Donald Trump has been doing a lot of talking lately about whether or not President Obama is qualified for his position in the Oval Office. Everything from his place of birth to his school grades have been called into question by The Donald, who doesn’t think Obama is fit to be Commander in Chief. Despite my negative feelings about Obama and his policies, I think Trump is way off base. Also, criticizing Obama’s qualifications is a little like a pot calling the kettle black.

Sure, there are no questions about Trump’s legal right to serve as president, but there are plenty of questions about whether or not he is fit for the job. In my opinion, his business dealings have shown him to be unethical and financially reckless. Once more people learn about these things, his popularity (whatever is left of it) will plummet.

Trump likes to distinguish himself from his competitors in the casino industry by saying that his casinos have always been squeaky clean. While many casinos began with mob connections, Trump’s were always free of that problem. That’s not quite accurate, though. As was pointed out by the Huffington Post this week, the Trump Plaza Hotel & Casino relied on a partnership with investors linked to the mob. Eventually, the New Jersey regulators made Trump buy them out so they would not be involved in the casino anymore. Trump also employed a man as vice president of the Taj Mahal casino who was connected to Asian organized crime.

Another problem with Trump running as a Republican is that he isn’t the slightest bit conservative. According to CBS News, Trump has given “more than $1.3 million in donations over the years to candidates nationwide, with 54% of the money going to Democrats.” Throughout his career, he has been a supporter of big government, including supporting Bill Clinton’s attempt at government-run healthcare reform. That means he has only a slim chance of making it out of the Republican primary.

Even if he did get the nomination, there are plenty of reasons that Republicans, Democrats and independent voters would shy away from him. They simply have to look at the business practices of the casino mogul. The most damning thing may be how he built his casino empire. In a scathing expose, conservative pundit Michelle Malkin shows that Trump utilized the corrupt and unconstitutional practice of eminent domain to build his casino empire. Trump allegedly colluded with politicians, who used the eminent domain law to confiscate private property for public use and then hand over to developers like Trump. It is a form of somewhat-legal theft some major real estate developers frequently abuse. The evidence of this is overwhelming and damning, but it’s too much to detail here. I’ll let the nonprofit Institute for Justice sum it up for me:

Unlike most developers, Donald Trump doesn’t have to negotiate with a private owner when he wants to buy a piece of property, because a government agency… will get it for him at a fraction of the market value, even if the current owner refuses to sell.

Eminent domain is the most corrupt law on the books, allowing a ridiculous abuse of power by the government. The fact that Trump has used it to his advantage many times in building his casino empire should exclude him from office. And if that doesn’t convince you that he shouldn’t be president, try this: Three times the man has filed for bankruptcy. He has made a lot of noise talking about Obama’s economic policies, but with his financial track record, he certainly doesn’t seem to be the man to right the ship.

Many in the online gambling industry, including this writer, were excited to see the Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection and Enforcement Act (HR 2267) pass the House Financial Services Committee last week. The bill, drafted by Barney Frank and Ron Paul, would repeal UIGEA and regulate the online gambling industry in the United States. Though many were quick to celebrate, the objectivity of time allows us to look at the obstacles still in the way of that bill becoming a law.

The first obstacle is simply the calendar. This is the beginning of August, but Congress is currently in their summer recess, from which they won’t return until September. The November elections will ring in a new Congress, so the 111^th Congress only has a small window – little more than one month – to get things done.

Though HR 2267 has passed the House Financial Services Committee, it has yet to be placed on the legislative calendar for floor action. From there, it needs to have a floor debate. Generally, bills receive an unlimited floor debate, which means the members of Congress can argue about and discuss the bill until the session ends and nothing will happen with it. Also, anyone who is strongly opposed to the bill can filibuster and talk the bill to death. Since online gambling is such a controversial issue, I’m sure there is a representative or two who would love to do just that.

Congress can avoid a filibuster by invoking cloture, which limits the debate to 30 hours and then requires a vote. However, a bill requires a 3/5 vote rather than a 2/3 majority to be passed once cloture is invoked. Though the bill passed the committee by a 41-22-1 vote, it’s hard to say whether it has enough support in the general House to pass by a 3/5 margin.

