Apolitical Poker Politics: Harry Reid Sucks Out on River, GOP Revolution, and Real World Celebrity Politics

By Pauly
Los Angeles, CA


I woke up in NYC for Election Day and got schwasted before I marched to the polls and participated as an extra in the latest installment of Democracy Theatre. Inspired by Julius Goat's hastag (#MrTParty), I decided to write-in my vote for NY state governor -- B.A. Barackus (who everyone from my generation knows was the bad muthafucker on The A-Team who was deathly afraid to fly so they always had to come up with a creative way to drug him in order to get him on helicopters and small engine aircraft).

On the national stage, Otis offered up a few masterful brushstrokes on the Republican Revolution.

My adopted state of California is ready to ship the Governator from Sacremento back to Hollyweird. Yes, California has a new boss, but he's been the boss before. Sometimes you can buy an elected office, sometimes you can't recently proved by uber-wealthy Meg Whitman who pissed away a bit of her own fortune yet still lost to Jerry Brown, who is to gubernatorial politics like Larry Brown is to NBA coaching.

On a more serious note, the citizens of California don't want to legalize marijuana as Prop 19 lost 54% to 46%. If those damn potheads stopped listening to Phish bootlegs, put down the bong, and remembered which day to vote... then maybe we'd have legal weed in California. Then again, making marijuana legal wouldn't solve California's massive debt problems -- instead it would just attract millions of migrant stoners from the rest of the country, and whatever financial windfall from taxation would be a band-aid on a gaping wound, but it would be the headiest and skunkiest band-aid you've ever seen.

Then there's Nevada, one of the battle grounds for the future of online gaming. Like most Americans, I learned everything I know about politics from Hollywood, and my astute knowledge of Nevada state politics was derived from The Godfather films, particularly the infamous scene in II when Michael Corleone uttered one of the most sinister lines in mafioso-genre cinema: "Senator, my offer to you is this -- nothing."

Never underestimate the fear of waking up with a severed horse's head in your bed.

Yes, this year's senate race in Nevada was on the radar of politically-minded online poker players, many of whom have put their entire future in the hands of career used car salesman Harry Reid, who changes his stance on issues more often than Lindsay Lohan pops in and out of rehab centers. But when it comes to politicians and attorneys, you always want the most slithery fucker out of the bunch.

Reid was on the brink of disaster and on the verge of losing his four-term long Senate seat to Sharon Angle, one of those wild and wacky Tea Party people who fired up the disenfranchised voting base like a hit of liquid sunshine at a Grateful Dead concert. Hey don't get me wrong, I'm all about fringe parties with libertarian roots attempting to shake up the establishment, and for the first time in decades, politico-heavyweight Harry Reid had a deer-caught-in-headlights look since he first immersed himself in Nevada politics in the early 1980s (way before any of the titans of 20-something online poker players were even born).

Luckily, Reid was backed by the old-school political Democratic machine, who was not about to let the Senate Majority Leader lose to a Tea Bagger. Plus, he must have called in a few markers in Las Vegas and Reno to lock up huge blocks of votes. Reid won by a margin of 40,000 or so votes despite "scientific polling" that suggested otherwise. Who knows if an late influx of cash from online poker entities helped get him over the top, but one thing is for sure, Reid will get his fifth term in the Senate as he represents Nevada's interest in DC for three full decades.

My favorite bit of political news surrounded a few micro celebrities who tossed their hats into the political ring, and we're not talking about Gopher from The Love Boat or that dude who was married to Cher. Interesting side note... in college I was an aspiring political science student and worked on the re-election campaign for Ben Jones, a congressman from Georgia, best known as his role as Cooter from Dukes of Hazard. Due to "redistricting" the congressional seats, Jones ran up against a guy named Newt Gingrich -- and lost. That was my last stint in Southern politics. I abandoned all hopes on politics, ditched any plans for law school, and headed to Wall Street instead where I quickly learned that you can always buy off a politician for the right price.

Anyway, on the poli-celeb front... Linda McMahon, the wife of Vince McMahon from WWE (it was called WWF when I was a kid when Rowdy Roddy Piper beat the shit out of Jimmy "Super Fly" Snuka with a coconut), lost her bid for a Connecticut senate seat. The wrestling money that funded McMahon's campaign got her a few snazzy commercials, but wasn't enough to get her a bid.

Chris Dudley, former NY Knicks center (back up to Patrick Ewing), was known in his day for being the worst free throw shooter in the NBA. Despite his Ivey Ivy League education, Dudley "couldn't hit water if he fell out of a boat" (an expression that former coach and sportscaster Al McGuire used to say). Dudley turned his eye to politics and ran as the GOP candidate for governor of Oregon. Dudley's contest has yet to be decided and looks like it's gonna be a photo finish.

Most shocking news in the 2010 midterm elections is the historical significance behind the first reality TV star to win a major elected office -- Sean the lumberjack from Real World Boston won a congressional seat in Wisconsin. I'm not embarrassed to say that I watched that entire season of the Real World because I had a wicked crush on the Texas lesbian with the nose ring. What can I say, I got a thing for lesbos from Texas. Anyway, Sean is the first reality show charlatan to win a seat in Congress and I'm sure he won't be the last as the floodgates have been thrust open. I heard a rumor that Puck is going to run for a California congressional seat in 2012, and that you can lock up the next NJ gubernatorial race for The Situation.

In the meantime on the cusp of the 2010 November Nine... Harry Reid sucked out on the river to keep his position in Washington, the legality of online poker waters are still murky, the Govenator will eventually return to making Terminator blockbuster movies, and you still need a medicinal excuse to smoke weed in California. Sure, it might just be another Wednesday in America, but depending on where you lean, it's gonna be sunny skies, or as Dylan said it best -- a hard rain's gonna fall.