Will There Be Legal Online Poker In The U.S. Within 12 Months?

[Jeremy]

Do you think online poker will be legalized or regulated somehow in the United States within the next 12 months? Share your thoughts.

[MJ]

Probably not, although we could see some good movement towards that.

California is a possibility, but not a good possibility for those of us who like making money.

[thefarang]

Legal or available? It could be legalized in under 12 months but the regulatory overhead would take more than 12.

Look how long it took for them to implement the Treasury rules for the UIGEA. There will be lots of comment periods on various regulatory issues and experts who weigh in and then it all needs to be pulled together into a legal framework.

Granted, many of the laws that apply to offline casinos and card rooms would still apply but you know people are going to want to stick rules about fraud, how long rooms can take to process withdrawals, whether or not rooms can even hold funds like they do now as they are acting in a quasi-bank capacity, tax and regulatory reporting requirements, etc.

I think you just gave me a great idea for a blog post :-)

[ih82lose]

No, nothing happens that quick with government.

[ReneeK]

The only thing the government managed to do quickly is the sneaking in of the UIGEA laws....

[MrDeposit]

I have to say yes, because the government knows they need the extra Billion+ tax dollars that will be rolling in.

[bonusbeast]

As great as that would be for most of us, I just don't see it happenin, hopefully I'm wrong.

[opp]

If possible at all will take 2-3 years and California may lead the push.

[PDX Nikki]

Will it be?

Probably not with the way the government takes care of things although they would be stupid to procrastinate. How far in debt is the US government? If they thought about how much money they could make by keeping the citizens happy and keeping their nose into important business, this country might be a better place.

Should it be?

It should never have become illegal. True people CAN develop a gambling addiction, but they can get cancer from being addicted to cigarettes and that's not illegal....you can kill your liver by being addicted to alcohol and that is not illegal. Instead they have help out there for people with these addictions, as they do with gambling addiction..so where is the difference?

[ak]

One could only wish, I bet its going to be a few more years before it even goes to congress and then it's going to need help from Vegas