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May 26 - It's hard to write an editorial about the American government's online gambling policy and how it relates to their hypocritical, arrogant, and ultimately untenable attitude at the WTO without the blood boiling, but there is good news on the horizon. China and the EU look set to side with Antigua on this matter and they may even impose sanctions on the USA...
First a brief overview of what has transpired in recent years at the WTO. The US likes to use the WTO when it serves their purposes, much as they use other international bodies. When the WTO disagrees with America's position they simply ignore the WTO, effectively making a mockery of the entire process.
The United States goverment has a blatanly hyprocitical position on online gambling. They claim it is immoral and that they need to protect their citizens from Internet gambling, but have carved out enormous loopholes for US horse racing websites. So you can gamble online on horse racing so long as you use American-based websites.
Antigua feels that this is blatant protectionism. Sportsbooks based in the tiny country would like to offer betting on the same horse races to USA clients, but cannot compete because their offshore companies are banned. How can the USA defend this policy?
The short answer is that they couldn't. They lost the case to Antigua and then simply ignored the ruling claiming that it was ambiguously worded. So Antigua petitioned the WTO again and in April a definitive ruling was handed down:
The USA has flagrantly violated the GATS treaty which binds all WTO members. This is the General Agreement on Trades in Services. The same treaty that the USA waves in China's face when it comes to licensing disputes, just an example of how precious GATS is to the USA.
So how did the USA respond to the ruling? They withdrew their commitment to GATS! They will no longer abide by GATS as it pertains to gambling services. Instead they will pick and choose which parts of GATS they will abide by, and more importantly which parts of the treaty they expect other countries to follow.
But China and the EU know that if they support Antigua on this issue they can either impose sanctions on the US or take the moral high ground when future GATS disagreements arise.
The real problem here is that the USA has made a mockery of the WTO, just as they make a mockery of the UN or the World Bank and really any aspect of International Relations that you care to think of in the past eight years. America is above the law, above all other countries, and not bound by the same rules and treaties as those countries. The Kyoto agreement? Doesn't apply to America. The sovereign rights of other countries? Doesn't apply to America. And the list goes on and on.
The bottom line, however, is that if other countries man up here and back Antigua in this battle the USA will be forced to back down over online gambling. The situation at the moment is clearly protectionist and violates international law.
It may take a few years but there will come a time when the online gambling industry is run on the same principles of free trade that America supposedly holds so dear.
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