Cato Daily Dispatch July 25, 2001 http://www.cato.org/ http://www.cato.org/dispatch/07-25-01d.html -------------------------------------------------------------------------- * U.S. Says No To Another Global Treaty * Even More Money For Colombian Drug War * Lawmakers Seek To Ban Online Gambling -------------------------------------------------------------------------- U.S. SAYS NO TO ANOTHER GLOBAL TREATY The United States -- already facing European criticism for rejecting a climate change accord -- said today it was abandoning a U.N. draft accord designed to give teeth to an anti-germ warfare treaty, according to the Associated Press. ( http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010725/ts/un_biological_ban_7.html ) Nations have been negotiating since 1995 to develop an accord on how to enforce the germ warfare treaty, painstakingly working through disagreements over the 210-page document. The draft is intended to create a way to inspect sites suspected of developing biological weapons without interfering with legitimate industries and facilities. "In our assessment, the draft protocol would put national security and confidential business information at risk," said U.S. chief negotiator Donald A. Mahley, effectively killing nearly seven years of negotiations. In "Constitutional Problems with Enforcing the Biological Weapons Convention," ( http://www.cato.org/pubs/fpbriefs/fpb-061es.html ) Ronald D. Rotunda notes that while the United States should continue to renounce the use of biological weapons, "the [enforcement] protocol will undermine the privacy rights that U.S. citizens expect and that the Fourth Amendment guards, will interfere with the safeguards that the appointments clause was designed to guarantee, and will compromise the intellectual property rights that the Fifth Amendment protects." Instead of allowing foreign inspectors access only to public property, the enforcement protocol would expand access to allow searches of private individuals and companies "without the strict protections of the Fourth Amendment and its requirement that a search warrant be issued by a neutral magistrate only after a finding of probable cause," says Rotunda. "The protocol's search of private property must be unusually thorough to have any chance of working effectively, but such invasive searches create a greater risk of a violation." -------------------------------------------------------------------------- EVEN MORE MONEY FOR COLOMBIAN DRUG WAR The House of Representatives yesterday approved a foreign aid spending bill featuring $676 million to fight the Colombian drug trade, rejecting a Democratic-led effort to shift some of the money to other priorities, according to Reuters. ( http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010724/pl/colombia_usa_funds_dc_1.html ) The House endorsed the $15.2 billion foreign aid bill on a 381-46 vote after defeating several attempts to cut spending on President Bush's Andean Initiative, which would provide drug-fighting money to Colombia and six neighboring South American countries. "We should not surrender Colombia to the drug lords," said Rep. Mark Kirk, an Illinois Republican. In "Declaring an Armistice in the International Drug War," ( http://www.cato.org/pubs/fpbriefs/fpb-026.html ) Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies Ted Galen Carpenter demanded an armistice to the failed international drug war that has hurt all sides of the conflict. In "Time to End the Drug War," ( http://www.cato.org/dailys/12-03-97.html ) Assistant Director of the Project on Global Economic Liberty Jacobo L. Rodriguez explains that "efforts to eradicate crops and interdiction of traffic -- that is, efforts to reduce the supply of drugs -- put only a small dent in the profit margins of traffickers." Earlier this year, the Cato Institute hosted "Plan Colombia: Should We Escalate the War on Drugs?" featuring Prof. Russell Crandall of Davidson College and Amb. James F. Mack of the State Department's Bureau of International Narcotics & Law Enforcement Affairs. The forum can be viewed live online. ( http://www.cato.org/events/010313pf.html ) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- LAWMAKERS SEEK TO BAN ONLINE GAMBLING A group of U.S. lawmakers yesterday vowed to gear up efforts to ban gambling on the Internet, pushing for legislation that would, among other things, bar the use of credit cards for online wagers, according to Reuters. ( http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010724/pl/tech_internet_gambling_dc_1.html ) The lawmakers -- with key members from both the House and Senate -- told a House panel that legislation would be introduced in the next two weeks seeking an outright ban on online gambling, an industry that has grown dramatically over the past several years. These bills would go beyond a measure that has already been introduced in the House that aims to curb such gambling by barring the use of many financial instruments to pay gambling debts to online casinos or sports-wagering sites. "We're going to pass legislation in this Congress that will ... make Internet gambling illegal. I'm convinced of that," said Sen. Jon Kyl, who sponsored a bill last year with such a ban that had passed the Senate. Tom Bell writes in "Gambler's Web: Online Betting Can't Be Stopped -- and Why Washington Shouldn't" ( http://www.cato.org/dailys/12-01-99.html ) that licensed, land-based gambling businesses and the 37 states with lotteries won't be able to stifle their online gambling competition. Controlling electronic gambling would be an enormous technical feat. He goes on to state in "Internet Gambling: Popular, Inexorable, and (Eventually) Legal" ( http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-336es.html ) that gambling will inevitably be legalized. In "Don't Give Up the Right to Gamble," ( http://www.cato.org/dailys/06-18-99.html ) mathematician Guy Calvert shows that gambling is a natural human endeavor, entrenched in American history and that "any coercive effort by the government to eliminate or reduce gambling must compete against that most formidable opponent, human nature." Calvert is also the author of the "Gambling America: Balancing the Risks of Gambling and Its Regulation." ( http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-349es.html ) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- In today's Daily Commentary: How Social Security cheats African-Americans. By Michael Tanner. http://www.cato.org/dailys/07-25-01.html --------------------------------------------------------------------------- *** Making a Federal Case out of Health Care*** Five Years of HIPAA --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Register now for the Cato Health Policy Studies one day conference on HIPAA, the most significant federal health care legislation in over twenty years. Featured speakers will include: Rep. Dick Armey (R-TX), Richard Epstein, Mark Pauly, Mark Hall, Fred Cate, Grace-Marie Turner, John Hoff, Conrad Meier, Madeleine Cosman, and others. Visit http://www.cato.org/events/hipaa/index.html for a complete schedule and to register today! ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice. To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
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