Gary Kaplan, the founder of BetOnSports.com, has been arrested in the USA as they have a law against gambling there in most states.

The weird thing about it: Gary Kaplan was not even in the USA - he was in the Dominican Republic on holiday! The USA asked the people there to arrest him and to send him to the USA so that they could arrest him.

Last year, David Carruthers, the boss from BetOnSports was arrested last summer on a holiday trip to Costa Rica - as they made the plane stop over in Dallas!

BetOnSports has started to refuse accepting players from the USA - but they are after the taxes! They want to have billions of taxes from him.

What I dont understand:

1. Why does the USA care about it?
2. Why are the haunting down online gambling managers all over the globe but do nothing about the really nasty porn(?) sites hosted in the USA?
3. Who gives the USA the right to arrest people outside the USA?
4. Even if someone made money though an illegal activity in a country, usually he/she would have to pay back the money to the customers. So there is no revenue afterwards and nothing to tax. So either it is illegal or you tax it. If you declare it as illegal but tax it at the same time, the USA also profits from "illegal activities".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/caribbean/news/story/2006/07/060719_antiguagambling.shtml

http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/87704

Is it politically correct to say the USA is governed by a bunch of idiots? No matter whether it is "war against terrorism", "war against gambling" or starting wars for no reason.......nothing against Americans - just against Bush, the other war criminals and ex-alcoholics with an IQ below room temperature...that concentrate on the most ridiculous and naiive laws but do nothing about poverty or the educational system or weapons in their own country.

Everything they do is contradictory and never logical....

Why don't they just arrest all USA citizens who have ever been to Las Vegas on holiday?

Wasn't the USA supposed to a be a new and free country for all the people from "Old Europe" who went there some hundred years ago?

But where did it lead to? One of the strictest countries, with no freedom at all and no predictability of legal decisions or legal security whatsoever.
No free education, low speed limits, no nudity, no drinking....no privacy, no data protection, lots of restrictions because of the "danger of terrorism"
- the only freedeom that exists there is the dubious freedom of running around with weapons.

wow every time I come on now you all are on the bandwagon about something us americans do....hmmmm maybe i should find some american friends and some juicy tidbits on blair and his nonsense...true there are alot of things that really annoy me here in the us, especially the school system, the health system and all our young people being killed in a wars that we should be out of by now......but if a cuntry has nothing to do with the way I live, sure am not gonna bash them all the time for something i have read on the net or papers......sorry my opinion

[quote="lostsuthernbelle"]wow every time I come on now you all are on the bandwagon about something us americans do....


NO WE HAVE A LOT OF OPINIONS ABOUT LOADS OF THINGS ...like you have on moon shine, not just the Americans ???

If something annoys me, I write about, no matter whether it is the US government, the government of my own country or of any other country.

I am not a partiot myself and whatever someone says about (one of) my countries, I will always try to look at what someone says and I am not shutting down because my feelings are hurt as someone said something "evil" against my country. If something is wrong, it is wrong - if people always defend their own country, no matter in which context, things that are not perfect will never improve.

300 million americans and we have to have the one that takes EVERYTHING personally.

Paranoia anyone?

and if everyone would bother reading the whole post I made, it says that americans arent perfect and I also put some of the problems here down...not paranoid abit and dont care about the comments itself about american ethics..it just seems like some people on here think there country is so perfect, while putting other countries down....and miss cheeky thought your not suppose to bring up the other site on here...oh forgot, only certain people are allowed to say something derrogatory against that site

Okay lads take it easy. No sense in making this personal.

lostsouthernbelle has a point, America is in the news a lot and it can't be easy to see your countries foreign policy and moral standing constantly under attack on nearly every website you come across. Not everyone is patriotic, but then again not everyone likes seeing their country bad mouthed either, but if your in a political forum you have to expect to see negative things said about things you hold dear.

You want to defend those things, you do it by proper discourse and debate or not at all, and not make personal attacks.

You have to thicken your skin a little if your in a political forum. Its just the way things are im afraid.

Pol and lostsuthernbelle you have pm's

I have no problems with people talking about the problems of this world at all...every country has its quirks and none is perfect as I have said in previous...I just commented on people constantly putting down either America or another country and not saying a word about there own country...I have put down America for alot of reasons thru out the time I have been on here this past year.....oh btw..no message in my inbox lol

Hi LostSuthernBelle, please i don't wish to appear to be jumping on a bandwagon at all, but current affairs is of some interest to me this past 5/6 yrs. I can appreciate how it must seem constantly encountering negative comments, but you must appreciate that looking at the US, from outside the US, is vastly!!!! different to looking at the US from within. You mention healthcare, education, social systems, etc. Sure, we all have similar gripes (certainly in the UK and Ireland at the moment), but these are not signficiant matters.

From my perspective, the thoroughly malignant effect that US foreign and economic policy has had on the world since Kissinger is at the root of so so much, not least the negative comments you might encounter in a place like this.

no problem darkle...I had my reasons for saying what I did..and some understand why I did...again I have nothing against anyone complaining about foreign affairs as long as they also look from within their own countries and the disharmony, political crap there is....enough said