Cringe and learn.
Topic: Poker
A hat tip to Paul Phillips for introducing me to Antonio Esfandiari's website:

http://www.magicantonio.com

It contains some of the most cringe-making material I've ever read about a poker player. In the Rocks and Rings section, we are told of the exploits of his 'posse' - guys who really know how to party -- and seem determined to teach the world this skill, one nightclub at a time. I'm not making this up.

One gang member is descibed as 'Executive Vice President of Female Affairs'. What a pratt! I suggest you check the section titled 'How do they talk'. If you think that Neil Kinnock shouting 'We're all right!' in 1992 was the high point of cringe, be prepared for a shock.

It's a shame really as he gives some quite useful advice in other sections and even informs readers about the history of some of the places where he's played.

What little I know about football.
Topic: Misc.
I never really got into football as a child. Growing up in the home counties, there was no local team worth caring about. At my secondary school, the games teachers made us play rugby and refused to discuss football. But that is not the only reason why I don't follow it now. Apart from the World Cup, I never felt that there was anything at stake. Who cares whether a bunch of foreigners nominally attached to Derby beats another bunch of foreigners nominally attached to Birmingham? In a few years time they will be somewhere else. What difference does it make to your life?

I do enjoy the big international tournaments, but it's painful to support England. Of course I don't really understand the finer points of the game. To illustrate how little I know, I'll tell you what I think is wrong with our national squad: We don't pass the ball. I'm so ignorant that I can't see past the fact that our players have a tendancy to boot the ball all the way to the front in the hope that our forwards get it. Since we have some of the shortest forwards in the international game (Owen, Rooney) and our tallest one (Heskey) is about as useful as a plank of wood, this seems rather dim. But there must be something I don't know about the game, as booting the ball up the field seems to be the default setting even when we are against 10 men! I could swear that the Brazilians, who seem to win almost everything, play the game with lots of low short passes, but copying them seems to be out of the question. As Blackadder learned in series four, if your plan has failed 18 times, the enemy won't expect you to try it a 19th time. You have the element of surprise in your favour!

But I digress. What has caught my attention recently is the tale of the Manchester United takeover by Malcolm Glazer. Glazer is an American who took over the Tampa Bay Bucanneers and turned them from also-rans to Super Bowl winners. He also forced the town to buy him a new stadium at no cost to the team. Naturally with a distinguished track record like that, he is totally unfit to buy a team whose best years seem to be behind them.

What makes this story so ugly though is what it reveals about the the greedy selfish side of the game. I mean the greedy selfish fans, that is. I have been dumbstruck at the whinging I've had to listen to on radio and TV. And the sheer stupidity, too. What's with all these banners saying 'Not for sale'? It is for sale. It's a public limited company on the stock market. Here's a hint. When the price of something is quoted in the FT every day, then it's for sale. Got that?

For decades now, football fans have been spoiled. They have come to take it as normal that bored millionaires take over their clubs and pour in millions with, in some cases, little hope of getting it back. That's fine with the fans, but when someone comes along who actually expects to see a return on his investment once he's done some hard work and taken some risks, all of a sudden their world has come to an end. If it was so bloody important to them that no American ever owned a 75 per cent stake in the club, then they should have used their OWN money to buy a 25.1 per cent stake. They didn't and now they act like a child who's thrown his dummy out of the pram. To hear some of them talk about their years of support you would think that they had never got anything in return for it. Well that's nonsense. For years they had the 'bragging rights' and boy did they brag. They got to sing about their team's latest victories and puff about like peacocks when the trophies were dished out. I can feel no sympathy for them and the hollow talk of boycotts merely makes me laugh. They were happy to see the club make money out of selling shirts in China before last week, how can they now complain when someone wants to buy their club for that income stream?

Gutshot domain change.
Topic: Poker
Gutshot has bought the domain name www.gutshot.com (as opposed to www.gutshot.co.uk). I have been asked to inform readers. Change your links.

Gross exaggeration.
Topic: Poker
This extract from the Paul Phillips blog illustrates something that has always bothered me about tournament reporting - the way that people who play a lot of tournaments can come across as far better than they really are when looking at their 'wins'. In part one of the extract, titled 'Nothing I could do', he shows a couple of plays made by someone who sounds like a terrible player.

