(This article is reproduced with the permission of Future Publishing Ltd and is as originally appeared in World Poker Tour Magazine Issue number 34, September, 2008… on newstands now.) It also is a walk down memory lane and lets everyone see how badly I missed the Palin selection, but then so did everyone else.

During August, the US Presidential campaign sank to the lowest common denominator. Barack Obama was called ‘dreamy’ and compared to Paris Hilton while grumpy old John McCain made so many errors that the, ‘ideal match’ of three months earlier had many looking for the ‘none of the above’ lever to pull.

Even I’m tempted to break the candidates’ online gaming positions into a simple TV advert. It would star ‘Kid Obama’ staring down ‘Old Man McCain’ with an ominously deep baritone voice intoning simple three to five-word word phrases such as: ‘Obama’s Not Ready’ or ‘McCain – Too Old to Lead.’ That is how little these campaigns value your intelligence. Any more substance would be too much for you to handle.

And my online gaming advert would run along traditional party lines. I’d have the baritone say, ‘Republicans say no to poker  – because Obama plays it!’

Democrats would use Barney Frank’s rapid lisp and say “We really do feel your gambling pain. We’re not against gaming, we’re just not sure how to make it happen, and we’re worried what the Bush/Cheney/Rove machine will do to us if we come out too strongly for you.

‘But we’ll study the matter and get back to you very soon.’

Democrats focus too much on over-information and ‘inclusion.’ They lose the plot and bring a dull butter knife to a gunfight. Republicans will rip their own grandmother’s head off. This is why Republicans have won all but three elections the past 40 years.

The poker world has come out in support of Barack Obama thanks to his tight-aggressive style of card play. He surveys the scene, takes it all in, takes a hit or two and comes back with strong, patient, solid play that takes him deep into every tournament. Riding the felt in the Illinois State Capitol, his strong poker face with lack of tells meant he usually had a hand and was able to bluff opponents off pots, thus earning their respect.

The exception was the night he won the US Senate race. There ensued a legendary all-night poker game send-off that wiped him out of cash. Alas, that night he was like Jamie Gold, with 12-million reasons not to care how he played.

It would be easy to paint John McCain into the Republican party’s ‘just say no to gambling’ corner. But while the religious right is against gambling, Senator McCain, according to a former Republican congressman, was a fairly regular participant in Newt Gingrich’s weekly game when they took control of Congress back in 1994.

Unconventional
Now, this article had to be written well ahead of the two party conventions, and won’t appear on the news-stands until after both the Democratic and Republican shindigs. So both of the US Vice-Presidential candidates will have been announced by now. But we think it’s important to provide a framework for where online gaming would sit as a priority in each campaign’s platform, and to examine the impact of each potential VP pick, so here’s a ‘preview’ of possible candidate choices – even though the theory has already been overtaken by events.

What the hell. Not only am I going to take a flyer on naming the possible runners here – I’m even going to give you my personal odds on them making the ticket, so you can look at the results and decide for yourself how smart I was. I mean, this is a gambling magazine, right?

While McCain has voiced no strong opinion on the matter, his potential vice-presidential running mates mostly come from the ‘just say no’ camp. Florida’s Governor Charlie Crist (12-to-1) runs a state that has fought casino gambling for the 50-years since the Mob was kicked out of Havana and wanted to set up shop in Miami. The northern part of his state is nicknamed ‘South Georgia’ for its brand of conservative, Christian politics. Their reach extends from the panhandle to Mickey’s place in Orlando.

To the south it’s ‘New Yawk’, as north-eastern snowbirds rule – and they love to cruise and gamble. The Seminole Indian reservation gladly obliges. They own a federally controlled Hard Rock Casino (with massive poker room) that sits at the intersection where the Indian bingo hall and its dirt parking lot once ruled supreme. Indian gaming has exploded in his state and, much to Crist’s chagrin, there is little he or anyone else can do about it.

Pawlenty of cash
Minnesota’s Governor, Tim Pawlenty (9-to-1), has recovered from the media feeding frenzy over an on-air remark he made about his wife’s love of fishing but apparent lack of passion in the bedroom. While not very bright with his wife listening, he made his anti-gambling stance very clear when he labelled a $5 contribution scheme to the Obama campaign an illegal lottery and went to court to challenge it.

Obama’s campaign has raised $450 million dollars in contributions under $100. The campaign’s idea was, donate $5 and you could be one of 10 people chosen to appear backstage with Barack and Michelle the night he makes his convention acceptance speech.

The Republican favourite, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (3-to-1), is a Mormon whose church expressly forbids gambling, drinking and enforces a tithe – that is to say, members have to give 10% of their income to the church.

The addition of any of these three would limit the chances of the Republican ticket moving the legislation along, even if ‘Maverick’ McCain, who knows Indian gaming from Arizona, likes the idea. The odds on them are long because McCain could surprise everyone with his VP pick. Party insiders feel he needs to do that to survive. He has morphed during this campaign season into someone even he, John McCain, would have had trouble voting for if this election had been held in 2000 instead of 2008.

