Prior to spearheading a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services, Rep. Sue Kelly, R-N.Y., gave Americans a forum to voice their opinion on the subject of online gambling.
Kelly, the chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Oversight, took calls from voters Wednesday during an interview on C-SPAN's Washington Journal. Although she took no official stand on the issue, she found herself on the defensive for most of the show, as the majority of callers were in opposition to any bill banning Internet gambling.
Kelly told C-SPAN that her main goal for conducting the hearing was to raise questions and examine issues relevant to I-gaming.
She repeatedly focused on the issue of young college-aged students getting into massive debt from gambling online and how gambling addicts can bet themselves out of job, house and family if they lose control.
"We find there are a lot of people logging on to do this," she said. "This is a tremendous boom."
In her opening comments, Kelly did brand those who gamble online as outlaws.
"It is illegal for the most part because it is offshore and unregulated," she said.
Right out of the gate Kelly identified one of her themes for the day.
"A student can get a credit card easily," she said. "They can log on and use that credit card to gamble and they wind up amassing a huge amount of debt. As a student they will have to pay off that debt somehow."
It was that kind of thinking that seemed to rile many callers. Of the seven calls that were taken during
the half-hour segment, five were against any move to ban online gaming. Only one caller was clearly in favor of banning online gaming, while another was neutral.
The first caller of the segment set the tone for the rest of the show by attacking proposed bills in the House and Senate which seek to ban Internet gambling.
"This is the most absurd piece of legislation I have ever heard of in my life," he said. "Betting on the Internet is the same as buying a stock, option or commodity. That is gambling in the most lethal form, and the government regulates that."
A repeated theme from callers on the show was disgust over the government trying to regulate every aspect of their lives. Callers, both gamblers and non-gamblers alike, flooded the lines and were outspoken about the government's interference with their daily lives.
"It is not the function of government to be regulating all aspects of peoples lives," one caller said. "I am not an advocate of gambling, however, I do think people have choices and it isn't the function of government to be involved in everything we do."
In her response Kelly did everything she could to defend the committee without being on the offensive.
"We don't know the answers to all these questions," she said. "I don't pretend to know all the answers to these questions. The idea is to raise the questions in the first place."
Kelly again said there were other interests to consider in her argument.
"When you have students who have easy access to credit cards and are running up large gambling debts and essentially damaging themselves at an early age because of the easy access to Internet gambling, it is time we take a look at the issue."
That comment set the next caller off.
"As a mother you teach your children responsibility," a caller from Illinois who identified himself as a longtime republican explained. "It is a personal responsibility, and you as a person cannot measure everything in this world. This is a personal responsibility issue and you as a government can't do that, that is the reason we have so many problems now."
Other callers echoed the sentiment.
"I don't need you telling me how to run my life," a caller from San Diego said. "You blame the college kids, but wait a minute. . . How come they are getting the credit cards in the fist place when they don't have jobs? Maybe that is what you should be focusing your attention on."
A disgruntled Republican caller from South Carolina said he was fed up with the government banging the drum of compassion in trying to get different pieces of legislation passed.
"I don't think it is the purview of the federal government to regulate every facet of human life," he said. I am sick and tired. . . sick and tired of being beat over the head with this 'this must be done for the sake of the children.' Oh the children. When people elect to have children they should take care of them, not the government."
The final caller of the segment was the only one who was opposed to allowing people to gamble online. He pointed to the severe addiction a gambler can face if the problem gets out of hand.
"I have no problem with the government dealing with gambling as a potentially insidious problem," the caller said. "It warrants as much scrutiny as the federal government can give it. The manic enthusiasm of gamblers transcends alcoholism and is closer to heroinism. "
The show concluded with Kelly saying she was enlightened by what she heard but was still going to move forward with the process.
"The people who all called here today are all adults and thinking people; they want to be free to do whatever gamble acts they desire," she said. "That is OK with me, I don't have a problem with that. My concern is for people that might be damaged by their behavior."