Abstract

This paper analyses the legality of private prediction markets under U.S. law, describing both the legal risks they raise and how to manage those risks. As the label “private” suggests, such markets offer trading not to the public but rather only to members of a particular firm. The use of private prediction markets has grown in recent years because they can efficiently collect and quantify information that firms find useful in making management decisions. Along with that considerable benefit, however, comes a particularly worrisome cost: the risk that running a private prediction market might violate U.S. state or federal laws. The ends and means of private prediction markets differ materially from those of futures, securities, or gambling markets. Laws written for those latter three institutions nonetheless threaten to limit or even outlaw private prediction markets, as the paper details. The paper also details, however, how certain legal strategies can protect private prediction markets from violating U.S. laws or suffering crushing regulatory burdens. The paper concludes with a legal forecast, describing the likely form of potential CFTC regulations and a strategy designed to ensure the success of private prediction markets under U.S. law.

Conclusion

This paper has described the legal risks facing private prediction markets under U.S. law and how firms that want to runs such markets should respond. To minimize the risk of CFTC regulation, firms should institute mechanisms to ensure that their private prediction markets do not support significant hedging functions and make clear, both in the documentation supporting their markets and in their markets’ structures, that they offer trading not in binary option contracts but rather in conditional negotiable notes. Publicly-traded firms subject to U.S. law can minimize the risks of illegal insider trading by either making public all prices and claims traded on their prediction market or by:
• Keeping trading by traditional insiders separate from trading by others;
• Broadening safeguards against illegal insider trading to cover all traders;
• Treating the market’s claims and prices as trade secrets; and
• Seeding the market with decoy claims and prices.

Although the skill-based trading emphasized on private prediction markets should in theory remove them from the scope of gambling regulations, a prudent firm could help to ensure that result by:
• Forbidding traders from investing their own funds in the market; and
• Requiring its agents to participate in its market.

As should perhaps go without saying (but as hereby will not), any firm implementing these legal strategies should back them up with ample record-keeping. Each person who trades on a firm’s market should, for instance, receive clear notification that the market does not deal in CFTC- or SEC-regulated instruments, and that it does not offering services subject to oversight by any state gambling commission. Better yet, traders should be required to access the market only through a click-through agreement in which, among other things, they consent to that stipulation. So go only a few of the provisions that ought to appear in such an agreement; any reasonably competent attorney will think of many worthwhile provisions to add.

Private prediction markets will almost certainly escape the legal uncertainty that now clouds their prospects in the U.S. Even if no legislator, judge, or regulator ever notices them, private prediction markets will come to win de facto legality simply by merit of their widespread use and acceptance. With reflection —perhaps aided by papers such as this one— and practical experience, attorneys will learn how to structure private prediction markets to accommodate the laws that rightfully apply to them and to dodge the effect of laws written for other, materially different markets. There remains some risk, granted, that the CFTC will crush private prediction markets under new regulations. With luck though —and perhaps also with some persuasion— the CFTC will instead allow prediction markets to choose from among several different tiers of regulations. And even in the worse-case scenario, private prediction markets will not disappear; they will simply flee the U.S. for other, freer homes.

My Good Lord,

Would prediction market journalism (that is, showing to the normal people on the street that prediction markets can help understand better baseball games, or whatever else, on top of being fun and pure) fit your criteria of non-bogosity and interestingness?

-

—

Ken Kittlitz (the head of the Foresight Exchange) to me:

You’re correct, the owner of an FX claim must find a different FX player to act as the judge. This is largely to ensure that at least more than one person thinks the claim is worth having.

With Inkling Markets and HubDub, at the contrary, the creator of a prediction market can be the same person who (judges and) expires it.

Remarkably, it was only in cross-examination that the very significant limitations and shortcomings in the evidence he was able to give became clear.

In court, Mr Murrihy had said ‘it was not incumbent that I verse myself in UK or other jurisdiction rules’.

Mr Murrihy also said in evidence:

I have not said I was an expert in respect of UK races.

The judge said in his ruling today:

This is an extraordinary admission given that he was purporting to give evidence about 27 races run in the UK according to UK racing rules…. In my opinion, that was tantamount to Mr Murrihy disqualifying himself in giving evidence in relation to the suspect races. In my opinion it is now clear that Mr Murrihy’s evidence was subject to a number of significant limitations and shortcomings which were not evident from his witness statements and his evidence in chief. It is abundantly clear that his evidence fell far, far short of establishing a prima facie breach of UK racing rules. I have reached the conclusion that even if it was appropriate to admit Mr Murrihy’s expert opinion, its probative value is so limited that very little value can be attached to it.

