I recognize that every morning when I shave. That fortunately has little affect on my readers or table mates. Politicians have the same kinds of problems. Harry Reed seems to have resolved one of his. Evidently his butt was getting uncomfortable sitting on the fence over the poker legislation.

Harry is off the fence and on “our side” of the issue. As a result, he’s lost some of his constituents. I suspect that his financial disclosure will show he garnered more casino money friends than he lost.

This is one of his critics:

“It (online poker) is just the tip of the iceberg and could open up this state to more online gaming,” said Bill Hughes, the Marketing Director of Peppermill, to the Reno Gazette-Journal. “It will only draw more money out of this state, from our poker rooms and eventually other facilities.”

Now Nevada is a hard place to pull off reality checks. But even Mr. Peppermill can’t be that dumb. Poker rooms in casinos have had their ups and downs. Pre-Moneymaker few rooms even had poker available. Online poker made poker again a viable option for casinos. It will never generate the $/sq. ft. that other profit centers produce but it does get more players through the front door.

Mr. Peppermill seems to think that the state outlawing online gaming has stopped it in its tracks.  My state also makes what I'm doing illegal.  Mr. Peppermill, all the folks that want to play poker online in your state are already playing online poker in your state.  Bad laws get ignored.

Online site have demonstrated they are happy to partner with the bricks and mortar side to bring lots of players to various tournaments. A fact that has bypassed the Nevada Gaming Commission during a major economic downturn for the area.

Reality doesn’t come to the top when discussing a marketing director. But, Mr. Peppermill has carried it beyond believability along with his California cohorts in their opposition to reality.

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When you put “I’m from the government.” ahead of that things can get surreal. Now throw in departmental regulation and it gets terrifying.

"We're experts in air traffic management and control for airplanes," said Hubbard, who is working on the FAA project with Stanford aeronautics and astronautics colleague Associate Professor Juan Alonso. "We plan to apply this expertise to the whole question of space traffic control. We need to figure out what kinds of systems will be necessary to tell flight controllers how to keep the space rockets out of the way of the flight from San Francisco to Washington."

Along with the aerospace experts who will develop policies for space launches, traffic management and human space flight, Stanford researchers at the Graduate School of Business will have a hand in examining and forecasting what business opportunities exist in space travel and exploration. Which evidently those business aren't smart enough to figure out on their own like business has since it was the barter system, I'll add.

"This emerging new commercial space area could be a business of many billions of dollars a year," Hubbard said. And we want our cut, I'll add.

Seems sort of reasonable. We don’t want those darn space ship crashing into our Vegas flight. But, think about it. Your one of those X-contest guys sending up your space ship. Are you also so dumb that you’ll send it out into space without looking in hindsight at the route and saying, “Oops, flight 107 got in the way. My bad.”?

Is the FAA the choice to handle this upgrade or is it more an opportunity to expand the department and ask for added funding? After all we have the other fairly costly entity called NASA and they been throwing things into space without knocking 747s out of the sky for quite a few years. It would seem there is a fairly responsible mechanism in place that has already resolved the issue.

ADDENDUM:

Part of this was inspired by my watching CSPAN. It was a speaker talking about crippling the new Health Care Legislation. One of the things is there won’t be a way to override a veto with the votes available. So, part of his solution was to cripple funding. And the example was not funding the 16,000 additional IRS agents that are needed to implement the mandatory penalties associated with not participating. But, then the White House, will likely call it job creation and use “stimulus” funds.

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It seems that everybody's favorite Democratic Senator, Harry Reed, is almost ready to support online poker.  Well, almost and sorta kinda.  It seems that his congressional cohorts have been working on him to support Frank's legislation.  But, small, Nevada casinos are still worried that it will negatively impact their revenue.  Being a dedicated politician he wishes to leave no special interest rock unturned getting gelt for his war chest.

It is a horrid quandary facing fearless leader.  So his support is sorta — kinda –  wink, wink, nudge, nudge, say no more.  Now that is leadership.  It has to give a warm glow to every inconvenienced poker player in the free world. Such clarity. Such purpose. Certainly deserving a statue in the rotunda. 

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You gotta love the guy. But, then there is that old one about “If you represent yourself, you have a fool for a client.” but sometimes it is a reasonable risk. I’ve done it twice in traffic court and am batting 500. Kickin the LasVegasCabbie’s backside. The last angry man is oh for two.

