Back in 2007, Florida Governor Charlie Crist signed a deal with the Seminole tribe that would have allowed blackjack and other table games in their casinos in exchange for the state getting a cut. The deal was later shot down by the state House and then a second deal was also scrapped. In that situation, most people would give up, say they gave it the old college try and move on. Crist, however, is still fighting for a deal. The question is, why?

I don’t want to sound cynical, but I usually don’t think that politicians make decisions based on what’s best for the people. I think they make decisions based on what’s best for them, which includes covering their butts when they make a mistake. Such may be the case here.

Though I stated it before, it’s worth reiterating that Crist is fighting for money he’s already spent. You see, governors have control over the budget of their state and they allocated funds for each department within the state based on revenue from many sources, mostly taxes. In this year’s education budget for the state of Florida, $433 million comes from revenue brought in by the deal with the Seminole tribe over their blackjack tables. Since earlier this month the House voted down that deal for the second time, that $433 million doesn’t exist.

Folks, if it’s bad financial strategy for an individual to spend money they don’t have, it’s equally bad (or worse) for a state to do that. In fact, many of America’s problems stem from the fact that the federal government is doing exactly that. Now it seems that Charlie Crist, the Florida governor who wants to represent the state in the Senate, has done that as well.

To save face, Crist needs to get a deal done so he doesn’t have to explain why he had to cut $433 million from the education budget. Considering he’s already trailing Marco Rubio in the polls for the Republican primary, that would be a mistake from which it would be nearly impossible to recover. And that’s why Crist is fighting so hard for a deal.

Gambling Review readers, meet Kris Zutis. Mr. Zutis has not yet graduated from college, but he’s already making lots of friends and enemies in the gambling world. Quite an achievement. When I was in college the only thing I had accomplished was racking up debt, constantly being drunk or hung over, and learning over 50 different meals you can make with ramen noodles. Zutis is clearly ahead of the curve.

A native of Latvia, Zutis is in his final year at Dundee University in Scotland. Zutis is an avid gambler and is even a member of poker clubs at the school. Zutis has designed a computer system for the final project for his Applied Computing degree that would detect card counters in blackjack. Yes, you read that correctly. A gambler wants to take away the only advantage  gamblers can have over the casino.

The system has already garnered a lot of attention, with Zutis being invited to the International Conference on Computer Vision Systems in Belgium to present his system to top developers across the globe. According to Zutis, the program he has developed uses a complex algorithm to track the progression of blackjack games and monitor the cards played and the bets being made. Put simply, the system counts cards the same way a player would and then determines if a player is using the same strategy. If so, it’s reasonable to assume that the player is counting cards.

Having another weapon against card counters is certainly a good thing for the casinos, and Zutis is making some friends in very high places representing the house. However, he’s not exactly popular with blackjack players at the moment. The website Blackjack Hero, a proponent of card counting, calls the inventor “hypocritical” and says they “can’t imagine anyone liking a guy who sells out to the casino’s side.”  The blog also pointed out that Zutis, an avid poker player, decided against developing a system that could affect his game of choice. Instead, he focused on blackjack.

It should be noted that Zutis’ program still needs some work before it’s ready to be unleashed in the casinos. It is just a college project, after all, but then again, so were Google, Facebook and Myspace. Also, card counting has never been possible at online casinos, so maybe someday blackjack players in brick and mortar casinos may have to deal with the same odds as online blackjack players.

Certainly Big Brother techniques, such as the eye in the sky, are already being used by casinos against gamblers and dirty dealers. One can’t blame the casinos for trying to get their hands on a program like this. However, the thought of a gambler selling out their own to make a buck just seems wrong. Every other game in the casino has a house edge that cannot be beaten by the players, but blackjack is the one game where a player who follows proper strategy and counts cards correctly actually has a chance to make money off of the house. This program would take away the only advantage the gamblers can have, meaning there would be no way for a player to make money off the casino, except of course by selling out and selling a product to the casinos that would hurt other gamblers. I guess young Mr. Zutis is a follower of the “if you can’t beat them, join them” philosophy. Such a shame.