FCC, Online Gambling, and Money Laundering

[WhiskeyGirl]

The FCC has been in the news for net neutrality.  Is the internet broken? 

The internet is one thing I rarely need to complain about, even to myself.  Works fine. 

There are a few stories that keep coming up.  A few thoughts...

Obama seems to think there will be some kind of new American prosperity involving the internet.  Maybe everyone will have an internet store and sell to little people in China?  No one ever seems to ask him how this new prosperity will happen over the internet.

Barney Frank keeps touting his online gambling bill.  Make online gambling legal.  Thousands of companies have sprung up on the internet in the past years to promote this new industry.  Maybe they're legit?  Not legit?  For the purpose of laundering money? 

How do you follow cyber money?  How easy would it be to set up a false gambling company over the internet and transfer money via fake gambling losses?  No paper trail like conventional Swiss or Caribbean bank accounts?

Thomas Petters’ Coconspirators Assisted in Carrying Out Ponzi Scheme

Seven coconspirators of Thomas J. Petters were sentenced to prison in the District of Minnesota in September 2010: Robert White, Larry Reynolds, Michael Catain, James Wehmhoff, Greg Bell, Harold Katz, and Deanna Coleman. Petters used a successful corporation for over a decade to perpetrate a scheme that defrauded investors of $3.4 billion in the largest fraud case in Minnesota history. Through his company, Petters Group Worldwide LLC (PGW), Petters obtained loans from hedge funds and investment groups for the stated purpose of financing sales to well-known big box retailers, such as Costco and Sam’s Club. The investigation revealed that the purchase and subsequent sale of merchandise to the retailers were actually fabricated transactions supported by fictional documentation. Petters was convicted of mail and wire fraud, conspiracy and money laundering charges in 2009 and was sentenced in April 2010 to 50 years in prison. The cases were prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota and investigated by the FBI and IRS-CI.

...The SEC also alleges that Imperia’s website said that investors could only access their profits by purchasing a Visa debit card from Imperia, but Imperia has no relationship with Visa and was using the Visa name without authorization. Through its website and a series of offshore PayPal style bank accounts, Imperia raised in excess of $7 million from at least 14,000 investors worldwide, including 6,000 investors in the U.S. who have invested in excess of $4 million with Imperia.

more here - http://dailynewsbeat.com/news-1246-headlines/2010/12/09/financial-fraud-enforcement-task-force-announces-results-of-largest-ever-nationwide-operation-targeting-investment-fraud/

(Anyone looking to find out who gave the OK for no income verification loans?  Fraud mortgages?  Financial collapse)

Will the Obama administration require transactions of more than $600 to be reported to the IRS?  Make sure folks have paid taxes on that money?

The internet if full of money making opportunities.  How many of those opportunities will be available to folk on Main Street?

Maybe the FCC is making way for internet gambling to get priority service, paid for on the backs of Main Street Americans?

[WhiskeyGirl]

Who will get the new internet gambling licenses?  Make big bucks?

A leaked draft of Reid's proposal reveals a plan to have licensees pay a 20% tax on all deposits, and it calls for a 15-month online poker hiatus -- during which ongoing poker sites in the U.S. will temporarily stop operating here (in order to create a level playing field between new sites and existing ones). It would also have an initial two-year period during which gaming-machine manufacturers, as well as casino and race-track operators, would be the only entities licensed.

See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/e0FjxS or http://www.dailyfinance.com/story/media/harry-reid-goes-all-in-with-online-poker/19752413/

Let me think of some other bits in the news - Obama has been budgeting more money for Native Americans to have internet access.  Aren't Native Americans already in the casino business?  Seems like a match made in heaven.  Why don't they pay to establish their own internet connections?  Make a new carrier? 

With Obama's new indigenous peoples sovereign push, I would imagine their operations would be exempt from any transparency...  Will every $600 gambling transaction be reported to the IRS?

Is this the great new internet prosperity the Obama admin envisions?  Somehow, I don't see any of this prosperity trickling down to Main Street.

I also have to wonder about High Frequency Trading and Dark Pools on Wall Street.  Will Main Street Americans have to pay for their unreported/secret transactions too?

Somehow, I don't see any of this prosperity trickling down to Main Street.  Main Street just get's to pay for it.

just my humble opinions and speculation