Manne wrote:
It doesn’t seem like that long ago that Barack Obama was named the 44th President of the United States, but a lot has gone down in the last three-plus years as we get ready for another election in 2012. President Obama will have to fend off the Republicans in order to stay in office for another four years, and we are getting closer to seeing who his competition will be.
Right now, it looks like Mitt Romney is the favorite to represent the GOP as some have him at 2/11 after he has picked up wins in New Hampshire (primary), Florida (primary), Nevada (caucus), Maine (caucus), Arizona (primary) and Michigan (primary) and currently holds 41.5% of the popular vote among Republicans. Romney, from Massachusetts, also ran in the 2008 primaries and he almost looks like a lock to come away with the win this time.
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However, Romney still has to hold off Pennsylvania’s Rick Santorum at 5/1, who has won in Iowa (caucus), Colorado (caucus), Minnesota (caucus) and Missouri (primary), although he has been accused by cheating by Romney’s staff in Michigan. Newt Gingrich out of Georgia comes in at 20/1 despite leading Santorum in the popular vote by a count of 23.2% to 22.1%; Gingrich has won only South Carolina (primary) and he’ll need a furious late push just to hold off Santorum.
Ron Paul of Texas is the wild card in this race with almost 11% of the popular vote and odds of 30/1 to represent the Republicans, and with no major wins it’ll take a small miracle for Paul to even catch up to Gingrich and Santorum.
2012 US Presidential Election - Republican Nominee
Mitt Romney 2/11
Rick Santorum 5/1
Newt Gingrich 20/1
Ron Paul 30/1
It seems like it is Romney’s race to lose, but the 64-year-old governor has to avoid any major mistakes coming down the stretch if he is going to try and move President Obama out of the White House in November.
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2012/02/28
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From his home computer, the 42-year-old UPS truck driver from eastern Louisville could click his way to virtual green felt tables at PokerStars.com — until the U.S. government shut down the website and two others last year on fraud and money laundering charges.
With that, Veneklase folded his online poker game — “I don’t want to disobey any laws,” he said.
But he was thrilled to learn recently that federal authorities might be changing their stance.
Struggling against an onslaught of Internet gambling operated legally from other countries, the Justice Department issued an opinion in late December reversing a long-standing position that the 1961 federal Wire Act prohibited most betting over the Internet.
It ruled that states can legalize many forms of wagering over the Internet, except sports betting, as long as it’s within their own borders.
Gambling law experts predict the decision will trigger an avalanche of online gaming — including lotteries, poker and other casino games — being legalized by states eager to capture tax revenue from the estimated $100 billion global Internet gambling industry.
“Clearly there’s going to be this big explosion of Internet gambling,” said I. Nelson Rose, an authority on gambling law and a professor at the Whittier Law School in California. “All the states are desperate for revenues.”
Previously, Internet gambling sites have operated legally from other countries and have been only a mouse click away for American bettors like Veneklase, who weren’t explicitly prohibited from playing.
But lawmakers in 10 states — including neighboring Ohio and Illinois — have indicated interest in trying online lottery sales or poker to capture some of that revenue.
Things are moving slower in Kentucky and Indiana, where officials say they are researching the possibities but expect no action anytime soon.
“Our job right now is to look at what the options can be,” said Arch Gleason, the Kentucky Lottery’s president. In Kentucky, customers buy Powerball and other lottery tickets at store terminals in retail locations. But under the state lottery law and the justice department’s recent ruling, the lottery could sell some existing games such as Powerball and scratch-offs over the Internet to players located in Kentucky, he said.
But they wouldn’t do so without discussing plans first with policy makers, Gleason added.
In Indiana, the law clearly states that it’s illegal to gamble over the Internet. (A separate federal law has allowed interstate betting via phone and computer to wager on horse racing.)
Gleason said any new forms of Internet sales for lottery products, particularly online casino-style games, would most likely require statutory changes, and the priority has been Gov. Steve Beshear’s proposal for a constitutional amendment to allow casino gambling, which was defeated in the state Senate last week.
Brian Wilkerson, a spokesman for House Speaker Greg Stumbo, said no new legislation is likely to be proposed this year because of the casino bill.
In Indiana, Hoosier Lottery officials are reviewing the state’s laws and “getting up to speed” on the Justice Department ruling, spokesman Al Larsen said.
It’s also unlikely that Indiana lawmakers would take up any new gambling-related legislation during a short session of the General Assembly, which wraps up by mid-March.
Mike Smith, executive director of the Casino Association of Indiana, said the trade group has focused this term on ensuring the riverboats are exempt from a proposed statewide smoking ban.
Industry takes action locally
But in the meantime, local gambling interests are not sitting on the sidelines.
Louisville-based Churchill Downs Inc., this month purchased Atlanta-based Bluff Media, a poker fan website, for an undisclosed sum.
Company CEO and Chairman Bob Evans previously had said the company saw the online poker market as a growth sector and wanted a foothold if online poker is legalized. Bluff Media doesn’t offer gambling with real money, but publishes a magazine, ranks players and directs gamblers to other sites. Meanwhile, Caesars Entertainment Inc., which owns the Horseshoe Southern Indiana Casino in Harrison County, has created a Montreal-based subsidiary to handle its World Series of Poker brand and to allow it to operate online poker where it’s legal to take bets from overseas customers.
Still, it’s unclear what the future holds for American online poker players like Veneklase. For years, he and thousands of other players in Kentucky and other U.S. states faced no barriers to navigate the Internet to download software and use credit cards to set up an account at Paradise Poker, Full Tilt Poker or another site.
Although federal law has prohibited gambling companies from taking bets over the Internet or by interstate phone lines, there was little to stop American players from connecting with sites in Aruba, Costa Rica and other countries.
Veneklase said he set up an account on PokerStars using $25 and started playing, winning as much as $10,000 during one stretch, he said.
“I don’t believe the government should regulate morality. Why not go ahead and let people do what they’re going to do anyway? I consider it entertainment.”
His trips to virtual poker tables ended after federal prosecutors in New York charged the operators of three popular sites, including PokerStars.com, with money laundering and fraud last April 15. Authorities also blocked access to the sites, asserting that the dot-com’s had violated a 2006 law which prohibits U.S. banks from processing online bets.
Beshear’s administration also tried its own crackdown in 2008 by suing 140 gambling websites that provide services to Kentuckians. The case is pending.
Veneklase said he plays online poker without wagering real money now, but he’d st