The judge said there was insufficient evidence on which a jury could conclude that the jockeys, and therefore all the defendants, were guilty.

The British Horseracing Authority said after the case:

The restrictions placed on the three jockeys involved in the proceedings expired at the conclusion of the proceedings. Kieren Fallon, who is licensed by the Irish Turf Club, is therefore able to ride in Great Britain, and Fergal Lynch and Darren Williams are able to re-apply for their jockey licences.

Fallon’s spokesman immediately called for two inquiries into the case – one into the police testimony, the other into why the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) proceeded with the trial. He estimated the trial cost taxpayers £10m.

Fallon, 41, from County Clare, Ireland, and two other jockeys, Fergal Lynch and Darren Williams, were charged with conspiracy to defraud customers of Betfair, the world’s biggest online gambling service. The former owner and racing syndicate director, Miles Rodgers, was also charged with conspiracy to defraud and with an offence under the Proceeds of Crime Act.

[External Link: BBC News]

The Contempt of Court Act 1981 (CCA) was enacted following a decision of ECHR that English contempt law contravened Article 10 of the Convention. It was intended to give greater protection to freedom of speech. [!!!!] The CCA introduces a strict liability rule. The strict liability rule indicates that conduct tending to interfere with the course of justice – particularly legal proceedings – may be treated as a contempt of court regardless of whether there was any intent to so interfere.

The strict liability rule applies only to publications. These are defined so as to include any speech, writing, broadcast or other communication in whatever form which is addressed to the public at large or any section of the public.

Two important limitations on the impact of the strict liability rule are:
- It applies only to a publication which creates a substantial risk that the course of justice in the proceedings will be seriously impeded or prejudiced.
- It applies to a publication only if the proceedings are active. [...]

In 2002 the Sunday Mirror was found guilty of contempt in relation to its publication of an article during the 2001 trial of the Leeds United footballers Lee Bowyer and Jonathan Woodgate. The article, released while the jury were deliberating, strongly suggested that the assault with which the two men were charged had been racially motivated, despite the judge stressing in his summing-up that the prosecution were not alleging a racist motive. It was found by the court that the article created an atmosphere in which justice could not be done, and a re-trial had to be ordered. Despite there being no suggestion that the newspaper had intended to prejudice the trial, the High Court found it guilty of contempt under the strict liability rule. [...]

Jesus, that’s 100% pure media censorship.

Previously: Once again, the BetFair legal department censors the traders.

From what I have seen to date, the prediction markets lobby merely represents an attempt by a coterie of interest groups to throw of what they see as being the stigma that is associated with the term betting markets. [...]

I think it is fair to say that the matter of what constitutes a prediction market has yet to be resolved; not least, when it is clear that traditional betting markets can be and are just as predictive as these so called “prediction markets.” (And for the pedants out there – yes, even in the case of traditional horse race pari-mutuel betting markets, where research has shown that in the Hong Kong and New Zealand betting markets, there is no favourite-longshot bias.)

Sadly, the impression that one is left with, is that those seeking to promote the prediction market industry, are guilty of cherry picking, in order to suit their own vested interests.

The fact that markets aggregate data and can be predictive is nothing new. Seeking to ringfence a subset of said markets and attaching a new industry definition to them is a perilous exercise to say the least.

On a slightly different note, I also liked one part of Jed Christiansen’s comment.

Judge by yourself: Prediction Market Industry Association

Previously: MIDAS ORACLE STATEMENT ON THE PREDICTION MARKET INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

I was thinking about the constitutionality of prediction markets when reading Gary McDowell’s “The War For the Constitution”:

Warren Burger summed it up for many when he described Mr. Bork as simply the best qualified nominee in the former chief justice’s own professional lifetime — a span of years that included the appointments of such judicial luminaries as Benjamin Cardozo, Hugo Black and Felix Frankfurter. Such praise was no empty exaggeration.

