ve been periodically writing about the upcoming presidential election, discussing the various candidates' positions on gaming related issues as well as the potential for future legalization and regulation of the internet betting industry. Today, I’ll be writing about Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who has been rapidly gaining in the polls in recent weeks, with the Democratic nomination process dragging on and on.

There was a point earlier this year in which McCain and the Republicans were big underdogs in the offshore betting marketplace, but that is no longer the case. Right now, the race between McCain and whoever emerges victorious from the Clinton-Obama bloodbath can be expected to be very tight once again, perhaps just as tight as each of the last two presidential elections which each came down to a single key state (Florida in Bush’s 2000 win over Al Gore; Ohio in Bush’s 2004 victory over John Kerry).

I’m a one issue voter. My issue is slightly broader than just gambling – I look for candidates that support the concept of ‘personal freedom’ in the classic libertarian sense. I don’t want the federal government to act like my mother, telling me which socially acceptable activities (like gambling) are allowable for me to engage in. I don’t want the Feds prying into my personal affairs. I am a tax paying adult, not a child, and I don’t favor any sort of government intrusion into my private life.

The single issue that concerns me the most is not the biggest issue on any politician’s current agenda. There are legitimate reasons to be concerned about a complete Democratic takeover of the House, Senate and White House, despite recent broad indications of Democratic support for legalizing and regulating online gaming. But when you read the rest of this blog, as I break down John McCain’s track record for sports bettors, the choice becomes very clear. Sports bettors simply cannot vote for McCain if this particular issue means anything to them.

“McCain wants to eliminate what he sees as the most troubling aspects of legalized gambling in the United States. He has led the fight to ban gambling on college sports, a battle the Nevada casinos have won (so far), in part by suggesting that he would make Super Bowl and NCAA pools illegal. And McCain would ban Internet gambling -- not because it's addictive, but because players typically have no way of knowing whether they are in fair games.

“And just as important, McCain has come to see his role as skirmishing as long as it takes for public opinion to come around his way. About banning gambling on college sports, he says: "When the most respected coaches in college athletics come to me and say, 'We want this banned because we think it can have a terrible effect on young people, then I'm going to react.”

“For McCain, though, that's not the bottom line. "I'll give you a little straight talk," he says. "There's going to have to be another scandal, and there probably will be." That's McCain: waiting for the next, inevitable burst of bad news to come along, to present an opportunity not only to excoriate wrongdoers but to corral the powerful into doing the right thing. To take another step toward saving sports.”

Bettors remember McCain’s efforts to end legalized sports betting on amateur athletics from earlier this decade. It was a full on, frontal attack against the Nevada casinos, since Nevada is the only state in the union where bettors can legally wager on college sports, most notably college football and basketball.

(Gaming lobbyist) Mr. Fahrenkopf said that eliminating legal gambling in Nevada ''would simply make things worse by driving this underground'' while doing serious damage to the economy of Nevada.

According to industry figures, casinos and other gambling outlets in Nevada took in about $2.3 billion in sports bets last year, with an estimated one-third of that on college games. Law enforcement agencies say that represents only a tiny fraction of all betting on college sports.

''Somewhere between 97 and 99 percent of all the gambling on sports is done illegally,'' said Senator John Ensign, Republican of Nevada. ''To think that doing something about this tiny percentage in Nevada is going to do anything constructive is ludicrous.''

But to a key advocate of McCain's bill, former California Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy, the very idea of allowing legal gambling on college sports is abhorrent and counterproductive for society. "There is an important symbolism here," said McCarthy who was a member of the National Gambling Impact Study Commission in the late 1990s. The panel voted 5 to 3 to seek a ban on college sports betting.

"We should be concerned about the role model . . . college athletes (serve for) younger people as being extremely important. We on the commission felt very strongly it was important to maintain what college sports mean to young people," McCarthy said.

But University of Nevada at Reno Professor Richard Davies, co-author of "Betting the Line: Sports Wagering in American Life," called the McCain bill laughable. "It is so idealistic. It doesn't take into account the fact that the American people have bought into gambling," Davies said.

The facts here are clear. Neither Clinton nor Obama supported McCain’s legislation to further limit the already limited rights of sports bettors by making college sports betting illegal in Nevada. Both Clinton and Obama have supported the start of the current online legalization process, a federally sponsored study of the offshore gaming industry, legislation that McCain has opposed. And with McCain living in a fantasy land where outlawing legalized sports betting in Nevada would curb sports betting all over the country, it’s clear that John McCain is Public Enemy #1 for sports bettors in the upcoming election.

Posted: Tuesday, April 22, 2008 12:00 AM
Sportsmemo.com