I’m not sure who’s blog to attribute getting to his site. My abject apology. There are a couple of stories on his site about run-ins with local law enforcement. You can get the legal info from his site. It is about stopping to pick up fares. It seems that is a no-no in LV.

Las Vegas caters to the tourist. From the limo line at the airport to the diamond club noshing, the business show they are happy to drop to their knees and at least appear to be willing to perform outrageous services that impact their bottom line. For those who aren’t high rollers with a stretch at their call there are jitneys and free bus rides to get folks to their casino area.

But what if you don’t want to sweat your way a number of blocks or maybe visit the neon graveyard or another spot devoid of slots? The likely vehicle will be a cab. And, LV in its wisdom greed used the law to stack the deck on something as basic as hailing a cab. If you want a cab, you must enter a property which has a chance to pull you in or at least sucker you out of a buck or two for their doormen letting you climb into a cab. New York City is more congested than even the strip. Yet, cabs are hailed everywhere and anywhere. But then, they don’t have slots or table games.

We’ve seen the UIGEA take away what we thought was our right. LV takes it even further. Not only do the local cops meet quota writing cabbies ticket for picking up fares but there is an administrative arm of the taxi commission doing it too. I call that a perversion of everything we call liberty.

As poker players, we’re disadvantage in all but a home game by the rake. But, in return, we get some perceived benefits. But, when you see how they go beyond to pervert local regulations to screw us even further, well, I call that angle shooting and it gives me another reason to go to the boats instead of hopping on a plane.

ADDENDUM:

I fought a ticket locally. Ended up there one evening and the judge (actually a local attorney down on his luck with some clout) found me not guilty which totally honked the cop who had to come in on his off time and lost the ticket.

The other was in Iowa. It was on the road to Cedar Rapids and there wasn’t another car in sight. The trooper had his out of the way spot and my almost 10 over cruise control that usually gets you a pass got me stopped. I hit the library and looked up the radar defense and went to court. Funny! I sat there the only idiot contesting a ticket that day. I was in business attire and had a legal pad with notes. I heard a couple of office folks commenting that I must be some attorney hired to get some rich guy off. I lost the case but the judge offered to sponsor me to his law school. But, I wasn’t that despirate.

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This was called negative by his opposition.  Well, it is, I guess.  But it also seems more accurate that a lot of the negative stuff out there.  That was his second Billy Ad.   The other one is similar and has the same black humor.

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A new poll of leading presidential scholars ranks Barack Obama as the 15th best president of the United States, just below Bill Clinton but ahead of Ronald Reagan.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/39283.html

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We can get to 5-6 figures on the homes we ‘own’. (Californians can likely still laugh/cry here.)  All that isn’t much of a reference when we look to Washington.

If you watch the videos, it will give you some idea about the President’s budget cuts being shouted out to all.   If your vote was blue for solid reasons — at least at the time — you also get a short review of campaign promise reliability.  The President keeps touting that all this stuff he’s doing is just what he promised.  Well, he promised a lot.  He was out recently celebrating the 10,000th road building (stimulus) project he’s funded.  But, elsewhere the rubber isn’t meeting the road.

If that one didn’t get it across, this look at 17-billion might.

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These days, my only real idea on politicians would be an amendment to the constitution that added another option to the voting booth. It would add: (3) None of the above. Sometimes, I think we’d be better off with an unfilled seat in congress or whatever than the options provided. It might break that cookie cutter version of how to be a successful politician.

I do have an exception. He’s my homer. It is our governor. Maverick is a popular adjective being thrown into political resumes. Kook might equally apply. But, even there, there can be good kooks and bad. The article I’d like you to read is a bit long but it sure details one of the good kooks. He’d make a great candidate for national office but he also a bright fellow and really hate the thought of putting his family through that meat grinder.

I don’t know your views or leanings but, whatever side it takes, the guy will make you think.

Here’s a darn fine read.

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It is a classic. And, it seems about all we’re getting from the White House these days.

Do you remember Candidate Obama? The man was flawless. He had a cogent and endearing answer for every situation. Now that the rubber has met the road, it isn’t as cut and dried.

His first dog was named George Walker Bush. It didn’t seem that he fully moved in before that was the source of all unsolved problems. I didn’t find it attractive. It was obvious and self-serving.