Once the online gambling bill is passed by the House, it would then be sent to the Senate for approval. Or, since a similar bill has been proposed by the Senate, that bill could be used instead. In any case, that bill would first have to be debated on and then passed by the committee by a 2/3 vote. It would then have to be put on the calendar for floor action and debated, just like in the House. It would then have to pass by a 2/3 vote in a normal debate or, if cloture is invoked, a 3/5 vote.

Once the online gambling bill passed the Senate, that version would likely be different from the House version, if for no other reason then due to the amendments added to the bill. Since both chambers of Congress would have a different version of the bill, it would then need to go to a conference committee. There, representatives from both chambers of Congress meet to work out the differences in the bill. There is no time limit for debate during the conference committee. If they are able to come to an agreement, the committee drafts a conference report, which is presented to both chambers. The House and Senate both then have to approve the conference report by a 2/3 vote.

After the bill passes both chambers (again), it would then be sent to President Obama, where he would have 10 days to sign the bill into law or veto it. The president’s veto can be overturned by a 2/3 vote in both chambers of Congress, which would pass the bill into law.

All of that has to be done during the 111^th Congress. Once the next Congress takes over, all existing bills that had not been signed into laws are killed. The process would then have to start over again from scratch. Though Frank and Paul could use the same bill, it would have to repeat the same steps, going through committee again (this time with different members) and having a floor vote (again with different members).

Those are just the problems that go along with the time limit placed on the legislative process. There are also problems in the form of various amendments that have been added to the bill. I will have more on that later.

What all of this means is that no one should take the passage of the online gambling bill as a certainty. Even if there is enough support to legalize online gambling in the U.S., there may not be enough time for this Congress to get it done.

“I understand that America is a mess right now. Unemployment and the economy are in a dismal state. It is my number one priority to solve these problems and fix the economy. But people, don’t spend money! Save it! Stuff it under your mattress! Keep it away from the greedy banks and don’t spend it on frivolous things! Hoard your money because you’re going to need it!”

Obviously, saying something like that would be terrible for the economy and is the exact opposite of what the country needs. It’s also a loose paraphrase of the words of President Barack Obama. Throughout his year in the White House and even before, Obama has made it clear that he’s not a fan of capitalism, taking every opportunity to portray businesses as greedy, people as being in need of handouts, and the government being responsible for taking care of the people. That would be fine, except that he is the president of a country that has a Representative Republic system of government and a capitalist form of economy. His attitudes are not only counterproductive, but also downright dangerous for both.

The most recent of many examples of this is Obama’s criticism of Las Vegas and people who visit the city. Obama recently said that people saving money for college shouldn’t waste their money on gambling in Vegas. Last February, he made a similar remark about companies that received TARP funds, saying that it was irresponsible for them to take trips to the Sin City.

It’s no surprise that an anti-capitalist wouldn’t realize that trips to conferences and junkets in places like Las Vegas are an important part of the process of obtaining and retaining clients. But at least in that case he was criticizing the spending of money by companies that had received money from taxpayers. In his recent comments, he criticized private citizens for spending their own money.

Lawmakers and businessmen in Vegas are understandably furious and many have vowed to support whoever runs against Obama in 2012. They recognize that his comments and policies are bad for Las Vegas, the state of Nevada, and the country as a whole.

While the entire country has a dismal unemployment rate of 10% — you know, the catastrophic number that Obama said we would reach if he didn’t get to pass his “stimulus” bill – Nevada is even worse, at 13%. You should also note that both are conservative estimates that don’t count people with part-time jobs, those who have given up looking for work, and those who work on a temporary project. And with unemployment that bad and Nevada’s tourism industry struggling, the President of the United States, the most powerful man in the country (with the exception of George Soros and Al Gore), is telling people not to visit Las Vegas and not to spend money in their casinos, which just so happens to be the biggest industry they have in the state. Real responsible, Mr. President.

