ONLINE GAMBLING WILL MAKE YOU (A) RICHER? (B) POORER?

Looking for still more ways to transfer money from you to the Treasury, the administration is preparing to further tap your vices. Right now, Barney Frank is writing up a bill to allow -- and tax -- online gambling. A recent report from the Joint Committee on Taxation indicates they think such activity could generate more than $42 billion in tax revenue over the net decade. Not all of this would be new money. Much of it would be siphoned off other gambling venues like Las Vegas and Indian casinos, all of which have fallen on hard times lately. The latter have been so hard hit, many of them are defaulting on their mortgages and other obligations. This pits existing gambling venues against the new online venue. Each of these will produce less revenue than anticipated as each cannibalizes the other.