[...] In essence, if the United States was going to say that “remote” gambling was so bad that it was necessary to prohibit it across the board, then it indeed needed to be consistent about that, and not use the claim as a way to discriminate against foreign trade. Although the discussion of this issue in the earlier rulings is somewhat impenetrable to the non-WTO literate (and was even so to many of them as well), the most recent ruling that came out in March of this year made it crystal clear. The United States has a wide variety of legal, domestic-only remote gambling operating currently. Further, something that so many people have not realised but this last panel finally got right, and that is that federal law doesn’t prohibit remote gambling at all – just remote gambling that crosses a state or international border. By leaving states free to have as much intrastate remote gambling as they want, but prohibiting services that cross a border, the federal government cannot possibly say that it prohibits all remote gambling. And, of course, the crossing of a border is, by itself, not a logical basis for discriminating against services. At least not under international law. [...]
Read the whole stuff. It’s good material. Insights.
