I am THE James

Yes, I know I haven’t updated this page in quite a while. That is totally my fault. I have been mega busy working. I have a couple of clients that have been keeping me very busy and at one point I had over 100 poker articles to write. I actually completed all of them and this week I have been slacking in comparison to the past two to three weeks. Of course my “slacking” still made me more money than a lot of people make a week. Yes, that sounds like bragging, and it is.

So we have a new President of the United State. Barack Obama won in convincing fashion over John McCain. I voted for McCain, but not without seriously considering Obama. I was leaning his way all the way to almost the end. Taxes and certain statements he made started me to lean McCain. Everyone that is buying into the “only the $250,000 and up crowd will see more taxes” need to do your research. Now, things may change and the plan may turn out better than what my research indicates. In a way I hope so. This isn’t because Obama won, but because the country typically prospers economically under a democratic president. There are certain points to Obama that I did like as well, so it wasn’t a “Obama bad, McCain good”type of vote. My research indicates that I would be potentially better off under Obama than McCain, and therefore I voted as such.

Now, with that being said, this election showed me the flaw in our current electoral system, especially for my state. In my state, the overall popular vote was significantly influenced by about 6 areas. In Missouri, the vote for the entire state was influenced primarily by Kansas City and St Louis. Due to the fact that these areas are much more heavily populated, the balance of power is shifted such to where if a candidate is a heavy winner, such as Obama was, then the state stands a chance to go to that candidate.

What should we do? I like what Nebraska and Maine do. First, they give the vote representing the two senators to the overall popular election. Then, the rest of the votes go by who won the popular vote in the particular district. For instance, look at Virginia. Lets say that a candidate wins the overall popular vote. He would get the two votes automatically. Next, the other 11 votes would be divided up according to who won the popular vote in the particular district. Lets say that the candidate won 6 of the districts. Then he would get 6 of the electoral votes and the opposing candidate would have gotten the other 5. I like this better as it prevents a few areas from swaying an entire state and actually makes the individual vote count more.

Now, I am not saying that using this system would have won McCain the election. It probably would not. It would have made it closer and a little more in line what the country actually thinks. I’m sorry folks, but from what I am seeing, the majority of the county was not overwhelmingly in favor of Obama. If you were in a big city or a highly liberal state, then yes, but in other states, such as Missouri and Virginia, the state was clearly not head over heels for Obama.

The WSOP Final table is tomorrow. I’m still of the opinion that this was a bad idea for the game. We will finally get to see tomorrow who will play heads-up and then Monday who will win. I shouldn’t say this, but I am rooting for some type of screwed up abnormality so that they won’t do this again. However, ratings are up and if ESPN decrees it’s good, it will likely be back.

Just a couple of weeks now before I head out to Vegas. I am looking forward to it. I tried playing some last night and did so-so. Of course, I was playing tired and played too distracted. Still managed a 2nd and 1st place finish out of three games played. My stud game play seems to be getting better in all realms. I hope this translates into strong H.O.R.S.E. finishes in Vegas as I am playing two H.O.R.S.E. events. I will be staying at the 4 Queens downtown. I’m also really hoping that this event draws decent. I would hate to go all that way for a bunch of tourneys that don’t draw over 50.

This past Monday, I returned from my stint at the World Series of Poker as a blogger for PokerNews.com. It was a fantastic experience, one which I hope to get the chance to do again sometime. Playing in the World Series is a lot different from reporting the World Series. I actually enjoyed the later more this time. One reason is that I didn’t have the stress associated with playing. The last two years, I was burnt out by the time the World Series was over. This year, I could have continued on past the time my contract expired. I was glad to be done though. By the time 4-H Camp time arrived, I was sort of regretting my decision. I ended up figuring out later on that was just due to my missing camp. I talked with several people about camp, and things went well. Step will be taken to where I can attend next year. There is a small hole in me that is noticeably missing due to not attending camp. At the same time, we must make sacrifices in our lives at time to make our overall life better, or at least put ourselves in said position. (more…)

I covered Event #29, which was a $3,000 NL Holdem event. As most of you know, I hate NL Holdem, but I will play it and I will cover it because thats where the money is at. Tuesday night was the final table of the $3k NL event. John Phan and David Singer were two of the pro’s at the table. (more…)

Tonight, I was playing a Stud 8 or Better session that was a microcosm of how insane poker can become. Let me introduce two situations to you and you tell me what you think the outcome was on each. (more…)

It has been a very interesting couple of weeks. For those of you that have not yet heard, I was offered and have accepted a position with Pokernews to help cover this years World Series of Poker. My main job will be blogging on the different events at the Series. Chances are that with my background, I will be covering mixed events. I’m really looking forward to covering the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event. After playing on the circuit for the last couple of years, it will be nice to be at the series without having to go through the pressure of performing. (more…)

I started playing inside of a casino in January 2006. I had played online mostly to this point and primarily tournaments. The WSOP Circuit was in Tunica, MS and I wanted to try my hand at live tournaments. There were 3 stud events in this set and I decided that I was a decent enough player to make a run. I arrived in Tunica and played in some satellites with a decent level of success. Two of my buy-in were paid for and I had made about $1000 in cash. Then reality hit in the form of my first live tournament. (more…)

Today I want you to take a quiz about poker. Try out the questions below and see how you score. Don’t cheat and use other resources to help yourself. Try and answer the questions based on your poker knowledge. I will submit answers in a future posting.

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Barbara Enright is a legend of the game of poker. She has 3 bracelets and finished 5^th in the 1995 Main Event, which to this day is the highest finish by a woman in the Main Event. Barbara is also a fantastic person and a true pleasure to play with. I had the pleasure to meet her in April 2006 during an Omaha Hi-Lo event at the Bicycle Casino in Los Angeles. She was very friendly and engaging. We sat there for about 20 minutes discussing things from Fremont Street in Vegas to proper Razz strategy. At this point in my life, I still had not been to Vegas, so she was giving me the lowdown about what to go see and do out there. She also gave me a little of what to expect at the WSOP that year since it would be my first WSOP. (more…)