Poker Forum

Clinging to the fictions of the past (and no doubt riding to work with horse & buggy, buggy-whip in hand) ... the powers that be in the US DOJ continue their journey into the rediculous lumping poker with blackjack and roulette. An intelligent position is to realize that the game of Bridge, like poker, is a game of skill. I still remain shocked that this argument is rarely used to make the point. You don't see Bridge Clubs that host Bridge tournaments for cash being shut down. Skill wins at poker and the new WSOP champion is a good example of that ... in fact, the entire Final Table of the WSOP is a great example of that.

Skill, like cream, rises to the top. Recognizing that is a sign of intellect. Poker is a game of skill.

The counter-claim by the DOJ uses all the old arguments as well as valid banking violations in a shotgun approach in their case ... after all, the DOJ wants to win.

The real question is why? The answer is money and a lot of it.

By winning this case and launching new "investigations" against all the evil-in-the-eyes-of-the-DOJ (but legal) poker sites such as LockPoker, etc, the DOJ will be able to seize hundreds of millions with impunity. The DOJ has made fortunes off PartyPoker (who is still paying off the dubious deal made years ago), PokerStars (the settlement includes a monetary payment that is mind-boggling), and recently FullTiltPoker. Groupe Tapie will take over the FullTiltPoker site and pay a small fortune over a number of years to the US DOJ is my guess ... a very safe bet IMHO.

The longer the DOJ Poker Prohibition in the US goes on, the more money the DOJ will be able to seize from the safety of warm offices, coffee at hand. It really is inconvenient hunting down real criminals and organized crime who have this bad habit of shooting back when you have all this low-hanging fruit worth millions in enforcing a virtual online Poker Prohibition.

I was not surprised to hear that a deal had been reached with FullTiltPoker, after all, the pattern is clear. Indict, roll out a civil case, seize every dollar possible, them make a deal for a few hundred million dollars.

Like the corporate executive being paid a salary of umpteen millions, it is legal, but is it right?

Like the Prohibition in the US (1920 - 1933) the online Poker Prohibition by the DOJ is doomed in the long term. The alcohol prohibition drove alcohol consumption underground pitting the government against a large percentage of the population until finally, faced with the reality that the US did not want to criminalize most of their voting population, it was repealed ... and taxed.

Online poker in the US is now solidly heading underground and the DOJ is fighting against it the same way as they used to send agents in to conduct raids on speakeasys (unregistered bars packed with people drinking alcohol). The use of VPN (Virtual Private Networks) allows anyone to play completely undetected. The online sites PartyPoker, PokerStars, & ultimately FullTiltPoker already have agreed to enforce the Poker Prohibition on behalf of the US DOJ by not allowing US citizens in the US to play on their sites. This leaves the thousands of other sites to fill the demand.

Since the DOJ cannot easily make it a crime for a US citizen to play poker online (that Constitution is a real barrier sometimes ... lol) due to the one thing that the DOJ hates ... political headaches ... they have to fight a losing war against the underground market.

Ultimately the US will see the light and also the tsunami of tax revenue that countries like France are tapping. Once regulated the DOJ will have to go back to chasing real criminals instead of twisting the UIGEA into a pretzel to criminalize profitable businesses and in the process confiscate moneys that belongs to US citizens.

Interesting, the DOJ's appears to be making a 'historically regarded' argument. That is, they don't care if skill is required in poker or sports betting, they are 'historically regarded' as 'gambling', while chess and duplicate bridge are not. The problem is that perceptions and mores change over time and MANY things things that were either permitted or prohibited in the past were later found to be acceptable or unacceptable, e.g. slavery, racism, cohabitation, etc. etc. etc.

So, basically the DOJ is gonna tell the judge that poker has always been generally regarded as 'gambling', therefore the UIGEA was violated, and that 'skill' is irrelevant.

I don't see anything in the quote paragraphs that say that poker isn't a game of skill. What the DOJ is saying is that poker IS a game of skill (and chance), which is fact. They also say sports betting is a game of skill and chance, which is also a fact. Online sports betting is illegal gambling, and online poker is illegal gambling in the eyes of the DOJ. They're just using sports betting as an example of a game that has an element of skill but is also illegal gambling. Just because a game, like poker, has skill involved doesn't mean it's not gambling or in violation of the UIGEA.

But somehow you conclude from the quoted paragraph that the DOJ says poker is not a game skill. Serious leap of logic there.

So, by making the 'historically regarded' argument, the DOJ is apparently going to take the 'plain language' route in statutory interpretation. In other words, the 'plain language' of the statute prohibits 'gambling' transactions, poker is historically regarded as gambling, therefore the plain language of the statute prohibits it, regardless of the amount of skill involved.

So, because most people regard poker as gambling, it's illegal. Seems like the same argument people made to support slavery, segregation, women's sufferage, etc. Obviously this is the perception that the PPA has been working hard to change; I become nervous when the gov't starts arguing that 'the law is the law' without resort to the merits of any particular case or whether it makes any sense.