U.S. Online Poker a Possibility?

November 10, 2008 (InfoPowa News) — The respected Las Vegas Review-Journal reported this week that the change in the U.S. administration ushered in by last week's elections could be beneficial to online poker in the country.
 
Quoting Harrah's CEO and Chairman Gary Loveman, who was responding to questions on a conference call, the LVRJ reported that the senior executive believes the odds for legalized online poker have improved with the results of last week's national elections, which Barack Obama and the Democrats won convincingly.
 
Loveman apparently described the prospects for the legalization of Internet poker as "relatively good." On the downside, he did not express the same optimism regarding casino games and sports betting on the Internet, where he thought the chances of legalization in the forseeable future were poor.
 
He said he was pleased with the outcome of the election not because of the transfer of power to the Democrats, but because none of the leadership on the committees dealing with the issue “is violently opposed to this process [of the legalization of online poker]. This is something we're going to be working hard at and we think the world got easier on this one," Loveman said.
 
Loveman's company, Harrah's Entertainment, has a real business interest in the legal acceptance of online poker ahead of other types of betting — the company owns the World Series of Poker brand.