government says online poker is a crime
apparently those of us who play dollar poker at night to unwind need protection from ourselves, but not just from ourselves, from ORGANIZED CRIME! the government doesnt think we can be trusted with our own money, and people living in washington (the state, and not DC) have been getting visits from the good people at the FBI. in washington online gambling is a felony, and because fulltilt poker isnt based in washington they are being looked at for aiding in a felony across state lines, and possibly money laundering, both of these are federal charges and would essentially force the US based company out of the US market.
here's the deal, it is now illegal for US banks to process transactions going to, or coming from gambling sites, such as those with slot machines, and other games where you have no real influence in whether you win or lose. games which require no skill, or any kind of mathematical knowledge. this i agree with to a certain extent, though i believe the american taxpayer should be allowed to decide for himself whether he wants to waste his money there. the law does not specifically name poker as a form of gambling, but it does exclude the american people from joining in the game.
personally i think poker is a game which requires skill, patience, and maybe a little luck but its by far not the slots. i think it should be excluded from this law. what do you guys think?
www.triplebeard.com
http://darkroomreview.blogspot.com
“...There are so many ways of being despicable it quite makes one's head spin. But the way to be really despicable is to be contemptuous of other people's pain. You ought to have some apprehension that the man you see before you was once even younger than you are now and arrived at his present wretchedness by imperceptible degrees.”
-James Baldwin
i saw one post from last month
they could be though, if states individually sanction play/sites (say if oregon allowed full tilt play, they could take a cut of both deposits and withdrawls. say, ten percent. thats two dollars on every minimum deposit. no one would really notice, but it would translate to millions for the county general fund
www.triplebeard.com
http://darkroomreview.blogspot.com
“...There are so many ways of being despicable it quite makes one's head spin. But the way to be really despicable is to be contemptuous of other people's pain. You ought to have some apprehension that the man you see before you was once even younger than you are now and arrived at his present wretchedness by imperceptible degrees.”
-James Baldwin
I don't think it's so much to do with the fact that they think people can't be trusted with their own money, but rather that the government have no real way of regulating online poker games. There's no way of making sure the money turned over by companies like Full Tilt is going into US banks. So the bottom line is, of course they want to make it illegal, they're not getting a cut. Not saying I agree with it, but also it's impossible to regulate players according to age like you would in a casino.
Have there been any developments in the Full Tilt poker thing? I can't find anything about the investigations that's newer than april.