Le Monde du Poker.

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August 19 2011, Elaine Chaivarlis

It's Friday and we're sure you're just as ready to start your weekend as we are, so we're going to keep this short and sweet. New Jersey senator Raymond Lesniak is looking to reintroduce his intrastate gaming bill. Keep reading to find out more on that, Jose "Girah" Macedo's legal issues, and more.

In Case You Missed It

Our new podcast series, Strategy with Kristy, is off the ground. Kristy Arnett spoke with Andrew "BalugaWhale" Seidman about everything from beginning play to polarized ranges.

Wondering what happened this week? Sarah Grant brings you all the details in the PokerNews Weekly.

The online high-stakes action was in full swing this week and plenty of notables banked big wins. Who won big and who had a losing week? You'll have to read the Online Railbird Report for that answer.

The debt super committee may be the key to getting online poker on radars of the U.S. congressmen. Here are our Five Thoughts on the issue.

On Monday, the Epic Poker League Standards and Conduct Committee held a hearing regarding Chino Rheem. The Committee released its decision on Friday, placing Rheem on probation.

"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again."

That's what New Jersey state Sen. Raymond Lesniak is doing. Rather than giving up after New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie vetoed his bill for intrastate online gaming, Lesniak is planning on reintroducing it.

"Both industries are dying a slow death and they need the additional revenues that online gaming will provide for them," Lesniak said of Atlantic City casinos and horse racing.

The state senator says that online gaming would create 1,900 new jobs and tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue. According to reports, one reason Gov. Christie vetoed the bill was because he was worried that Internet cafes would pop up around the state and exploit it.

In the new version of the bill Lesniak said, "They will be strictly prohibited from doing that."

According to NJ1015.com, the bill will be reintroduced on August 25.

Read more on Lesniak's reintroduction on NJ1015.com.

According to a post on TwoPlusTwo by Eric "Rizen" Lynch, Lock Poker is pursuing legal action against Jose "Girah" Macedo. The latest official statement, as posted by Lynch said, "Lock is currently pursuing legal action against Jose so we are unable to make a substantial comment at this time. We do realize that ongoing silence can lead to people jumping to conclusions. What happened goes against the very core of our player based philosophy and we intend on exercising our legal rights in the most severe degree. We will keep you updated as things progress."

Lynch went on to post that legal action will be filed in the near future and once that happens, then the purpose of the lawsuit will become clearer.

"I was VERY clear with Lock before we released this statement that it was a bad idea unless we were actually committed to pursuing legal action, otherwise it would just look like an attempt to avoid commenting," Lynch said.

Read the thread on TwoPlusTwo for more.

What we're about to tell you is shocking. We know you think we're omniscient, but even we make mistakes.

Our mistake? Well, we recently purchased assets from Per Hagen. If the name doesn't ring a bell, Hagen, who was on the 2010 BLUFF Power 20, is a former poker agent. Back to the situation at hand. PokerNews recently learned that Hagen sold the same assets to multiple parties. To add to it, he didn't even own the assets he was selling.

We have been hearing numerous reports of shady dealings and are working on a large editorial piece. If you or anyone else has been scammed by Hagen, please contact us.

Every now and again we like to throw PSAs your way. This is our fair warning to all of our friends, you shouldn't trust Per Hagen. Avoid him like you'd avoid a Nigerian lottery email.

On Friday, QuadJacks reported that Pocket Kings Ltd. chief marketing officer, Lothar Rentschler resigned. PokerNews has confirmed the resignation via email.

Lothar worked for Pocket Kings for three years and said it was "not an easy step" to come to the decision. "However, given the current circumstances, I do believe it is a long overdue step towards the right direction," he wrote.

He continued, "Our hands in Marketing were bound and at the end even every communication was stopped. Again, I can only apologize for this situation. The future will hopefully see a better, well organized structure and a return to business as usual. To see the brand FTP going down that way, hurts a lot."

Read more at QuadJacks.com.

According to EGRMagazine.com, Bet365 will be shutting down its services to its Australian players. The U.K.-based online gaming site is preparing to apply for a sports betting license Australia.

The Australian obtained an email sent to Bet365 players which read, in part, "We're in the process of applying for a sports betting licence in Australia. As part of our preparations for this, we regret to inform you that our Casino, Poker, Games and Bingo sites will no longer be available from week commencing 22nd August. Any funds currently in your Casino, Poker, Games and Bingo balances will be transferred to your Sports balance. Our Sports site will continue to work as normal. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience this may cause."

TheAustralian.com.au has more.

Follow us on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news.

Every day I read PokerNEWS headlines, and it seems that everyday, there's something either completely pathetic, laughable, or disgraceful to read about. Mostly, I click on the site in the hope of finding, that the day has finally come, and PokerNEWS is actually doing it's own investigating, and not simply cherry picking others' PR statements and calling them PokerNEWS content.

In every industry, there are businesses at the forefront, digging in, driving, moving forward even without knowing exactly what might be found under the next stone they turn over. Leaders lead, they don't sit around the water cooler waiting to hear something cool so they can spread it around.

This past year has delivered the most drastic changes in poker since ESPN aired the 2003 main event. That's eight years ago already, ...eight years. Wow. There's been the discovery of rampant cheating, on a premier on-line poker site, by a former WSOP main event champion, as well as many other cheating stories that have caused the poker world to lose at least some confidence in on-line gaming security. But despite the scope of cheating, and impact it continues having in Poker, the subject of cheating is treated like a venereal disease by media, including PokerNEWS. It's not as important to rip into young kids about making poor choices (Macedo), as it is to investigate and explain how freely cheaters have been exploiting cracks in on-line gaming security systems and protocols. But the investigative effort isn't being made, and the real story, the story that impacts everyone, isn't being told. Instead, readers are fed this bullshit notion that Jose Macedo is the devil himself, and that he's the reason why our on-line poker experience is corrupt with wrongness.

And then there's Full Tilt. Oh boy.

Why is it that the only time we read about Full Tilt is when there's a PR statement? Do we know...
...if Howard Lederer, Chris Ferguson and Phil Ivey or any Full Tilt founders were involved in the decision to NOT secure player deposits?
...how fat the monthly paychecks, or how much money these guys have stashed away (money that effectively belongs to the FT members/depositors)?
...why the AGCC didn't honor its commitment to protect players - were there payoffs to look the other way?

Full Tilt was unrelenting in the advertising of it's "coolness", via the promotion of a stable of professional players. This is the brand. As such, those pros all got paid deep stacks of cash, regularly. FT promoted its players in poker magazines, merchandising, and in television exposure. But now we know, what we know - that Players were paid huge sums of money, that television advertising deals were paid for, that print ads were paid to media, that merchandising inventories were bought and paid for - then sold for profits, that palms were greased to no-end, and that FT founding members continue living in opulence, off the backs of suckers, ...(a'hem) I mean, FT members/depositors. So why is it that despite such a heaping pile of fuck all, no media are coming down on Full Tilt? Jose Macedo has received a worse wrap from PokerNEWS than Full Tilt has received from them. Where's the investigating, where's the research, the dirt? Why is PokerNEWS giving Full Tilt a free pass?

I'm gonna go to sleep now and tomorrow, I'll come back, click on the PokerNEWS site, and hope I find something I rarely find on the PokerNEWS site anymore, an interesting and informative article or story that I can sink my teeth into. The cherry picking and nonsense is weak guys. I know that Tony G likes to think that PokerNEWS is a leading on-line, publication in Poker. But poker consumers know bullshit from bananas. At the end of the day, it's just not enough to think you're a leader, you've gotta be one.

View the original article here