Over the last week or so I’ve become more and more distressed with the ban on internet gambling being signed into law. I have hated the idea of it for quite a long time, way back before a lot of internet poker players even had any idea that such a shitty little wrinkle was on the horizon, I protested the event and asked people not to allow it to take place then. It’s not just poker that’s at stake, it’s ‘choice’ *freedom* that’s at stake.
In mid year, 2000, the Information page on PokerWorks looked like this:
Pretty funny, huh? It’s the only thing funny about this whole damn post. Underneath the short, vivid sea blue box, is a long, dark green box that stretches across the page. This is what the box contained and the link is active, now as it was then:
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URGENT-YOUR MEMBER OF CONGRESS MUST HEAR ABOUT YOUR OPPOSITION TO THE INTERNET GAMBLING PROHIBITION ACT!! http://web.archive.org/web/20001208235000/http://www2.capweb.net/iccc/ |
I’m not mad about the bill being signed into law. I’m downright fucking enraged that such idiocy is placed on a bill that is supposed to protect our ports AND US from what? Ourselves? And the US citizens are supposed to give up our rights and just kneel down, with abject understanding and say, “Well…it’s the law. So let’s all stop playing internet poker.”
It’s bull shit people! BULL SHIT! I don’t know about you, but I left home a long time ago. I’ve been a responsible adult for years, without needing someone to tell me what I can and cannot do when it comes to playing poker, or having a social drink with friends, or playing a friendly or nonfriendly game of cards in a casino or in a home game or on the internet. I don’t need a babysitter. If I did, I’d hire some well built stud that’s around 20 years old.
And what does this stand for?
Our freedoms are going down the drain as our nation’s law makers decide what is good for us in a medium that they have no right deciding. If poker is gone, what’s next? Where is the line drawn? It isn’t. One thing leads to another and soon we won’t be able to think unless we file a form and ask permission first. Woops! That would entail thinking though…silly me. The land of the free is far from free.Some of these elected wonder brains should be able to figure out that there’s millions to be made by charging fees for licensing, providing servers that are monitored and tested continuously to protect us from malicious cheats and hackers, and taking their teensy bit of rake out of every pot or however they decide to tax online poker, and give us back our GAME!
Ken P. has put the link up in his blog. I’m putting it up here. It’s time to go sign a petition, mail the url to all of your friends and relatives (and to your enemies too just in case they play poker), and ask all of them to mail it to someone they know. Send letters to your congress people. Make as much noise as possible or soon there may be a law against making noise.