Las Vegas will benefit from legal online poker
Wednesday the Nevada Gaming Control Board published proposed regulations intended to establish state regulations for legal online gaming, namely online poker. This set of guides was produced to satisfy the 2011 Nevada Legislature Assembly Bill 258.
Prior to Internet poker being offered by Nevada’s established gaming industry the feds in D.C. must pass legislation making Internet gaming a legal business. Will this apparent miracle happen anytime soon? Maybe. No one loves money more than our coven of lawmakers in Washington and by ignoring Internet gaming they are blatantly ignoring billions of dollars in tax revenues (forgot that “tax” is now a dirty word). Additionally, the online industry will create thousands of mid-level, skilled job openings and that’s a vote getter for political lifers seeking public approval in the upcoming 2012 elections.
Unfortunately, the self serving bureaucrats have created so many critical problems – wars, mortgage fraud, debt ceiling, credit default swaps, home foreclosures, spiraling energy cost, failing education, declining health industry, etc. – that the legalization of Internet poker is probably on page 412 of the list of priorities required to get America back on the track and that makes any effort for legalization a long shot. Possible, but not probable anytime soon.
Internet gambling has been around since there has been an Internet and even though the DOJ is bent on fostering another dark age of moral prohibition, the international Internet gaming industry grows and expands daily. The rest of the world is marching steadily into the digital future and as surely as automobiles replaced horses the Internet is rapidly replacing the traditional brick and mortar facades of many industries. The right to legally play poker at your computer instead of a casino should be a matter of personal preference.
Can you even imagine settling into your favorite chair in front of the big screen for a relaxing evening of football. You grab a snack, pour a cold one and boom! Your front door explodes into a shower of splinters and the morality police (read feds) storm in and haul you away in cuffs because you’re a criminal. You broke the law of the land because that bottle of booze has alcohol and alcohol is an illegal substance says Congress. This was real life in the United States during the prohibition era (1920-1933). Alcohol was the evil doer then, now it’s online poker.
Legislating moral standards decided by a few over the many has never worked and typically leads to the powerful gaining even more power over the weak underclass. If left unchecked, moral legislation will strip away all of our personal freedoms. The trend will continue until the underclass rises up and makes use of its mighty collective muscle to restore civil order to the chaos of unwanted needless laws. Let’s stop the madness now before wide spread prohibition takes over and destroys all of our rights to enjoy the pursuit of happiness.
Read the proposed regulations and voice your feelings to your Congressional reps. Send them an email, send them many emails, and tell them who’ll get your vote. Time to let them know we’re not bluffing.