Then he shows this person's 'stats' on the Hendon Mob database. A superficial glance would make you think that he's a good player, but it's clear he's not from what Phillips tells us. So this guy must just be playing a lot of tournaments. I would like to know his results after entry fees are deducted. What you earn from this game is the 'net' not the 'gross'.

Actually, on second thoughts, the fact that losers can look like winners keeps this game going. Forget the above!

Food for thought.
Topic: Misc.
A very interesting article in the Sunday Times of May 1st this year disputes the idea of "dumbing down":

Bad is Good

Read the whole thing.

Election thoughts.
Topic: Politics
I have just voted in my 5th general election and like every time before, I've voted Conservative. That won't come as a great surprise to most of you. But this has been different in that for the first time ever, I can think of one Labour policy that appeals to me and I'm annoyed at the Conservatives' opposition to it.

What has disappointed me most about the campaigns has been the clear focus on elderly voters at the expense of the young. I can understand why the parties all do it. They know that the retired are more likely to vote than the young, as they have the free time and have had longer to form opinions. But at the risk of sounding ageist, I have to say it sticks in my craw. Is it really right that the future direction of this country is determined by the votes of people who have less than a dozen years left to live? The decision we make today will have repurcussions for decades to come.

The Conservatives have come up with some good issues on which to fight the election, but left it too late to spell them out. I also happen to think that while Michael Howard would be a good prime minister, Portillo would have stood a better chance of winning the election and I was disappointed that he wasn't selected as leader. Perhaps he could be persuaded to run one more time? Please?

I expect that Labour win today. What is interesting is whether they win next time. I don't think they will. There are a lot of chickens coming home to roost and discontent will rise. I just hope they don't do too much damage to the economy before they are booted out.

The one policy where I find myself in agreement with Labour is on housing. The Conservatives vilify Prescott for wanting to build more housing on the Green Belt, but I think Prescott's got this right. There is an urgent need for more housing in the South East of England and I feel that he's facing facts, while others bury their heads in the sand. I do feel sickened listening to some middle-class southerners prattling on about defending the Green Belt. While they may think that they are speaking for the defence of rural tranquility, what they are actually saying is that people who live in overcrowded and overpriced towns and cities should be made to stay there. It sickens me. The Tories express their opposition to 'Prezza's digger' in terms of giving local communities a voice, but we all know what this means because nobody has any incentive to say 'yes'. Every community would say no to more housing, because the people consulted are those who don't benefit from greater supply. The poor and the homeless wouldn't have a voice in this process.

Before anyone leaps to the assumption that I'm wanting government interference in the market to suit my own needs, I should stress that I'm not. What I would like is for the market to be made more free. What we have at present is unrestricted demand, but highly restricted supply. The number of bodies who have the right to object to new housing construction has risen in recent decades and the result is a big anti-development bias. This must be reversed. The Tories are supposed to be the party of free enterprise and it disappoints me to see them being so protectionist on this matter.

On a sad note, it disgusts me to report that my award for the most interesting policy initiative of any manifesto that I've seen goes to the British National Party. I don't mean its race/immigration policies. I refer instead to its idea of gun ownership for anyone who has completed a period of national service. I have no desire to see the BNP win anywhere, but I have to say this is the sort of bold thinking that all parties should attempt. Gun ownership is a subject that I can't make up my mind own, but I can agree that we ought to accept that the police are failing in their duty to protect people and that if they don't improve soon then perhaps citizens should be entitled to defend themselves. Alas the fact that it's been presented by a bunch of racist thugs will probably mean that it's not taken seriously when it should be.

Poker in Barcelona.
Topic: Poker
There were two cash games going on when I arrived:

?20/40 Hold'em
?250 buy-in
?200 minimum rebuy
2.5 per cent rake
Cap of ?15

?250 Omaha
?200 minimum rebuy
?5/10 blinds
2.5 per cent rake
Cap of ?30

A tournament is staged once a month. The next one will take place on the 12th May and will be ?200 Hold'em NL, with rebuys of ?50 (don't understand how this works) and an optional add-on. Entry fee is ?20.

In the following months:

9th June - ?200 Hold'em, Pot limit same details as above.

14th July - ?200 Omaha, Pot limit

11th August - ?200 Hold'em, No limit

8th September - ?200 Hold'em Pot limit

The ultimate compliment.
Topic: Poker
I received the ultimate compliment yesterday, while playing online. I was called a 'calling station' and a 'rock' by the same player in the same game, in under half an hour!

