No

by Anthony Megna

Created on: April 22, 2011

Here's the bottom line with the online poker ban; the government was late to the party, needs the money that poker brings, and is wiping the slate clean so that they can get their mitts into it. That's a fact.

Back in 2006, President Bush signed the bill that forbids any money transaction entity, such as banks, from dealing with online poker outfits. It's not illegal to play poker online, however, it is illegal for any bank or financial institution from processing any payments or to have any business with the online poker companies. That's the reason why all of the online poker companies are headquartered outside of the United States.

Now here is the interesting part, the government permits betting on horses and lotteries, but not poker! Gambling is gambling, wouldn't you say? In fact, the worst odds in the world are betting on lotteries, and yet the government has a grudge against poker for some reason. But now we know what the reason is, and that is that billions upon billions of dollars have been made and are still being made by the online poker companies, and the government wants some of the action!

My prediction is that once online poker is legalized, which it probably will be at some future date because there is far too much money involved, then the government will definitely have their hand in it. But that's not a bad thing, I believe it should be regulated and taxed. I just don't like the way the government went about doing what they just did as it's rather underhanded. They have had since 2006 to make some sort of move, and yet they sat on their hands until they spoke to that Australian bloke who did a deal with the justice department. What's that deal, you might ask?

The deal is that this particular gentleman made millions showing the online poker companies how to bill their customers with phony addresses and companies. The government got wind of this, threatened the Aussie, and told him to come clean with everything he knew about how the online poker business works. It took this long for the government to find out this information? And we're supposed to be fighting terrorism? Now that's scary!

Anyway, now the government has some ammunition, has served the owners of the online companies and threatened them with jail and stiff fines, while Joe Blow is trying to fill his straight as he sits in his pajamas playing a $1 and $2 hold'em game in the privacy of his own home for some fun. Why doesn't the justice department concentrate on getting the real bad guys, yet they see the online poker companies as an easy target for them to go after some easy cash. It's sickening and makes me disgusted to be an American right now. Frankly, I'm embarrassed as hell!

So the answer is that it's not right for the government to ban online poker, but it's beyond wrong the way they went about doing it.......

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