Punch line: After whacking tanning salons with higher taxes, the Obama administration has turned its guns on another culture-crippling endeavor: online poker.
Porous borders: no problem.
Online poker: must be stopped.
If it weren’t so funny, it would be sad.
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According to the WSJ:
Eleven people, including the founders of three of the largest online poker companies doing business in the U.S., have been charged in the largest crackdown on Internet poker by U.S. authorities.
Those charged Friday include the online poker websites PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker.
The charges set up a long-awaited showdown between the sites, which claim millions of U.S. players and billions in revenue, and the federal government, which has long alleged that their operations are illegal.
Federal prosecutors have targeted the three largest online poker companies doing business in the U.S., charging their founders with money laundering and bank fraud and seizing five of the companies’ domain names.
“This is seismic,” said James Kilsby, an editor for Gambling Compliance, a website which tracks regulatory issues. “It’s a game changer.”
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The charges are likely to disrupt a fragile ecosystem that involves millions of players in the United States who play poker for money.
PokerScout, a website that tracks online poker, estimates that almost 2 million people played poker for money in the U.S. last year, representing $16 billion in wagers.
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