There can be no higher praise.

Banged to rights.
Topic: Misc.
I got a phone call out of the blue yesterday from an old university friend whom I normally meet every couple of years or so. He told me that he's had a change of career and is now a police officer. I'm delighted by this, as he's just the sort of person I think should be in the police. He's bright, polite, trustworthy and most importantly of all, six foot six.

We got talking about the workload in the police. I'm not impressed with the way that the service functions in this country and I got a glimpse of the problem when he explained how much work he had to do after arresting someone. Essentially it's a nine hour task. The last time he arrested someone it was at 2pm. He got home at 11.30pm. I can certainly imagine that this is a deterrent to anyone. In fact he told me that 25 per cent of those who join the service leave within two years. Those who survive are often those who avoid getting involved in marginal cases. That just can't be right.

One thing that maddens him is the trend for innocent people to give 'no comment' interviews rather than just say that they didn't do it. No comment interviews are more time consuming than those where the interviewee says something, as the officers have to think of every possible question in order to cover themselves.

In one recent case, several young men were taken in after some criminal damage. The first one they spoke to said that he was completely guilty and that the others had nothing to do with it. The rest all gave 'no comment' interviews, when they could have just said: 'It wasn't me. X did it.'

I asked Jon whether he could think of ways to speed up the process and he mentioned a few bureaucratic changes, before coming to the wording of the new police caution, which now says.

"You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence."

Given the time wasted by no comments, he said 'I think we should say:'

"...it may fuck your defence if you do not".

And I totally agree. So if you get arrested in Brighton by a giant who cautions you this way, tell him Dave says 'Hi'.

Speechless in Fulham.
Topic: Poker
Transcript for game #1571808035 requested by DavidYoung (ebznl@aol.com)
*********** # 1 **************
PokerStars Game #1571808035: Hold'em No Limit ($3/$6) - 2005/04/23 - 14:08:52 (ET)
Table 'Wotho' Seat #6 is the button
Seat 3: DavidYoung ($235 in chips)
Seat 4: JarleAA ($1186.25 in chips)
Seat 6: Obender ($721.25 in chips)
Seat 8: alkor ($529.10 in chips)
alkor: posts small blind $3
DavidYoung: posts big blind $6
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to DavidYoung [Qd Jd]
JarleAA: folds
Obender: raises $12 to $18
JarleAA leaves the table
alkor: folds
DavidYoung: calls $12
*** FLOP *** [6d 4h 5d]
DavidYoung: checks
Obender: bets $24
DavidYoung: raises $60 to $84
Obender: raises $402 to $486
DavidYoung: calls $133 and is all-in
*** TURN *** [6d 4h 5d] [9s]
*** RIVER *** [6d 4h 5d 9s] [8c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
DavidYoung: shows [Qd Jd] (high card Queen)
Obender: mucks hand
DavidYoung collected $471 from pot
DavidYoung said, "?????????????"
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $473 | Rake $2
Board [6d 4h 5d 9s 8c]
Seat 3: DavidYoung (big blind) showed [Qd Jd] and won ($471) with high card Queen
Seat 4: JarleAA folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: Obender (button) mucked [Tc Qh]
Seat 8: alkor (small blind) folded before Flop

Experience.
Topic: Politics
A week ago I was berated on a poker forum for expressing views on politics and religion that showed I have no experience of life. Of course no example was provided and the argument went no deeper than that, so I didn't feel any need to provide a proper rebuttal, but it got me to wondering what was meant by experience.

When I was in sixth form at school I did history A level. One of my teachers was a kindly old man called Mr Jones. I don't know his real first name but we all called him Benny. I hope he's alive now but it's less than likely. He seemed frail even then. He must have been quite efficient because we finished the syllabus a few days early in the summer of 1987 and so he asked us whether there were any topics of a wider nature that we wanted to discuss. The first question that was asked was 'Will there be a united Germany? Here is his answer based on fifty years of studying history: "Not in your lifetime!"

It took three years. I'm not saying that Benny Jones wasn't a great teacher. He probably was. But somehow he managed to get it spectacularly wrong. Experience didn't help him.

Want a more up to date example? Check out what the Independent's Middle East correspondent, Robert Fisk, said about the impending war against Afghanistan (not Iraq). This is a man who prides himself on thirty years of experience in Middle East affairs.

