One of the reasons I think Republicans lost control of Congress in 2006 has never been publicly discussed. Recently, I got an email from the Advocacy office of the Small Business Administration that reminded me of that reason.

The Advocacy Office's function is a good one. The Office is charged with speaking up on behalf of Small Business to ensure that laws written for Big Business don't unnecessarily impact the little guys.

This latest email provided links to postions Advocacy has taken on the regulation of Internet Gambling and its impact on Small Business. What follows is the answer to your "So what?" question.

In October of 2006, Congress passed a law restricting Internet Gambling. The law primarily impacted gambling with organizations located overseas. Whatever the overt publicly stated reasons for passing the law, one of the covert reasons was to ingratiate the Republican Party with "values voters" opposed to gambling.

My contention is this. No matter what public face individuals give you, they often have private practices they don't want you to know about. For an evangelical, gambling might be one of those practices. An individual might be livid over the shut off of access to their favorite internet gambling site, but unable to express that frustration publically. Instead, they will speak of other dissatisfactions with the powers that be and they will vote to express that dissatisfaction in the privacy of the voting booth.

Oh, surely gamblers weren't that upset, you say. Think again. When was this done? October. October has the baseball playoffs, the World Series and football season (both college and pro) is in full swing. What if you were an a winning streak that was interrupted? What if you were on a losing streak? How do you redeem your losses? How do you even contact these sites for a final settlement?

Just another example of a law being passed without fully considering the consequences.

Here are a couple of links from the Advocacy email for more detail.

"On December 12, 2007, the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of
Advocacy filed comments with the Federal Reserve and the Department of
Treasury regarding proposed regulations on the Prohibition on Funding of
Unlawful Internet Gambling.

"A copy of Advocacy's letter can be found at
http://www.sba.gov/advo/laws/comments/frs07_1212.html and a fact sheet
summarizing Advocacy's letter can be found at
http://www.sba.gov/advo/laws/comments/factsfrs07_1212.pdf.

"If you have any questions regarding Advocacy's position on this issue, please
do not hesitate to contact Jennifer Smith at 202-205-6533.

"For more information about the Office of Advocacy, please visit our website at
http://www.sba.gov/advo/ or telephone 202-205-6533."