A former Yale law professor and U.S. Solicitor General, Mr. Bork was, at the time of his nomination, a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. When he was a circuit court judge, Mr. Bork’s opinions not only were never overruled on appeal, but on several occasions his dissents were adopted by the Supreme Court as its majority view.

In an earlier day such an appointment would have been celebrated as adding breadth, depth and luster to the highest bench. Instead, the nominee faced a mauling by those who set out not only to destroy him personally but to discredit all that he stood for as a jurist.

It was immediately clear that the unprecedented vote of 58-42 against his confirmation reflected something far more historic and fundamental than an ordinary partisan standoff. The confrontation in fact had been one of the most cataclysmic and divisive events in American domestic politics during the second half of the 20th century. The reason was that Mr. Bork’s opponents succeeded in making the fight over his nomination into a contest over the future of the Constitution.

* * *

Time has shown that Mr. Bork’s theory of constitutional interpretation remains very much alive; he was defeated but his central idea was never discredited. That theory of interpretation and its implicit belief in restrained judging should continue to guide anyone who believes that the inherent arbitrariness of government by judiciary is not the same thing as the rule of law.

One thing that is more scary than irrational voters is whimsical judges. And I know a few, personally.

*Off the top of my head, free speech and peaceful assembly seem to enable our rights to prediction markets.

UPDATE: Chris Masse linked prediction markets to the right to privacy here last year. I’m not sure that is as relevant as speech and assembly–the whole point being prices from prediction markets is a public good (even as I concede that the anonymity of traders improves prices). But what do I know–I’m not an attorney or judge, just someone who knows a lot of them.

UPDATE: Tom Bell, on the Constitution’s call for progress in science and arts.

UPDATE: Alvin Roth, on the repugnance of markets (including prediction markets in terror). This reframes my point–constitutional repugnance is good, fleeting cultural repugnance is irrelevant. Just as slavery markets were not repugnant yesterday (but unconstitutional), so prediction markets are repugnant today (but constitutional)!

Cross posted from Caveat Bettor.

InTrade-TradeSports should have expired the Larry Craig event derivative today, on October 4, 2007, and not on September 5, 2007. That’s their main error. Last September, they expired this event derivative on the basis on Larry Craig stating his “intent to resign” —which is different than to announce an upcoming or effective resignation. Larry Craig later changed his “intent” —he then intended to stay in the US Senate (providing he would be able to withdraw his guilty plea). Unfortunately, today, a judge ruled against his attempt to dismiss his guilty plea. So, US Senator Larry Craig is announcing today that:

1. He is not resigning from the US Senate;
2. He will not seek re-election for his US Senate seat.

The condition #2 is sufficient to expire the December 2007 Larry Craig contract on the “yes” side. (“Yes”, he is announcing his “intention not to run in 2008″.)

—

ADDENDUM: The original InTrade contract

Sen. Larry Craig to announce resignation or intention not to run in 2008 on/before 31 Dec 2007 – This event derivative has been expired by InTrade on September 5, 2007.

The rules (= the event derivative contract statement):

This contract will settle (expire) at 100 ($10.00) if Senator Larry Craig announces his resignation from the Senate or announces he will not run for re-election in 2008 on or before 11:59:59pm ET on the date specified in the contract.

The contract will settle (expire) at 0 ($0.00) if this does not happen on or before 11:59:59pm ET on the date specified in the contract.

A resignation does not have to result in the actual departure by the contract expiry date but rather the announcement of the resignation must be made before the date and time specified in the contract.

Expiry will be based on official, public announcements made by Larry Craig as reported by three independent and reliable media sources.

Due to the nature of this contract please also see Contract Rule 1.7 Unforeseen Circumstances.

The Exchange reserves the right to invoke Contract Rule 1.8 (Time Protection) if deemed appropriate.

Any changes to the result after the contract has expired will not be taken into account – Exchange Rule 1.4

Please contact the exchange by emailing help@intrade.com if you have any questions regarding this contract before you place a trade.

Important:
Please contact the Exchange if you have any query or uncertainty (including how it may be settled) about this Contract, the Rule above or the Contract Rules before you trade.

[...] The complicated state of US law

The always fascinating subject of American state and federal law as applied to online gambling was next on the agenda, with US gaming lawyer and respected author Martin Owens and the more recent personality arrival Edward Leyden of iMEGA in the hot seats.

