Sunday, March 30, 2008

Poker News - Massachusetts to go ahead with gambling study

Massachusetts to go ahead with gambling study
Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has said a $189,000 study on the possible impact of casinos in the commonwealth will still be conducted — even though the state legislature has tabled a bill that would have licensed three casinos in Massachusetts. The bill, which would have also ��...full article

750px-flag_of_massachusettssvg5.jpgMassachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has said a $189,000 study on the possible impact of casinos in the commonwealth will still be conducted — even though the state legislature has tabled a bill that would have licensed three casinos in Massachusetts.

The bill, which would have also banned online gambling in Massachusetts, will not come to a vote again until next year.

According to pokerpages.com:

Spectrum Gaming Group of New Jersey won the state contract late February and has been working on the analysis for the past month. It was expected to complete the analysis 60 to 90 days after winning the contract.

The Patrick administration brought on the consultant to help sell the casino plan after critics questioned the validity of the governor’s estimates on revenue and jobs. Gov. Patrick had predicted his three-casino plan would raise more than $400 million annually for property tax relief and construction projects and create 20,000 permanent jobs. The administration backtracked on a claim of 30,000 construction jobs this month after the number was questioned by The Boston Globe. The governor testified last week it would create more than 10,000 construction jobs.


Whole thing here.

Spectrum Gaming was not involved in committee hearings and debate in the Massachusetts legislature last week before the bill was tabled.



Online poker developer not worried about proposed Canada ban
GigaMedia Limited, which develops and licenses online poker and casino software, said in a statement that it was not worried about the possibility of a ban of online poker and gambling in Canada that may be on the way. Canada has been considering laws — ��...full article

generic_laptop_chips5.jpgGigaMedia Limited, which develops and licenses online poker and casino software, said in a statement that it was not worried about the possibility of a ban of online poker and gambling in Canada that may be on the way. Canada has been considering laws — similar to what the United States has in place regarding online gaming — to stop online gambling operations in the Mohawk Territory of Kahnawake.
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High-stakes poker player linked to NY prostitution ring?
The New York Daily News says a “well-known, high-stakes” poker player utilized the services of Kristin Davis, who has been linked to former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer. Davis allegedly ran a number of high-end prostitution rings and is currently being held on money laundering ��...full article

generic_ak_reach_for_chips.jpgThe New York Daily News says a “well-known, high-stakes” poker player utilized the services of Kristin Davis, who has been linked to former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer.

Davis allegedly ran a number of high-end prostitution rings and is currently being held on money laundering and prostitution charges.

The name of the poker player has not been discovered, according to pokerkingblog.com:

The New York Daily News apparently obtained a list of all of the “clients” that utilized the services of Kristin Davis. There were many names on the list, including doctors, lawyers, hedge fund managers and apparently a well-known poker pro. The pro is not named in the article.

The article goes on to say that the “poker star” spent a total of $26,450 on eight separate “dates”, with two of the “sessions” lasting a total of seven hours. According to the article, the “gambling man” was amongst the biggest spenders in Davis’ “crew of regulars”.

Whole thing here.



Neil Channing smashes Irish Poker Open final table

Neil "Bad Beat" Channing exemplified the latter dynamic when he destroyed the final table of the 2008 Irish Poker Open yesterday.

Entering final-table play as the chip leader with $2.75 million of the $6.67 million in play, Channing quickly took charge of the final table and never relented. It was a scene reminiscent of Brandon Cantu at the final table of the WPT's Bay 101, and perhaps even of Jamie Gold at the 2006 WSOP final table.

Channing, a poker professional and author from Sunderland, England, won €801,400 million and some incredible bragging rights for his efforts at the Irish Poker Open.

Channing played the big stack perfectly and left a wake of destruction in his path. He made short work of Danilo Paulson, Tim Blake and Thomas Dunwoodie, which gave him a great advantage against Ireland's Donal Norton as they entered heads-up play.

Channing had a 2-1 chip lead but with the average stack at over 50 big blinds for each player, many thought it might be a marathon. The poker gods, however, had other ideas.

