Fox Business News recently took on the issue of online gambling. A surprising move from the notoriously right-leaning news outlet, since most of the bigger opponents of online gambling are Republicans, and the bill to lift the UIGEA ban is one that has been proposed by a Democrat. This is a much more complicated issue than one of simple left and right though, and Fox News is right to handle it as such. Money is really the issue at stake in many ways.

Many fear that online casinos will take business away from the hugely profitable US land based casino business, which would mean more and more money going overseas, since the UK casino industry, like www.jackpotcity.com/uk/, stands to make the most money from the reopening of the US market, at fist anyway. There is another factor though, which has caused an unlikely alliance. There has, for several years been a pull within the Republican party toward the religious right, and this is a group which always opposes gambling in all forms. In the hopes of at least keeping gambling confined to Las Vegas and Atlantic City, the religious right has teamed up with the powerful gambling lobby. This works well for both sides, since the casinos have the money and the religious leaders have the rhetoric. The plan hasn’t been working as well as they had hoped though, and the alliance formed in 2006 is starting to come apart.