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LANSING — Arlene Minsky couldn’t tell you who the current World Series of Poker champion is. Nor is she positive that a straight flush beats four of a kind.

Minsky is the president of the Clinton County Arts Council, a non-profit organization based in St. Johns that promotes the arts and cultural heritage of Clinton County.

The council is hosting an open house this month for its new “train museum,” in St. Johns — complete with restored train cars, models and artwork housed in a historical train depot.

It couldn’t have happened without poker.

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ESPN and Harrah’s are trying to reignite interest in televised poker by changing the format for the Main Event. In years past, the tournament was played and filmed in July, but it reached the airwaves several months later. Those who followed poker knew who won the championship long before it aired.

This year, the Main Event will be whittled down to nine players on Monday. But the finalists will return to the Rio Nov. 9-10 to play for the title, where it will be filmed and broadcast immediately following its conclusion.

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WASHINGTON: The moral opposition to gambling might be gasping its last breaths.

As more and more states turn to casinos and gambling to fill shrinking budget coffers, the voices of the religious opposition are struggling to convince people that it is morally wrong.

It’s an uphill fight: A recent study by Ellison Research showed that 70 percent of Americans do not consider gambling to be a sin.

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Barney Frank does not play poker or blackjack. The games bore him, and he thinks he would be terrible at them even if he tried. He’s never played a slot machine, doesn’t go to casinos, and has never tried to gamble online.

“I wouldn’t place a bet with your money,” he said.

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The proposed California law that would be the first step toward allowing online poker rooms in California made it through its first committee, and its sponsor, Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, hopes to see it lead to a law that would give the residents of his state a place to play online poker regulated by a governmental party in the United States.

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WASHINGTON — Despite a stunning setback in his effort to roll back a ban on Internet gambling, Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., says the issue is not going away.

“At this point, Im waiting to see what the Republicans, who voted against this, plan to do after getting the heat for killing it,” Frank said this week.

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Yesterday I met with Bryan Kendro, Senior Legislative Assistant to Congressman Jim Gerlach of Pennsylvania’s 6th Congressional District http://gerlach.house.gov/District/ . I was accompanied by Pete Segal, a PPA member and constituent of Gerlach’s. Congressman Gerlach was one of the “Nay” votes that lead to the defeat of the HR5767 amendment to the UIEGA. If you’re not familiar with this amendment and its purpose, click here.
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The Bryant Park Project, July 7, 2008 · Running for president is already a crapshoot, but it turns out that many U.S. leaders have also been pretty serious gambling men. Andrew Jackson, Ulysses Grant, Teddy Roosevelt, Warren Harding, and Lyndon Johnson all played poker. When he was in the Navy, Richard Nixon won enough at the game to finance his first congressional race.

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It’s getting easier to play poker for a good cause in Jackson.

A card room run by Charity Poker Solutions opens today at Hot Rods, 1715 W. Michigan Ave.

Charity Poker Solutions, owned by Patrick O’Dowd, Jason Fuller and Tomas Cobb, plans to host Texas hold ‘em tournaments four days a week on behalf of charities and nonprofit organizations.

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An Irish government committee set up in 2006 to review how to improve regulation of gaming and casinos, which would apply to both live and online poker games, has stated that Ireland could benefit from the restrictions the United States placed on Internet gambling with passage of the 2006 Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), if the right reforms and legislation were made.

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