In a gigantic pot, Norton held J-8 for trip eights when combined with the board, but little did the Irishman know that Channing held K-8.

Norton was suddenly in dangerous territory and forced to make a move with pocket fives. Channing made the call with #Ac-#9h and hit trip aces on the board, which dashed the hopes of the hometown crowd and gave Channing his biggest poker payday to date.

Winning the 2008 Irish Poker Open was no small feat, considering 667 players including Doyle Brunson, Marty Smyth, Andy Black, Ciaran O'Leary, Rolande de Wolfe, David "Devilfish" Ulliott, Padraig Parkinson and many more came out to play in this year's event. The players competed for a total prize pool of €3 million, which made the tournament one of the richest in European history.

To read a comprehensive recap blog from PokerListings' very own Finnish phenomenon Owen Laukkanen, who was on assignment in Ireland, click here.

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Lee Markholt wins WPT World Poker Challenge
Lee Markholt had cashed 14 times before on the World Poker Tour, but he never made it to a final table. When he finally made it to one, he didn’t waste the opportunity. Markholt won the WPT’s World Poker Challenge on Friday in Reno, Nev., taking ��...full article

wpt_logo7.jpgLee Markholt had cashed 14 times before on the World Poker Tour, but he never made it to a final table.

When he finally made it to one, he didn’t waste the opportunity.

Markholt won the WPT’s World Poker Challenge on Friday in Reno, Nev., taking the first-place prize of $493,815 in the $7,500 buy-in event.
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U.S. may offer settlement to Antigua

According to the Antigua Sun, it's hoped the proposed settlement will put an end to the five-year trade battle over Internet gaming between the two nations.

Antigua and Barbuda had filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization with regard to the United States' ban on Internet gambling. The WTO ruled that the U.S. laws obstructing online gambling are in violation of trade agreements it made as a part of the WTO.

Since then, Antigua has been battling for compensation in the matter. It was awarded $21 million per year in trade sanctions by a WTO arbitration panel in the initial ruling.

Rather than changing its laws to comply with the trade regulations, however, the United States chose to change its commitments to the WTO, which opened the nation up to compensation claims from other nations with an online gambling industry, as well as to a second claim from Antigua.

Antigua once again requested arbitration by the WTO to settle the claim, but the proposed settlement due on Monday, according to Mark Mendel, Antigua's attorney in the WTO dispute, could bring both aspects of the trade dispute to a close.

Mendel told the Antigua Sun that the proposal, if it is submitted, will address both the initial trade dispute as well as the withdrawal of the United States' commitments to the WTO.

"Any settlement that we do would be comprehensive. It would take in everything," Mendel said in the article. "They are (two separate issues) if we have to litigate them, but if we can settle something then it should all be settled in one go."

In previous news reports, Mendel had said that the United States had stopped efforts to negotiate a settlement. However, if the two parties can come to an acceptable agreement, they are not bound by the WTO arbitrator's previous decision.

Mendel indicated that he had no idea what might be in the United States' proposal, and they are just waiting to see what the proposal is and re-evaluate their position.

Several other countries have filed claims against the United States since it announced its withdrawal of online gambling from its WTO agreements. Costa Rica was the latest to reach a settlement agreement with the United States, along with Canada, Japan and the European Union.

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U.S.-Antigua online gambling impasse near end?
The United States is planning to propose a settlement that would end a bitter trade dispute regarding online gambling between the U.S. and Antigua and Barbuda. The settlement, which should be offered by the end of the month, could end five years of acrimony and legal ��...full article

antigua_flag4.gifThe United States is planning to propose a settlement that would end a bitter trade dispute regarding online gambling between the U.S. and Antigua and Barbuda.

The settlement, which should be offered by the end of the month, could end five years of acrimony and legal wrangling on an international scale.
(more…)



#363 – NBC Heads-Up Championship #13 – Clubs and Spades Finish Without Incident
Seriously, compared with the action that came before, the second round of the Clubs/Spades bracket was not especially exciting. All but one of the matches were over in 70 minutes and the all-in-fest that started 30 minutes in usually featured...

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