Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.
Posted on 03/07/2007 6:06:39 PM PST by JTN
I like this Al D'Amato fellow already. Tell you why: He understands the value of a poker face.
Take the announcement this week that D'Amato is taking a "leadership position" with the Poker Players Alliance, a group you've never heard of that nevertheless is committed to doing God's work by protecting the rights of card players everywhere to lose money online. At one point while talking about his new challenge in life with a reporter for the New York Times, D'Amato, the former Republican senator from New York, railed against the law passed last year that makes it extremely difficult to play poker on the Internet, saying Congress ought to be more concerned with terrorism and drug trafficking (assuming it isn't) and hailing poker as perhaps America's favorite sport. He added: "You don't have 70 million people participating in baseball."
In fact, the PPA's news release estimates that only about 23 million people played Internet poker last year, meaning Al has a bunch of Friday night garages to fill if he's going to get his sport up to 70 million nationally. But why let all that cigar smoke get in the way of a good story?
Every hold 'em junkie now has a former U.S. senator to call his own. D'Amato isn't just the lobbyist hired for big bucks to represent online gaming; he's a customer. D'Amato is one of the more famous poker players in congressional history, assuming such a list might exist, and that takes in a whole lot of territory normally reserved for calculated liars, convicted cheats and general obfuscators -- and we still haven't gotten to the poker table yet. He's the man.
Of course, D'Amato is working for money. The PPA, which puts its membership at 160,000 (again, take it or leave it as an estimate) is taking aim at a bill passed last year that banned using credit cards or online payment systems as part of online poker and other gaming activities on the Internet. D'Amato is a longtime player, mostly with a regular group of friends and colleagues rather than online. Still, put such theological synergy together with the ability to pay up, and you've got yourself a lobbyist.
What D'Amato and the PPA seem to hate the most is the fact that Congress casually lumped in poker with other online games of chance. As they see it, poker is a game of skill and chance, which therefore entitles Al to call it a sport, which blah blah blah -- you can see where this is going. D'Amato rallies to the defense of those brave and heroic online gamers, who evidently need protecting in the form of Congressional legal re-interpretation. (Translation: Exempt poker from the no-credit-card law, and we're good to go.)
D'Amato also raises a point with which American history is likely to agree, even if it's comically misguided here. "Prohibitions don't work," he said in the PPA's news release. "They only create unintended consequences."
Just like liquor, in other words. Well, drinking, gambling you get the idea. Try to ban card games online, and they'll only start playing poker in somebody's living room late at night, buying their own chips or using makeshift materials like pretzels and M&Ms as token "money." Where will the madness end?
Actually, D'Amato and the PPA might get to where they want to go. One of their expressed aims is to get online poker regulated and taxed in the United States, and considering that most poker sites are essentially offshore ATMs right now, you can see the appeal to Congress of squeezing some tax money where none currently exists.
Still, it could be a while. The Democrat-controlled houses seem to have some other things on their collective minds just now. Just don't count out the man suddenly dubbed "The First Senator of Poker." Al D'Amato hasn't yet begun to show his cards.
With one exception - he doesn't point out that it's none of Mark Kreidler's business what people do with their own money.
Ping
My daughter, SIL and grandson was living in Horseheads, NY in 1993. My SIL died of Agent Orange cancer, Agent Orange according to his Dr's.
My grandson was still in high school and they were left in dire straights, financially.
My daughter needed help getting through the red tape of SS and widows pension.
She was encouraged by a friend to write Senator D'Amato and ask his help.
In no time Senator D'Amato had cut through the BS and helped my daughter.
I will always have respect and love for this kind Senator that came to the aid of my daughter.
I will always have respect and love for this kind Senator that came to the aid of my daughter.
It's really heartwarming that D'Amato helped your daughter. Too bad he didn't help our country when he had his chance, but instead went through his Senate Committee Charade which helped the Slickster evade having to answer for Vincent Foster's death.
Yeah, really heartwarming.
ML/NJ
Two things:
(1) Hillybilly had Alfonse's brother by the short and curlies and was about to lower the boom (admit it, I mix a wonderful metaphor)
AND ....
(2)the MSM airwaves were chock-a-block 24/7 for months with that OJ crap out in LA ... providing the Clowntons with all the cover they needed.
Al's investigator did write the most damning report of the whole affair ... a real pity Al didn't get to use it.
Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.
No, he is defending the dignity of man, and man't natural right to enter into contracts with others so long as they don't harm third parties.
People lose money every single time they go to the movies, too. Why don't we ban them? Why is internet poker as a form of entertainment somehow a bad thing?
Why is internet poker as a form of entertainment somehow a bad thing?
Because it leads to addiction and it is the moral obligation of a bunch of strangers to hire govt. to put a gun to the potential addict's head and restrict him from tempting his fate along with the other 299,999,999 people in America. Perfectly sensible solution to a gigantic problem. </sarc>
You don't suppose it has anything to do with the fact that big gaming corporations in the Atlantic City, Mississippi, and Las Vegas made large contributions to the GOP do you? Nah, they love competition from the Internet.
those interests made just as many contributions to the Dems too. corruption is very much at home in either party.
I joined the PPA when they first started, but won't give them another nickel, and I told them as long as they back Dems for office I won't be giving. Maybe D'Amato can change that, who knows.
Al D'Amato is an idiot. Who cares what he thinks?
yeah, in a 2 party system, sometimes there is no good choice. the lesser of two evils is still evil.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.