'Bush is walking into a trap'

He might have been right in diagnosing some of America's faults, but his opening statement 'Retaliation is a trap' is utterly ridiculous. Should the US have done nothing after Pearl Harbour? A quick read of Osama bin Laden's 1996 Declaration of War against the United States reveals that it was American weakness and not strength that inspired Al Qaeda. Fisk's article suggests that the invasion of Afghanistan would make matters worse. In fact it was a remarkable success and you barely hear a word about it now, as there is no anti-US angle to squeeze out of it. Hundreds of thousands of people who had fled the Taliban have returned. The election went well. The best that the anti-US press could muster up was that the ink used to validate voting was too easily washable. Pathetic.

A lot of people's forecasts on the big political issues of recent years have been utterly and completely wrong and the forecasts of those with 'experience' have been among the worst.

Later this year I intend to go through all the various forecasts I have made on this site to see how accurate they have been. The Pope bet (see yesterday) doesn't count as it was a value bet at seven to one. I have certainly got some things wrong but I don't think I've fared any worse than people who have far more experience than I.

Tournament Reporting, Part Two
Topic: Poker
This is part two of the very long post I started yesterday. This part concerns the Gutshot comp that David wanted me to write about.

Friday, 8rd April #100 PL hold?em Rebuys

And so on to Gutshot, where I draw a starting seat next to Mad Yank Fanelli and decide to catch up on matters arising. Two seats to my left was Andrew Georgiou. Opposite me was Julian Thew, whom I had never seen before that day. Looking around I didn?t see many rebuy maniacs and began to wonder whether I had had my first bad beat of the night. Ron was applying some Thai ?Tiger Balm? to his head, telling me that it was calming. I decided to try some out and learned the hard way the dangers of rubbing your eyes with the same fingers afterwards, as I struggled to keep my eyes open long enough to see my cards without them stinging. I also started wondering just how effective the stuff could be, if it?s supposed to be keeping Ron calm. I had initially assumed (don?t know why) that Thew was a rock, but the reality hit home when I got all-in with AA against him on a re-raise and found calling me with Q-9 offsuit! But otherwise it was still not a great starting table.

From outside the Salon Prive I could hear the sound of Jac Arama screaming and I began to fear that I was in a no-hope situation in terms of building a stack. At the break, tales abounded of people with 11,000 stacks. I had ended with my starting stack of 2,000 and bought another 3,000 in the add-on. On returning to the table, I learned that we were to be moved upstairs. That meant that I would probably not have to move again, which was good. It was only then that I realised that the comp only had about 78 runners. I had expected this to be another sell out and it occurred to me that perhaps I had underestimated the aversion some people have to playing pot-limit as opposed to no-limit hold?em. Come on people! It?s not that different. For some of you it?s a benefit, as it prevents you making silly all-in moves when there?s no need for it.

Ron started cracking away and raised on the button when I had AJs in the big blind. I moved all-in and he called like a bullet with J-7o. I knocked him out. He seemed genuinely outraged that I had shown him no respect by backraising with the AJs. Some people thought that he was cracked up, but I actually don?t think he?s done much wrong here. He needed to steal some blinds and when he was reraised there was a decent chance that I had something like AQ or AK where he wouldn?t be dominated.

Looking around the other tables, it seemed as though they all had more chips in play than ours. Notably Joe Grech seemed to have a very big stack, but he wasn?t the only one. David Colclough arrived at the table. He mostly seemed to raise with decent hands and he got unlucky against me when I raised with A-T needing a confrontation and called his raise with JJ to catch two aces on the board. The person who was giving me the biggest headaches however, was Gutshot?s own webmaster Dan Smyth. Anytime he raised he seemed to have a strong hand and I only ever once saw him fold to a reraise (from Colclough in the blinds). Consequently when he raised on my big blind from the button I folded A-T, which I would have called most others with very quickly.

I kept myself in play with some more aggressive raises. In once case, raising with T-6 suited and being called for a third of my stack. On a flop of A 6 x, I checked and when the opponent checked behind me, I moved all in on the turn and was relieved to seem him pass. I don?t often make this sort of play, but it has to be done sometimes. Thew got himself knocked out in the oddest way I think I?ve ever seen. On a flop of 5d 6c 3d, he called with 8c 2c after a bet from Dan (!!) and a call in between. That?s not a misprint by the way. On the turn of the K of clubs, he faced a bet and a checkraise and called all in after a long dwell. The turn had given him a flush draw as well as the dubious middle-pin 4. The river was the 10 of hearts and Dan knocked him out with trip fives, along with a rather more unlucky player holding Kd Qd.