Owens ran over the ‘curious’ nature of state vs. federal law in the United States, detailing the complexities and inconsistencies and the apparent predilection of the enforcement authorities to harass and intimidate vulnerable targets rather than focusing on issues of US law that remain unresolved.

He predicted increased demand by individual states for some involvement in Internet gambling and the revenues it can raise. “Internet gambling is not dead in America,” he asserted.

Trade association iMEGA’s president Edward Leyden said that his organisation represented the wide interests of entertainment that included online gambling, insisting on the fundamental right for adults to engage in entertainment that may include online gambling.

He went on to give an impassioned summary of his organisation’s activities to date, primarily in taking the federal government to court on the UIGEA.

He praised Judge Mary L Cooper who is currently hearing the case and will make a ruling on iMEGA’s application for a restraining order on the UIGEA within the next 30 days as an erudite, fair and technology oriented official with conscientious attention to detail.

“Following the hearing last week, and without presuming to prejudge the issue, we came away feeling very confident in a fair and knowledgeable result from Judge Cooper,” he said before going on to discuss the just-published UIGEA regulatory proposals on which the government has invited comment by December 12 (see previous Online-Casinos.com/InfoPowa report)

Of the 52 pages published, only 16 deal with the actual regulations – the remainder was explanatory and indicated an attempt by the drafters to produce a fair and balanced document under difficult circumstances.

Leyden reminded the audience that many of the Congressmen voting on a security bill to which the UIGEA was attached at 2.30 am on the cusp of a Congressional recess late last year had not known what the attachment comprised.

More

—

New York Times:

“As he stated on Saturday, Senator Craig intends to resign on Sept. 30,” Mr. [Dan Whiting, a spokesman for Mr. Craig] said in a statement. “However, he is fighting these charges, and should he be cleared before then, he may, and I emphasize may, not resign.”

Aaaarrrrgh…

Slate Video – Senator Craig: The Re-enactment

Sen. Larry Craig plead guilty to disorderly conduct following his arrest for allegedly soliciting in a public restroom. Slate V delivers a re-enactment, based on the police report.

Minnesota Police report.

Bathroom Sex FAQ

—

Yet another InTrade-TradeSports scandal??

—

Sen. Larry Craig to announce resignation or intention not to run in 2008 on/before 31 Dec 2007 – This event derivative has been expired by InTrade.

The rules (= the event derivative contract statement):

This contract will settle (expire) at 100 ($10.00) if Senator Larry Craig announces his resignation from the Senate or announces he will not run for re-election in 2008 on or before 11:59:59pm ET on the date specified in the contract.

The contract will settle (expire) at 0 ($0.00) if this does not happen on or before 11:59:59pm ET on the date specified in the contract.

A resignation does not have to result in the actual departure by the contract expiry date but rather the announcement of the resignation must be made before the date and time specified in the contract.

Expiry will be based on official, public announcements made by Larry Craig as reported by three independent and reliable media sources.

Due to the nature of this contract please also see Contract Rule 1.7 Unforeseen Circumstances.

The Exchange reserves the right to invoke Contract Rule 1.8 (Time Protection) if deemed appropriate.

Any changes to the result after the contract has expired will not be taken into account – Exchange Rule 1.4

Please contact the exchange by emailing help@intrade.com if you have any questions regarding this contract before you place a trade.

Important:
Please contact the Exchange if you have any query or uncertainty (including how it may be settled) about this Contract, the Rule above or the Contract Rules before you trade.

US Senator Larry Craig (on September 1, 2007 ):

Senator Craig Announces Intent to Resign from the Senate

BOISE, Idaho – Senator Craig made the following statement to Idaho:

First and foremost this morning, let me thank my family for being with me. We’re missing a son who’s working in McCall, and simply couldn’t make it down. But for my wife Suzanne and our daughter Shae, and Mike to be with me is very humbling.

To have the governor standing behind me, as he always has, is a tremendous strength for me. To have Bill Sali who has never wavered, and who has been there by phone call and by prayer, and his wife, is tremendously humbling.

For the leader of our party, Kirk Sullivan, to be standing here, who sought immediate counsel with me in this, is humbling. For Tom Luna—for any public official at this moment in time—to be standing with Larry Craig is a humbling experience. Learn more about Senator Craig’s top accomplishments

For most of my adult life, I had the privilege of serving the people of Idaho. I’m grateful for the opportunity they have given me. It has been a blessing. I am proud of my record and accomplishments, and equally proud of the wonderful and talented people with whom I have had the honor and the privilege to work and to serve.