Both candidates face renegade third party challengers. McCain faces former conservative Republican Congressman Bob Barr who, while not as colourful as 1992’s billionaire Ross Perot, could siphon away up to 8% of Republican votes from those concerned about McCain’s conservative bona fides. That makes him the Republican Party’s potential Ralph Nader spoiler.

And yes, 2004 consumer activist Nader is again running a third- party campaign.

Evan can wait
Conventional wisdom says while the Republicans are tightly controlled by their party’s conservative, Christian right wing, Democrats adopt a more liberal, ‘what you do in your own home is your business,’ approach to the issue of online gaming.

In fact, Obama loves to play poker, but the Democratic VP hopefuls are harder to read. Evan Bayh of Indiana (2-to-1) was the August flavour of the month.

He appeared beside Obama (and many were teased into believing Obama would announce him as veep choice) during his last trip to Indiana.

Bayh has detractors, though. The son of legendary Senator Birch Bayh, many wondered how tough he would be under pressure. “Evan looks out for his own interests very well,” said one insider, citing his disappearance in ’04 during Republican Swift boat attacks – and his original support of Hillary Clinton’s campaign this time round.

Virginia governor Tim Kaine (4-to-1) was seen in a joint appearance with Michelle Obama. Many would like to see this former Marine on the ticket. He’s a young governor in a state that voted Republican in every recent election yet is firmly in the ‘undecided’ column this year. Obama did well in Virginia’s urban centres and ran away with the Democratic primary race there.

Hillary Clinton’s ‘dream team’ stock (12-to1) has fallen rapidly, because Bill is behaving even more childishly than usual and the ‘US royal family’ are not fully on board. Obama also fears what vetting Bill’s business ties would reveal. When someone nets a cool $100 million dollars over eight years, it does raise some interesting questions.

Besides, what President would want a ‘government in exile’ sitting in the next office plotting a coup? Meanwhile John Edwards’ extra- marital affair and possible love- child sunk his ship back in port.

Biden his time
The real VP choice may well come from one of Obama’s two experienced foreign policy Senate colleagues. Delaware Senator Joe Biden (6-to-1) and former Georgia Senator Sam Nunn (9-to-1) are hard-charging Democrats who would give Obama foreign policy ‘street cred’ and not stand in the way of online gambling.

Or… there is also a ‘nightmare’ scenario for each of the parties’ leaderships. Both candidates talk about the need for bipartisanship to solve the nation’s international and economic ills. Indeed each of them has a top advisor from the other party.

Bone of contention
Some have suggested, rather than throwing a bone disguised as bipartisanship – an opposition party member named Interior or Commerce Secretary  – each candidate could do something never done before and offer the VP role to someone from the other party. Let’s not forget that in the event of the president falling off his perch (or being pushed, come to that), the veep more or less instantly becomes his successor. Opposition control of the executive branch being ‘just a heartbeat away’ terrifies political insiders.

Yet two names come up repeatedly on everyone’s ‘well, you never know’ list. Nebraska Republican Senator Chuck Hagel (12-to-1) could throw open a sceptical Midwest that has always voted Republican. Hagel is furious with his party’s partisanship, war-mongering and deceit.

He ran briefly for President then decided not to seek a third term in the Senate. Hagel is a decorated Vietnam war veteran, highly respected and has co-sponsored several bills with Senator Obama. So although it’s a little unlikely, I wouldn’t be utterly suprised if Hagel was nominated.

The other conundrum is Connecticut’s Independent Senator Joe Lieberman (7-to-1). Lieberman was the unsuccessful VP pick of John Kerry four years ago. Many blame his tepid support and poor debate performance for the party’s ultimate loss.

When he ran for re-election two years later and lost his party’s primary, the Dems abandoned him. Rather than accept defeat, he ran as an Independent and won back his Senate seat.

His ‘payback’ has been to caucus with the Democrats – thus keeping chairmanship of the powerful Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs – while being a thorn in their side, accompanying John McCain everywhere, most notably correcting the candidate’s serious gaffe in the Middle East, and most recently questioning Barack Obama’s patriotism.

The Democrats need his vote to form a majority now, and will still do so next year to stop filibusters, but they would dearly love to throw him overboard.

The broader issue is control of the Congress. While Democrats expect gains in the House and Senate, losing the White House could kill all hope of avoiding the McCain Administration’s pursuit of the status quo. Democrats need 243 or more House seats and between 57 and 59 Senate seats. That would be enough to stop filibusters, force consensus and move the lame-duck Congressional session forward to tackle stalled legislation.

Without a larger Democratic party majority and control of the presidency, our long online gaming nightmare looks set to continue. And US ports instead of experienced poker players will handle the fish.

Denis Campbell is a freelance political and business journalist. He is editor-in-chief of the daily e-magazine The Vadimus Post.  He is also a member of the Bristol/SW poker team and plays online at Party Poker and poker.co.uk