I didn?t get many good hands when we were down to two tables, I was lucky that my left hand opponent would often indicate boredom. On one occasion it encouraged me to lose half my stack with a failed steal-raise when someone behind him called. But on every other occasion it helped. I never got called by him in any case. My luck finally ran out when I called all-in with Ad Jd against a raise from As 7s, only to see my opponent make the spade flush. I was about 16th. I went straight to the internet cafe and logged onto Coral. I have no idea what took place next and you?ll have to ask the winner, Neil Channing to write about the rest some other time.

That?s it folks. I hope you didn?t enjoy this and that I?ll never get asked to write one of these again. Good luck!

Tournament Reporting, Part One
Topic: Poker
David Lloyd asked me to write a tournament report for Gutshot on the #100 Pot Limit comp on Friday. I didn't really want to do it, as I mostly dislike tournament reports and rarely read them. I also played in the comp itself and was in no mood to carry on watching once I got bounced out in the last two tables.

Later I wrote something very long. But it's no longer topical and David doesn't like the negativity of the opening paragraphs, which I feel are essential to the whole thing. He's got far more experience of these things than I, so I'll accept his judgement on it and run it here. Now read on.

I?ve never been a fan of tournament reporting. It seems such a limited format. Surely there?s only so much that can be said about a poker game? Doesn?t a simple formula suffice for most readers? Get a snappy title and away you go. A pun on the winner?s name isn?t a bad start, though I don?t suppose anyone will ever surpass ?German conquers Omaha? (Consult a WW2 history book if you don?t get this one) after Matthias Ronacher won a PLO comp in the 1997 WSOP.

Having had a job writing business reports, I know how easy it is to let a template take over. After a while, the hardest part is finding new ways to say the same thing. Listen out for those football reports on SKY where they do their best to avoid repeating the names of the teams. ?It was a vital fixture for Leeds at home today ? the Elland Road squad had their work cut out ? Blackwell?s boys were tired after a two-nil deficit at half time, but it was good news for fans of The Whites when they came back to equalise ?zzzz.?

So think how much harder it is when you?re writing about a game where the options are check, bet, fold, call or raise! Anyone who can make that interesting deserves a knighthood in my opinion. Full marks are due to Tikay for entertaining so many people. Meanwhile, I?ve been asked by David Lloyd to write about Friday?s Pot Limit hold?em comp.

I stated my objections and I crossed my fingers as I left the club that night thinking I had made a clean getaway. But that was then and this is now, and I?m feeling guilty that I haven?t taken the burden off his shoulders, even though I would rather that the job wasn?t done at all. So I?ve decided to give ?two for the price of one? today and hopefully he?ll never ask me to write another one of these wretched things again. I will cover my experiences of the #300 freezeout from the Victoria festival and the #100 PL hold?em comp on Friday, though I?ll have to warn you that I totally lost interest in the latter once I was knocked out in the last two tables and didn?t watch a single hand of the final.

Sunday, 3rd April #300 NL hold?em freezeout.

When did everyone go freezeout mad? Once upon a time you could trust people to be lying when they said that they wanted to play freezeouts instead of rebuy comps. They would prattle about the unfair edge that the maniacs enjoyed (Jac Arama?s name seemed to come up a lot) and then when finally offered the chance to play one would stay at home. Then a funny thing happened. Luton offered a #100 freezeout on Friday nights and in contrast to the unimpressive turnout when Russell Square did the same thing, people actually turned up in large numbers. Where did it all go right?

I decided to see what the appeal was on Sunday and thus paid up for it three days early just to ensure myself a place. It was almost sold out (146 I believe) and first prize was roughly #16k. I was given a tag for my seat and noticed that ?R10? looked eerily like ?RIO?. Could this be a sign of things to come? Was I to be given a boost this day that would get me into the WSOP? I?ll be all right! Looking around the table, I failed to recognise most of the people. I knew the man on my right and Keith ?the camel? Hawkins, who was three seats to my left, but that was about it. Play started with 3,000 points and blinds of 25/25. The first four intervals were to be 30 minutes long and thereafter it would be a 45 minute clock. While waiting for it to start I noticed that the cards to be used were the ?A+? brand. I?m quite fond of this brand, as they are thicker than some of the ones used elsewhere and they seem to have better quality control on the paintwork. I would love to see them used at Gutshot, but I know that if Roy finds out that the Vic are using them then there is absolutely no chance of this, due to his pathological desire to be different to the er ? er. ? Edgeware Road crew. So don?t tell him! OK, now on to the action.