I choose to serve because I love Idaho. What is best for Idaho has always been the focus of my efforts, and it is no different today. To Idahoans I represent, to my staff, my Senate colleagues, but most importantly, to my wife and my family, I apologize for what I have caused. I am deeply sorry.

I have little control over what people choose to believe, but clearly my name is important to me and my family is so very important also. Having said that, to pursue my legal options, as I continue to serve Idaho, would be an unwanted and unfair distraction of my job and for my Senate colleagues. These are serious times of war and of conflict—times that deserve the Senate’s and the full nation’s attention.

There are many challenges facing Idaho that I am currently involved in. And the people of Idaho deserve a senator who can devote 100 percent of his time and effort to the critical issues of our state and of our nation.

Therefore it is with sadness and deep regret that I announce that it is my intent to resign from the Senate, effective September 30. In doing so, I hope to allow a smooth and orderly transition of my loyal staff and for the person appointed to take my place at William E. Borah’s desk. I have full confidence that Governor Otter will appoint a successor who will serve Idaho with distinction.

I apologize to the people of our great state for being unable to serve out a term to which I have been elected. Few people have had the privilege and the pleasure to represent Idaho for as many years as I have. Each day, each week, each year brought new challenges and opportunities to create a better life for Idahoans. I have enjoyed every moment and cannot adequately put into words how much I appreciate what you have given me: the chance to work for this great state. I hope you do not regret the confidence you have placed in me over all of these years. I hope I have served you and our state to the best of my ability.

Lastly, Suzanne and I have been humbled beyond words by the tremendous outpouring of support we have received from our friends, our family, our staff and fellow Idahoans. We are profoundly and forever grateful. Thank you all very much.

US Senator Larry Craig announced his intent to resign, not his upcoming resignation (or effective resignation). Big difference. A resignation intent is not an upcoming/effective resignation. We know now, thanks to the New York Times, that there was an unstated conditionality —whether Larry Craig gets cleared before the 30th of September 2007. Thus, InTrade should not have expired the Larry Craig event derivative on the basis of that senatorial output. I bet that some traders will soon complain on the Intrade-TradeSports forum. They can contact me, if they wish.

More Info: – AP – MSNBC Video – Idaho Stateman -

—

ADDENDUM:

Definitions of the word “intent” on the Web:

* purpose: an anticipated outcome that is intended or that guides your planned actions; “his intent was to provide a new translation”; “good intentions are not enough”; “it was created with the conscious aim of answering immediate needs”; “he made no secret of his designs”
* the intended meaning of a communication
* captive: giving or marked by complete attention to; “that engrossed look or rapt delight”; “then wrapped in dreams”; “so intent on this fantastic…narrative that she hardly stirred”- Walter de la Mare; “rapt with wonder”; “wrapped in thought”
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

* Intent in law is the planning and desire to perform an act.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intent

* Reiki is an Intent driven system. Intent is the key to using the Reiki energy in healing and Attunements.
www.reikithehealingpath.com/reiki_glossary.htm

* Intent is the plan and will to act in a particular way or choice to remain inactive.
www.attorneykennugent.com/library/i.html

* The singlemost causal agency in all action, creation, destruction and change at all levels of existence. That component of consciousness which gives rise to all forms. The means by which the Will of God and Natural Law is manifest. The essence and source of motivation.
www.eoni.com/~visionquest/library/glossary.html

* Humans appear to be comprised of two important awarenesses: The Conscious Awareness (usually experienced through the personality) and a Greater Awareness. The Greater Awareness resides at body center and is connected to a fundamental force Seers call Intent. Intent is the equivalent of a muscle in the physical world. It is the means by which action, change, and expression happen in both the physical and energetic worlds for all humans. …
sentecenter.com/glossary.htm

* the mood, message, or meaning desired by the artist
www.learner.org/channel/workshops/artsineveryclassroom/p1popups/vocabulary.html

* A state of mind (mens rea) in which a person seeks a particular result through a particular course of action.
www.iejs.com/glossary/Glossary_I.htm

* the subtextual objective of a character
www.austin.cc.tx.us/sbramme2/Glossary.htm

