Let\’s Talk about Sets, Baby …
Level of American poker discourse to hit a high note in coming days

From Boston to Cali to Las Vegas to Washington DC … it\’s all about poker-poker-poker \’til the cows come home.

So wow, so much is going on right about now. A lot of smart people doing a little bit more than just geeking out about poker and the industry\’s/game\’s/lifestyle\’s future. Wish I could be everywhere:

We\’ve got the Global Poker Thinking Society getting together at Harvard — featuring Howard Lederer, Charles Nesson, and Crandall Addington.

And then this weekend is the California Poker Conference — where speakers include WSOP Commish Jeffrey Pollack, PPA Executive Director John Pappas, and some influential old-timers such as Mike Caro, Lou Kreiger, Barbara Enright, and many others.

And then on the next day, Pappas heads back to Washington DC, where he\’ll be hosting the Poker Player\’s Alliance DC Fly-in — a little Beltway lobbying fest on behalf of pro-poker legislation. This is the one I really want to be at — and we\’ll try to stay on top of things from afar — because twisting Congressional arms enlightening our representatives is a lot of fun. I gotta say, it also kinda makes me proud to know that our success wooing Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX) as a co-sponsor to HR 2610, the Skill Game Protection Act, kinda inspired it.

From CardPlayer:

JP: We had a really great meeting in August with Congressmen Pete Sessions in his Dallas, Texas, office. It was myself and a number of our local PPA members, including Clonie Gowen, who\’s a Dallas, Texan, and Robert Williamson III, another Dallas, Texan. We went in and sat down with him and talked to him about the Wexler bill and why it just didn\’t make sense that a game of skill is being outlawed on the Internet. And it really resonated and it really came through and what I saw was, wow, this is something we need to replicate, this is something we needed to do more of. Based on that meeting, I thought we needed to get people out to Washington. Whether we make 20 meetings or 200 meetings, I think it\’s going to be a worthwhile event.

Very cool! (And well done, Pokeratizen politicos!) Good times, all around. And indeed, we should do more of that.

I\’ll be in Vegas … assuming I make my flight, which leaves in — yeow! — four hours, to do the TV Co-hosting thing with Tom Schneider for the inaugural Poker Bowl. This should be a pro-studded affair … even Doyle Brunson will be playing, along with Greg Raymer, Scotty Nguyen, reformed self-colluder ZeeJustin … and Absolute spokesman Mark Seif. Like seriously, we have so much to talk about!

And so little of it to do with how to play [cards]As Ks[/cards] in middle position.