On the first hand I called with 45 suited and folded on the turn. I was shocked to see on the showdown that one of the unknowns had called in early position with Q6 in the same suit. In that kind of loose play, I think that paradoxically the small suited connectors go down in value, as the chance of someone beating your flush with suited filth goes up. Nice to get a cheap warning early on! Later I did call with a 56 suited, wary of getting involved on a small flush for too much action and was relieved to make a nut straight on the turn with it. I was a bit surprised that I didn?t get called. On the flop there was a bet and a call. On the turn the original bettor made the same bet as before and the player in between made a raise to three times the bet. I reraised to 15 times the bet fully expecting to get called or raised by the other raiser and was stunned when he passed. The same player managed to go all in on a nine-high flop with T9 about half an hour later, so I can?t think what he laid down against me.

As a general strategy, I decided to observe how Keith played the comp, as he?s played far more of this kind of event than I. In the very early stages, he was getting involved more than I would have done. It looked to me like he was frittering his chips away but then came a hand from the twilight zone. Keith raised preflop and got called by the player on my right. The flop brought A J x with two spades. The man on the right checked and Keith bet. The other man called. The turn was a spade. Keith?s opponent checked and Keith made a big bet. The man on my right instantly called all in, as though defeat were unthinkable. Keith looked utterly crestfallen. So imagine our surprise when the caller showed A2 of clubs!! Keith had AJ and caught an irrelevant J on the river to fill up. It was one of the most extraordinary gifts I have ever seen.

Every tournament switches from a point where it goes from being risky to play hands to being risky not to play hands. When the blinds reach a certain level they become worth nicking. If you haven?t already worked out what that level is in the standard Gutshot weekly comp, then you are either a beginner or should give up now. I was curious what Keith thought the ?blinds-worth-nicking? point was in this comp. To my astonishment, he seemed to get his boots on at the 100/200 level. I was hoping to capitalise on this by raising over the top of him, especially if he got a weak caller but the opportunity didn?t arise.

Now for some specific hands:

I hold AA under the gun and decide to limp. This was provoked by the arrival of Mr X who loves to raise in the blinds and was small blind this hand. I?m not exaggerating when I say that he raises more in the blinds than on the button, which I always find extraordinary. I also had the camel as a likely suspect of course and was thus doubly gutted when neither of them raised. The flop brought J 5 6 rainbow and I decided to check. I was planning to check-raise or possibly check-call here but was annoyed to see that after the camel bet, Mr X check-raised. I folded. Keith called and then folded when X bet the pot on the turn card Q. I think I got away from disaster here. I put X on two pairs and although I can?t be 100 per cent sure he was beating me, I know that I don?t want to go broke on one pair in an unraised pot. I am sure I had Keith beat though.

Later in the comp, after I?d doubled up with AA over KK, I limp in early position for 200 of my 4900 stack with 66. Keith has the button and raises to 900 and a player in the small blind goes all in for 1200. It?s 1,000 to me and I know that Keith can?t reraise because the all-in is an under-raise. I also know that he is not likely to bluff into a dry side-pot, so it?s tempting to play. But I refuse to call for a quarter of my stack with a small pair when there is a decent chance that I am beaten by one of the opponents, so I fold. Yuk! Keith shows A7o and the other bloke shows AJo. Neither hits a pair and I forgo the chance to win a big pot. Still think it was the right play however.

I played tight for a while and lost more chips, not getting the chances I wanted until I made my one clear blunder. In a hand where there was a no small blind, I found KQo. I can never understand people limping in early position in this spot, as they are only getting evens against the random hand and all the other people in the pot, so I stupidly decided to raise to 1,100 of my 3,100. Keith said ?I?ll give you a spin? and called me. Then someone else moved all-in, covering my remaining 2,000. I folded in dismay. What the hell was I doing in this pot?