* Voluntary function of a person’s mind in purposely performing a perceivable act.
www5.aaos.org/oko/vb/online_pubs/professional_liability/glossary.cfm

* requires that one intended to deprive the possessor “permanently” of the property. Although the mens rea of larceny is the intent to steal, the focus is on the loss to the possessor, not the gain to the defendant. Thus, even if the thief did not gain in the taking, if the possessor lost in the process. Courts have also held that permanence can be more than keeping forever. …
www.voyager.in/Larceny

—

PARTING SHOT:

The problem with most of the socially valuable prediction markets (i.e., the non-sports prediction markets) is that all depends on:

- how well the event derivative contract is stated;

- how well the related information is interpreted;

- how well the event derivative contract is expired.

With the Larry Craig prediction market, we have yet another example that InTrade (which gets plenty of cites in Midas Oracle * and other business media outlets) might not have done its job with the highest degree of professionalism required —at least in my opinion. Judge by yourself, scanning all the facts presented above by yourself.

In the summer 2006, I denounced the North Korean Missile scandal, and here’s what followed:

- I received an e-mail from InTrade CEO John Delaney saying that I could put a prize of $10,000 in the ‘lost’ column;

- I have been attacked by a second-tier phone-booth conference organizer, sponsored by InTrade;

- I received e-mailed insults from Ireland, sent on forged e-mail accounts.

—

[*] 3,820 cites of InTrade, says Google Search.

—

Next: Resignation Intent vs. Upcoming Resignation vs. Effective Resignation

—

UPDATE: Chris Masse’s response to the Mike Giberson comment…

The real issue is not much that InTrade makes a mistake (we all do), but whether it acknowledges its mistake and compensates the victims. (In the North Korea Missile scandal, InTrade did not behave well in this perspective, according to my reading of the situation.) [...]

US Senator Larry Craig simply said, “I’m thinking about resigning on September 30”. He did not say, “I’m resigning, effective September 30.” There is a huge difference between the two kinds of statement. And this difference (and InTrade’s error) pops up today because Larry Craig is exercising his constitutional right to change his intent. [...]

Next: Donald Rumsfeld’s resignation letter – November 6, 2006

—

UPDATE: New York Times…

Sen. Larry Craig has all but dropped any notion of trying to complete his term, and is focused on helping Idaho send a new senator to Washington within a few weeks, his top spokesman said Thursday. ”The most likely scenario, by far, is that by October there will be a new senator from Idaho,” Craig spokesman Dan Whiting told the Associated Press. The only circumstances in which Craig might try to complete his term, Whiting said, would require a prompt overturning of his conviction for disorderly conduct in a men’s room at the Minneapolis airport, as well as Senate GOP leaders’ agreement to restore Craig’s committee leaderships posts taken away this week. Those scenarios are unlikely, Whiting said.

Craig, a three-term Republican, met Wednesday with Idaho Gov. C.L. ”Butch” Otter, R, to discuss a transition in which Otter would name his Senate replacement, Whiting said. Even if Craig were to complete his term, he said, the senator would not seek re-election in 2008. Whiting said Craig remains intent on clearing his name through the legal process in Minnesota and by having the Senate ethics committee address his claim that his misdemeanor conviction should not be a matter for action by the panel. [...]

UPDATE: How US Senator Larry Craig managed to fool InTrade-TradeSports.

—

UPDATE: InTrade-TradeSports should have expired the Larry Craig event derivative today, on October 4, 2007, and not on September 5, 2007.

InTrade-TradeSports should have expired the Larry Craig event derivative today, on October 4, 2007, and not on September 5, 2007. That’s their main error. Last September, they expired this event derivative on the basis on Larry Craig stating his “intent to resign” —which is different than to announce an upcoming or effective resignation. Larry Craig later changed his “intent” —he then intended to stay in the US Senate (providing he would be able to withdraw his guilty plea). Unfortunately, today, a judge ruled against his attempt to dismiss his guilty plea. So, US Senator Larry Craig is announcing today that:

1. He is not resigning from the US Senate;
2. He will not seek re-election for his US Senate seat.

The condition #2 is sufficient to expire the December 2007 Larry Craig contract on the “yes” side. (“Yes”, he is announcing his “intention not to run in 2008″.)

—

UPDATE: Craig hopes to redeem himself for future lucrative job as lobbyist.