What--outside of losing all his chips--could make 2003 World Series of Poker champion Chris Moneymaker rise up from his chair after the primary level of Main Event play and bolt for the door? What can make him run out into the desert heat, cut short a talk with fellow champ Joe Hachem, and cram himself right into a convertible Mustang? What can make him direct his driver to the Gold Coast with instructions to have the automobile running in an hour?

Well, only the way forward for online poker in America could do that.

Moneymaker, still keen so as to add another gold bracelet to his wrist, would routinely not abandon his Day 1C stack for anything longer than a rest room break. Today, however, after one level of play, he decided to blind out for so long as it took to support considered one of poker's biggest causes.

Moneymaker was as a result of meet his fellow American online poker supporters Jason Somerville, John Pappas, and Lee Jones at a roundtable to speak about the long-standing and ongoing fight to manage online poker in America.

Jones didn't wish to waste any time getting everyone seated.

"Every minute that we do not start is a minute Chris Moneymaker isn't normally Event," Jones said.

"Sit the hell down," Moneymaker quipped before reconsidering. "I'm doing much better here than I'M typically Event."

In any case, it was time to handle the 800lb gorilla riding at the elephant within the room.

Somerville, Pappas, Jones, and Moneymaker

"We're bobbing up on a decade for the reason that passage of UIGEA," Jones began.

For folks who don't remember the tip of summer in 2006, that is the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act, an 11th hour piece of legislation slipped secretly into an American port security bill that modified the way in which online poker operated in America forever.

Since that moment, advocates like Jones and Pappas, the chief Dirctor of the Poker Players Alliance, has been working tirelessly toward without equal goal of getting online poker regulated in America.

"We're really starting to see the sunshine on the end of the tunnel," Jones said.

Nevertheless, Pappas pointed out, while we is also living in an era of instant gratification, online poker regulation hasn't and will not happen simply because poker players want it to.

"Lawmakers don't work that way," Pappas said. "IT IS A slog."

The struggle is real. Within the time since UIGEA and 2011's Black Friday when the yank government essentially ended online poker within the United States, only three states have passed laws regulating internet poker. It is a start, but it's nowhere on the subject of the consideration days of the game.

So, why the optimism?

It's a fair question.

It's been a few years since New Jersey opened its state as much as online poker. PokerStars joined the sphere earlier this year and raised that's state's online poker revenue by 30%. While it is a success story, it's nowhere just about where the PPA desires to be.

To hear Pappas tell it, it is a matter of education, both for players and lawmakers. Once a year that appears like a defeat in some state legislature is definitely the made from several months of successful education. Now, after ten such years of education, lawmakers are beginning to see the light.

Pappas said it is very possible the state of California could vote on a web based poker bill as early as August. Meanwhile, a surprise bill in Michigan appears to be at the fast track in that state. Both, so far as Pappas is concerned, are reasons to be hopeful.

The real action, though, is in Pennsylvania.

"Literally, as we're speaking, they're talking about that bill," Pappas said. "Often, internet gaming is regarded as controversial. In Pennsylvania, that isn't the case."

Pappas said the various arguments happening in other states over online poker just haven't been issues in Pennsylvania. It's simply an issue of budget questions, and if those get solved, a web based poker bill passage generally is a reality there faster than anyone expects.

"Quite frankly, it would happen tonight," he said.

That's where things could get interesting. If Pennsylvania comes online so with regards to New Jersey, it might inspire other states within the northeast corridor to follow suit. Big apple was very with reference to passing its own bill this year. With Pennsylvania comes Big apple? Who knows, but when it happens, Pappas thinks the eastern seaboard could become a hotbed of online poker action.

"I think the dominoes start falling then," he said.

But for a domino to fall, you have to have some one to push it. That's where it gets tricky again.

If online poker has a friend, it's Jason Somerville, the always-Twitch-streaming, regularly-shouting advocate for the ages.

When PokerStars went online in New Jersey, Somerville went there, turned on his camera, and streamed live content for 6 weeks. The outcome? 400 thousand unique visitors, all of whom got a taste of what online poker seems like while hearing the most important message: advocacy is straightforward when you just make the effort.

"It literally takes you 30 seconds to contact your representatives," Somerville said today.

He does all of it the time. He's talked to lawmakers in lots of states, and he'll keep doing it. But regardless of what number of millions of viewers he has, he's just one voice. He wants a chorus.

Fellow Big apple poker player Vanessa Selbst said the advocacy will start with educating the would-be advocates.

"The biggest thing is for individuals to grasp how they are able to help," she said.

It will take, they said, a combined effort of individuals making the verdict to talk up, after which going to the Poker Players Alliance website and understanding how one can do it. After that, it is a matter of spreading the word to fellow players--at the table, on Facebook, and anywhere they are able to find someone who will listen.

The point is this, Pappas said: if people in favor of regulated online poker in America don't speak up, lawmakers and regulators will only hear from individuals who oppose the game.

"We want to make sure we're twice as loud," he said.

What's more, he said, individuals who live in states that are not currently battlegrounds shouldn't sit idly by. He likened the cause to the multi-state lotteries. Once Powerball started spreading across America, even states that traditionally didn't cotton to gambling felt compelled to come back on board. That is, for instance, if you happen to live in South Carolina, it's just as much your responsibility to advocate because it is for somebody who lives in Pennsylvania or New York.

And that's why Chris Moneymaker temporarily abandoned his WSOP Main Event stack for a short time. He lives in Mississippi, a spot where he cannot legally play online. When Moneymaker desires to play on PokerStars, he flies to New Jersey. He doesn't hate it, but he'd much rather play from his own sofa.

"If I'LL sit in my very own state and play, that will be a terrific thing," Moneymaker said.

For now, however, he needs to be content to hop back within the convertible Mustang, zoom back across Valley View, and retake his seat within the WSOP Main Event. While he tries to rebuild his stack, he can take into accounts the day when he might again be capable of qualify online for this event from the relaxation of his own home.

$1 million Spin & Gos running now! Click here to get a PokerStars account. Brad Willis is the PokerStars Head of Blogging. Follow him on Twitter: @BradWillis. WSOP photos by PokerPhotoArchive.com.

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