People of the United States and the rest of the world, spend your money as you see fit. You should of course be responsible, but if you have the disposable income to take a vacation, I can think of no place better than Vegas. Of course, as I’ve said countless times, you should never wager money that you can’t afford to lose, but if you can afford to lose it, Las Vegas would be happy to have it.

A major online gambling lobby has launched an aggressive advertising campaign pushing for the legalization and regulation of online gambling in the United States. The campaign is in support of bills introduced by Representative Barney Frank and Senator Robert Menendez that would repeal the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, which has been called unconstitutional yet has been upheld in the courts. Of course, the courts have a history of upholding unconstitutional laws (such as eminent domain).

The series of ads has been released by online gambling advocacy group the Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative, as reported by CasinoGamblingWeb.com. The ads will propose two major reasons for legalizing online gambling. The first, according to spokesman Jeffrey Sandman, is that the government needs to “start collecting taxes on the billions in revenue currently lost to unlicensed, offshore gambling operators.” He says that the extra tax money can be used to pay for healthcare reform and “other worthy programs.” The second reason given is that, according to the lobby, gambling online in an unregulated industry is much more dangerous than if the government was in charge.

I don’t know which advertising firm worked with the Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative on this, but if they think they can persuade the American people to legalize online gambling with those two arguments, then they spend too much time reading The Huffington Post.

First of all, using the funds from online gambling to pay for Obamacare is kind of like me opening a lemonade stand to pay my mortgage. Even if it was able to make a significant dent, “the government needs more tax money” isn’t exactly a winning argument right now. Haven’t they been paying attention to the tea parties and healthcare protests? If not those, surely they’ve seen Obama’s approval rating plummet the more he talks about spending and expanding government programs. As for the other argument, does anyone actually think that there is an industry out there that is run better by having the government involved? The idea that government regulation of online gambling will end corruption is laughable. Creating another bureaucracy isn’t exactly high on the wish list of the average American citizen.

Instead, a smart campaign for online gambling would focus on the fact that the government has no right to tell the people how they can and can’t spend their money online, unless of course they spend it on child pornography. As it is, I think the ad campaign could do more harm than good. If UIGEA is repealed, it won’t be because the American people are eager to feed more money to the government beast.

A few days ago, Gambling Review brought you the feast of ridiculousness that was the Asian Poker Tour’s open invitation to Lady Gaga. In the letter, the folks at the APT weave a simplistic web of grade-school puns, humor and unbelievably weak attempts at inside jokes to “entice” the platinum selling artist. To sweeten the deal, they made sure to mention in their open letter that Michael Phelps had been invited the year before, hadn’t shown up, and so they were inviting him again this year, but they still hadn’t heard from him.

I spent so much time laughing at the open letter to Lady Gaga that I couldn’t resist finding the one to Michael Phelps and posting it here for your and my pleasure. With cracker-jack puns like “Forget the controversy about suit changes in your sport, concentrate on these suits: spades, clubs, diamonds and hearts!” Michael Phelps is sure to feel as though he is turning down an invitation from his closest friends and not a bunch of Asian complete strangers.

My favorite part is when they joke with him about his being caught taking bong hits at a college party, an incident that cost Michael Phelps the front of the Wheaties box, probably millions of dollars in other endorsements and resulted in an ashamed public apology. “Some media reports even suggest that you may have got in with the wrong crowd in the last 12 months – we promise to keep you out of trouble.” I’m sure he appreciates that joke that must have been thought of in a twelve year old’s tree-house. And of course there’s no better way to keep Michael Phelps from using drugs than by inviting drug cesspool extraordinaire and class act, Lady Gaga.

As the cherry on top, they ask Michael Phelps to invite Barack Obama as if they swim together everyday at the same pool. Why not ask Phelps if he can invite Chewbacca and Iron Man? Surely they are all American celebrities with whom Michael Phelps is acquainted. A sentence like “Michael Phelps! Tony Stark is the inventor of the spectacular Iron Man Armor! But he would surely let Chewbacca win at the risk of losing his valuable arms which the wookie would happily rip off if he lost a hand of poker!”

Ok, enough speculation. Please enjoy the Asian Poker Tour’s open letter to Olympic Gold Medalist Michael Phelps below.

