I'm really depressed about the state of online poker now

[Big Bend]

I've been a lifelong Libertarian Republican (ever since I regretted voting for Mondale), and have always voted for the conservatives in any election. But whats happened lately with the efforts to shutdown online gaming has got me really depressed. I've devoted much of the last 3 years learning this game, studying constantly, reading 100+ poker books, buying instructional DVDs and software and subscriptions to cardrunners.. I've always been a lifelong strategy game lover (board games, computer wargames, backgammon & more) and poker was the ultimate. Now that the people I voted for are taking it away from me I'm quite hurt, depressed, anxious. I live in TX where cardrooms are not legal.. live games I find to be too slow and boring anyway (especially NL live). Ya there may always be a way to fund online poker and withdraw somehow, but its not gona be the same until its legalized someday, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. So I'm left with this huge void crashing down on me, with feelings of loss and anger.

Not to mention that I was a winning player and the loss of extra hobby $$ is gona hurt.. tho I'm lucky to have a nice career, I had hoped to use poker winnings as a major fund for various purposes. But alas...

Too bad the Democrats suck worse than the Republicans for everything else (in my opinion). Like a friend of mine recently said, its not so bad getting old with everything going to hell, just leave it all for everybody else to deal with.

Its all very depressing.. Not just the demise of online poker but life in general and the world as we know it. I'm really worried about whats gona happen to my children and grandchildren someday. I fear the worst.

Any suggestions for getting over this depression and trying to remain positive about the future would be much appreciated right now. I know we here in the USA are still much better off than 95% of the planet, and overall my life is great.. just trying to keep things in perspective.

L8r.. BB

[SplawnDarts]

The national level Democrats don't like gambling either, ever since the Kennedys and the mob parted ways. Bobby Kennedy got all this started.

[teddyFBI]

[ QUOTE ]
Like a friend of mine recently said, its not so bad getting old with everything going to hell, just leave it all for everybody else to deal with.


[/ QUOTE ]

Spoken like a true Republican

[holdme]

Republican =/= Libertarian. The Republican party is getting increasingly fascist, and it's sick.

Live poker will still be there, even if they do manage to take online gambling away. I too feel let down by my government. From attaching the internet gambling prohibition to the Safe Port Act to arresting to British shareholders of Neteller who did nothing illegal, thereby withholding millions of US dollars.

I know that post didn't help you, OP, but I needed to vent too.

[dboy23]

As a republican turned libertarian I can somewhat sympathize with you here. Seeing as I actually believe we should be free to do whatever we want (provided it doesn't disturb the rights of others) and live with the consequences of our actions I tend to disagree vehemently with both of the big parties.

Joining the LP seemed liked a better decision than just not voting.

[KurtSF]

FYI, I grunched this because I had a strong response to OP, but I'll go back and read.

OP, I' in exactly the same boat as you, with the minor (perhaps trivial) distinction that I was always on the liberal side in any election. Republicans have always been scum in my eyes (except gun control, they got that right), and the difference now is that Democrats are just as big scum. There is no one at all sensible or rational involved in the US government anymore. Its pathetic, and terrifying.

RE: the state of the world, yeah, for several years now I've been calling our times the "End of Days." Rome didn't fall in a day, and neither is the US. Humanity will survive, life will go on, but we are heading into a major train-wreck of civilization right now.

The poker world is a micro-expression, I believe, of the short-sighted, fascist, and just plain stoopid things being done by our government these days. It couldn't have been worse timing for me. I recently made a change in my game and have been reborn as a pokerplayer. I won about 25% of my lifetime winnings in the last month! All of a sudden I have a future in this game, and it gets pulled out from under me by a bunch of self-important posturing morons.

A close friend and I have a reoccurring conversation about Germany in the 30s, about when you know to run. The best answer we have come up with so far is when the populace is disenfranchised. That is, when the people's will expressed through voting is no longer empowered or important or heeded. We've passed that point in this country. I swear to anything, if I didn't have family and so many ties in this country I would be trying to find a way out.

$0.02

[urko888_]

I too agree w/ the general bleakness of this thread.

First there are the jack off congressmen telling people that poker is evil and it should be banned. So facist, but really just the tip of the iceberg under the current administration.

We have a Department of Justice targeting anyone high up in the world of online gambling due to the fact that, newsflash, gambling can be used to launder money! This is basically the DOJ shutting down a financial market/economy because it can't control the money supply! Think about that for a second. If Uncle Sam isn't in charge, like he is w/ the most respected currency in the world, the dollar, he wants to shut down the game, literally!

Then we have an Office of the Vice President (OVP) setting up secret working groups designed to figure out ways to make Iran look bad on the world stage. If is a fact that Dick Cheany has set up his own National Security Office working group within the VOP that can read NSA, CIA, and FBI emails, yet doesn't have to share any of it's own info. This is a man who three years ago was telling Iran to "take a number" in terms of it being next on his hit list. Who do you think is feeding the press "theories" that Iranian forces are behind every spectacular attack in Iraq.

The bottom line is this country has ways to go before the population really rises up and changes the way politicians operate. When I say "ways to go" I think of things like an accidental war (see WWI) set off by one of our carrier battle groups now parked right new to Iran. Or the collapse of the dollar. Or another terrorist incident. Or a Watergate type incident, the VP's chief of staff just committed treason by outing the idenitity of a intelligence agent after all. The list goes on and on.

Unfortunately there is nothing the average American can do about it all. All you can really do is vote libertarian, continue to play online poker/promote the game in general, and give a healthy FU to the man.

[sweetjazz]

OP, I'm also of the libertarian bent, although leaning more liberal than conservative. And I am disappointed with what is going in this country in terms of public policy, including of course poker. Both parties are just machines to propogate the careers of politicians who little deserve the power they are given.

I had actually tentatively planned to spend the next several years with my primary job playing online poker, in order to build up some savings while the poker boom lasted. It is not much of an exagerration to say that the government may have cost me $1 million in poker income.

But that said, what can you do? You can try to get more active in politics, whether it is on the local, state, or federal level. That could involve anything from volunteering for a campaign of someone you believe in (if you can find such an individual -- not easy these days, I know) to trying to educate others about the ideas behind libertarianism and how Enlightenment principles (which probably would go under the label of classical liberalism, but has a lot of libertarian ideas) led to our Constitution.

Even if there is not something you can do about online poker, there are other more prominent issues which you can advocate and try to persuade others about. Having my liberty to play poker online away made me more sensitive to the other injustices that people endure, from gay couples who cannot share health benefits simply because their sexual orientation is disapproved of by others to the removal of the writ of habeus corpus on the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, some of whom are only guilty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and being turned in by someone out to make a quick American buck. Maybe these issues are important to you or maybe there are others that you think need more attention. Overall, the American public is very ignorant of what its government is doing and is all too willing to sacrifice the future for short-term benefits. A lot of people wouldn't feel that way if they were better educated in civics, and for better or worse, that duty has been neglected by the government itself and the media that covers it. So either the citizens will wake up and get active, or America will continue to see its great ideals slowly deteriote.

[Big Bend]

Yep, we're screwed. Between the upcoming wars, terrorist acts, economic collapses, energy supplies dwindling, moral decay in our society, corrupt leaders, failing schools - all this and more - the online poker fiasco isn't that big of a deal. But it portends bad things to come I tell ya. Our grandchildren will inherit a very different world than the one we grew up in, and its probably gona suck.

The depression continues... [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

BB

[Freelancer]

How the hell did you guys manage to go from;
Poker legistation----->end of the world


Not that I'm american or anything (or ever planning to move there evarrr) so this might have something to do with this...