The crapshooter versus the poker player
Yes, I know it’s wrong to read too much into this, but still…
Who would you rather have as President? A guy who routinely risks thousands of dollars on the throw of a pair of dice? Or a cautious but winning poker player?
I like this story from Barack Obama’s days as a state senator in Springfield, Illinois:
Obama’s play-to-win approach drove other players crazy. Former state senator Larry Walsh, a conservative corn farmer from Joliet, once got ready to pull in a pot with a four-of-a-kind hand. But Obama had four of a kind too, of higher rank. Walsh slammed down his cards. “Doggone it, Barack, if you were more liberal in your card-playing and more conservative in your politics, you and I would get along much better,” he said.
Comments
| 3 July 2008, 6:15 pm |
If someone beat my four-of-a-kind, I’d be tempted to call him a cheat. Or maybe they were playing with a buncha wild cards.
| 3 July 2008, 6:23 pm |
Yeah, Gene,
Obama is a God, a God, I tell you. Get out those cute pink jack booties, you might need them some day to march in worship.
BTW, Nixon was probably the best poker player among recent presidents.
| 3 July 2008, 6:30 pm |
Sorry, Harry Truman was the best poker among postwar presidents.
| 3 July 2008, 6:57 pm |
Bush is also said to be a pretty good player, but I can’t find anything on Carter. Maybe we should just have an online Texas Hold’em tournament and forget the election. All the money used to pay for advertising and consultants could go into the pot and be donated to charity at the finish.
| 3 July 2008, 9:06 pm |
Jim: How do you know? I must admit I am not a historian specializing in Truman lore, but I do know during WWII Nixon won over $10,000 in 1945 dollars playing poker in the Pacific backwaters while serving as a Navy Lt. (equivalent of AF,Army or Marine Capt.) on a “Mr. Roberts”-like cargo ship which he used to put himself through law school and start his political career. Of course, besides poker Nixon and Truman also had in common the fact that they were both veterans–Truman serving as a Capt. in the artillery in Europe
during WWI.
| 4 July 2008, 11:29 am |
Holding four of a kind and losing to another four? I think that would be the day I gave up poker.
| 4 July 2008, 6:42 pm |
It sounds like my state senators play with wild cards.
| 5 July 2008, 7:02 pm |
The poker player keeps his intentions secret until the last - expertly practicing decption until the moment of truth. Little surprise, then, that Obama is a master.
Craps, on the other hand, is more a game of probabilities and calculation - like blackjack, a game of mathematics and of keeping your nerve when things seem to be going against you.
It seems probably that McCain risks a far smaller proportion of his wealth at the craps table than Obama wagers behind his poker face.
| 5 July 2008, 7:15 pm |
“I do know during WWII Nixon won over $10,000 in 1945 dollars playing poker in the Pacific backwaters while serving as a Navy Lt.”
Further support for my hypothesis that sucessful poker-playing pols are lying b’stards.
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