Now we have the oil spill. Barak Obama is not responsible for the oil spill. Government failure to solve it isn’t his fault either. And, changes to the departments that may have been overly lax in monitoring the off-shore drilling seem to be progressing as well as they can in politics. Yet, the White House can only drag out some dog bemoan their lost homework.

It seems like a bit of honesty just isn’t possible – even when it’d do them some good. Maybe it is time to think about some Trumanesque honesty. It kicked Dewey’s arrogant butt while all the political pundits were writing Harry off. The American people can accept the truth about a bad situation when they feel the guy is meeting the problem head on without pulling punches.

I know I keep bashing Democrats like they were the only evil. That’s because they have extreme power and can force good or evil without regard for the electorate. The “Republican solution” is every bit as self-serving as the White House’s approach. All they can do is complain like they were me or some other powerless schmuck.

As soon as one side says something, the other trashes it. It is knee jerk politics that serves the party ahead of the nation. There is no difference between their rhetoric and that of Candidate Obama – except Obama did it a lot better.

We’ve a third party. It sounds refined. They are serving tea. No scones with clotted cream though. The media is almost unanimous in painting them as kooks. A lot of them are. They’ve a very diverse collection of messages. It does include the old John Birch crazies. The Neocons have snuck in the back door as is their want. But, it also includes an interesting and party spanning cross section of the populace – which most media ignores being there. There is a surprising mix of blue and red in their paint pot.

While the ideas they represent are quite diverse, they unite in the view that something isn’t working and has gotten out of hand. If they could come together, they might get some change but it doesn’t take a Vegas bookmaker to know that is a long shot.

What is sad across our new, somewhat three party system is that nobody has the clout or reasoning to really institute some change. All the angry shouting identifies that there is problems. But all that shouting doesn’t do a damn thing to solve them. It takes some honesty and a willingness to work together and for instead of always against.

ADDENDUM:

Keep Indiana’s Governor Daniels in your spotlight. He’s denying that he’ll run but hopefully that is just a bit of wise politicking. He’s been a Washington insider so he won’t be stuck with the Carter problem that won’t work for the tea party either. The important thing here those is that he’s willing to honestly talk about a problem.

He ran for governor in a weird seeming way. He had a motor home and drove around the state. He’d stop in local coffee shops and not only talk but listen. He didn’t use big rallies spouting focus group generated sound bites. He just talked about the problem being faces and the solutions he saw. He owns the Governor’s mansion and his popularity even brings about common goals in a legislature with mixed party control.

————-

My RSS feed is pretty diverse.  Some are those I can frequently disagree with or are polarized far more than I appreciate.  But, it makes for thought.

Here is one that made me think a bit and relates a bit to today's blog.

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I went to the website.  The AG doesn't provide an email address — I see why they wanted me to call.  Constituents seem too bothersome.  So, I went to the Governor's site and asked him to forward it.  I wanted to copy to him anyway.  Nice guy with solid ideas about what is right.

The site by the way (in.gov) is loaded with 404 errors (page not found) and is really an embarrassment to Hoosiers.  Clumsy, overly busy design to boot.  Anyway, here is a copy of the letter I sent turning myself in:

Dear Mr. Zoeller

I am a constituent that even voted for you. I’m almost 70 and live in Portage.

I see you have supported the UIGEA. I also know that it is illegal to play poker outside the state supporting casinos. Well, Greg, I play poker. Loose the damn hounds.

If I went to your casino, I’d have to play at dollars level. Online I play at much lower level. I play every day. It keeps me active and is a lot cheaper than a monthly cable bill.

I recall your office’s wrath at government over the GM bonds. It did suck to have the rules changed in a way that cost the state account substantial loss. One should be able to expect reasonable rules without government interference.

So, why do you and the state intrude in what I wish to do for enjoyment and mental stimulation? Yes, I agree it should be regulated. That is much different from outlawing one’s pastime as you have and again seek to do.

I’ve been around a long time and lived in much less regulated times. Those were also pretty good times. The law was respected. The new “Nanny” state and political correctness has reduced society’s respect. You make laws without regard for future effect. Every law comes with future impacts that aren’t considered in their writing.

You may feel that gambling is wrong. That’s your choice. I don’t and it gives me pleasure. When you approach 70, there isn’t a lot of that around. And, now you are seeking to limit mine. That is shameful.

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