Dear Michael,

They say a week is a long time in politics and I’m sure you’ll agree that a year is a long time when you are a world beating Olympics legend. It now looks like that you are back to your best and congratulations on the new world record. Last year, we noticed that you had told your local paper that you were a poker buff and since then you have played in small tournaments at Caesars Palace in Vegas and been around and about on the circuit. In fact, lots of poker players claim you’re their friend but whether that is them using their famous bluffing skills is a different matter!

Last year you were in Beijing for the Olympics and we encouraged you to head down to the Asian Poker Tour Macau event at the StarWorld. We heard positive noises but there was no sign of the human dolphin when they called ’shuffle up and deal.’ We would like to extend this invite once again to you to come, all expenses paid, and take part in this showpiece poker event. The Main Event is in Macau between the 20 – 23rd August but the 12 day festival of poker starts on August 12th so let us know!

Forget the controversy about suit changes in your sport, concentrate on these suits: spades, clubs, diamonds and hearts! Forget your rivalry with Milorand Cavic, how about a heads-up game with the legendary Johnny Chan or modern day poker icon JC Tran? We know you couldn’t make the meeting with the Pope but how about a meeting of poker minds in Macau?

Some media reports even suggest that you may have got in with the wrong crowd in the last 12 months – we promise to keep you out of trouble. We’ll give you access to pools of sharks, fish and those that you swim in! If you don’t want to bring your goggles, fair enough, bring a pair of sunglasses and your poker face! While you are at it, you could ask a certain poker playing President by the name of Barack Hussein Obama II if he fancies joining you!

The question remains is the newly rejuvenated human dolphin really a fish? We hope to find out!

Best Wishes

The Asian Poker Tournament

Barack Obama is a polarizing figure to say the least. When he showed up on the scene seemingly out of nowhere, he became all the rage. This despite the fact that he only beat Blair Hull in the Illinois Senate Democratic Primary by having David Axelrod get Hull’s divorce records unsealed and then using that information to spread a lie that he hit his ex-wife, and the fact that he only won the Senate because Republican Jack Ryan withdrew from the race after, you guessed it, his divorce records were unsealed and the lie was spread that he tried to have sex with his own wife at a nightclub (Yes, folks, that was the scandal that destroyed Ryan’s career). Despite all of that, when Obama announced his candidacy for president, the media, college students and professors, and other people who listen to the media and college professors believed that he can walk on water. If Obama is The Chosen One, surely he would be a great poker player, right?

If there is one thing Obama has it is charisma. His public persona is that of a cool, confident leader, in spite of his weak grasp of politics and economics. His cool demeanor would serve him well at a poker table. Obama is also used to convincingly lying to the people, which would serve him well when bluffing. On the downside, Obama is not nearly as convincing or charismatic when he doesn’t have a teleprompter and planted questions, so he would be wise to pick a strategy ahead of time and stick to it. No going off script.

As Ricky pointed out in his Sarah Palin article, having a good nickname is important for poker players. President Obama has gone by a few different names. Back when he was hanging out with communists and drug dealers, he went by Barry. Some people call him by his middle name, Hussein, but his supporters are always quick to call those people racists for trying to make him sound like a Muslim, as if Barack and Obama are names as American as apple pie. Other names that he goes by, though unofficially, are The Messiah and The Anti-Christ, depending on who you talk to.

Good poker players are great at math, and with the way the national debt is rising and the amount of money being spent, Obama should certainly be good with numbers. A good poker player is also secretive, which certainly applies to Obama, who blocked virtually every document about his personal and professional life from being released to the public. Good poker players are also very disciplined, and I can only commend Obama’s restraint for never strangling Joe Biden after any of his attacks of verbal diarrhea. Good poker players have to be accepting of the fact that sometimes they will lose, and I’m not sure how Obama would handle that, because he doesn’t have a whole lot of experience with adversity. Hopefully, his opponents won’t get too annoyed at him gloating “I won” every time he scoops the chips toward him.

Most of the above skills seem to be in his favor, but the number one reason Barack Obama would be good at poker is because he is very good at taking other people’s money.