Barney Frank Reintroduces Internet Gambling Regulation Bill

With this in mind, Frank has once again introduced a bill that would simultaneously grant citizens greater liberty while also protecting children and guarding against money laundering.

Barney Frank may have been stymied by Spencer Bachus and his zealotry this summer, as Frank's bill proposing regulating online gambling was defeated by a tie vote in committee after Bachus quoted a study as reaching conclusions about teen suicide that the study's own author disavowed. Still, Frank knows that the public continues to become more educated on the subject, and thus less pliable to the ravings of lunatics like Bachus and Chad Hills.

With this in mind, Frank has once again introduced a bill that would simultaneously grant citizens greater liberty while also protecting children and guarding against money laundering. The Payment Systems Protection Act of 2008 requires the Department of the Treasury to work with the Attorney General to specify which forms of gaming are illegal on the Internet.

Frank's bill, along with his Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act, and legislation proposed by Pete Sessions and Jim McDermott, all push for regulation of the online casino industry. A multitude of safeguards not currently found are required by the bills, including age checking, guarding against identity theft, and protection for problem gamblers.

Frank had assured reporters last month that, with Democrats likely taking more Congressional seats this fall, the bills regulating online gambling will pass in 2009.

Frank is backed in his quest to regulate Internet gambling not only by citizens for freedom, but by all the major financial institutions, including the Chamber of Commerce, The Financial Services Roundtable, Credit Union National Association, and National Association of Federal Credit Unions, all of whom find enforcing a ban untenable.