Now down to a very small stack when the blinds were 200/400, I decided to do something rather odd. I found JT suited under the gun and called. This seems like a bad play, but I thought I was so low that my equity in the comp was close to zero and the best way back in would be to give myself this shot at winning a decent pot with a multi-way hand. To my surprise all the players behind me folded and I found myself facing the two blinds. On a flop of A 9 4 (no flush draw for me), I decided to bet out after they checked and won easily. I had recovered 800 of the 1,100 I had squandered before, but this wasn?t what I had in mind when I played the hand in the first place!

I let the blinds go through me and on the following few rounds moved all-in with A7s, QTo, ATo and finally KTo. The first three merely got me back my blinds, but the last was done with the intention of picking up more chips. I was called by Paul Testud who had AK for what seemed like the 4th time in about 15 minutes. No help. Me gone. Ho hum. Looking back on it, I should have taken notice of the fact that the 100/200 level was followed by 200/400. Gutshot comps have a 150/300 level in between, which means that you aren?t put to the crunch so early and I?ve grown used to that. I?m not sure I will ever again pay that much for a comp with such a leap after 2 hours of play. I found it unsatisfactory frankly, though I understand the need to make it finish in one day. I went into a cash game and two hours later Hugo Martin told me he had been knocked out 16th. It must have been absolute carnage.

Incidentally, Neil Channing had a disaster. During the break he went down to McDonalds to get some food and rushed back to find that when play resumed, two of the players behind him were missing. Since this made it easier to steal the blinds and he was short-stacked, he moved all in with some rubbish he wouldn?t otherwise have touched and promptly got called and bumped out of the comp. Next time Neil, GO LARGE!

Rover.
Topic: Politics
The story of the collapse of Rover, five years after being given a new lease of life, illustrates many of the failings of 'New Labour'. In 2000 Rover reached the end of the road. BMW could not make money out of it and in fact was losing a fortune - an average of #39m a month for the previous six years. Think about that the next time you hear a union leader attack the German company. Alchemy Partners had a realistic plan for cutting the company down to profit, focusing on the MG brand. Then came the Phoenix offer, which promised everything to everyone. The government went with the fantasy rather than the reality. So too did the unions.

As Pete Birks says on his blog:

"Phoenix inherited #427m from BMW to fund redundancy settlements, plus #350m worth of unsold stock. It also got land and other businesses that it sold off for #1bn, If all this had been used to pay off the Longbridge workers in 2000, then the workers would have got an average of (wait for it), more than #150,000 apiece. Instead those workers got the satisfaction of working another four years and being thrown on the scrapheap, four years older, with only statutory redundancy pay. Oh, and there is STILL a hole in the Rover pension fund.

But the buyers of Phoenix managed the following; There is a #16.5m directors' pension pot. They have personal control of a (profitable) financing business which might (I am not absolutely sure of this) have been bought via a #10m loan note from, yes, Rover. What might be equally staggering, more than 30 years after Edward Heath called Robert Maxwell* "the unacceptable face of capitalism", is that none of this was illegal. Rover was kept alive solely by burning money, week in, week out. And it wasn't the directors' money. This was a brilliant financial mugging. Immoral, but quite within the law. Depending on your attitude, the directors of Phoenix were brilliant, or amoral gits."

* It was actually Tiny Rowland.

This BBC news article covers it well. Note the unions' attitude at the time: "We are fighting for jobs and Alchemy did not give us that option, so with Alchemy out of it at the moment the mood is ecstatic," said union official Carl Chinn at Longbridge."

Interestingly, the youngest person interviewed was the most clear-headed: "Sammy Singh, 18, said: "Our futures are still unclear. Alchemy had a long term strategy and whoever takes over we could be faced with the same problem in three months' time."

The whole affair has been a gigantic waste of money for taxpayers and a squandered opportunity for the workers, who could have retrained for something else when they were five years younger than they are now. It reveals that New Labour, as well as the trade unions, are breathtakingly ignorant about commerce. It is poetic justice that this has blown up in their faces at the start of a general election campaign.

It is finished.
The death of Pope John Paul II has been covered exhaustively in the newspapers, so I haven't rushed to write about it. I know that he was one of the most significant popes of recent centuries and I'm glad, as others are, that he helped to defeat communism in Eastern Europe. I'm even told by a friend that he was responsible for ending Catholic opposition to capitalism, though I don't know what he meant by that.

As an atheist, I can really only judge him by how his life affected others in terms of human freedoms and prosperity, rather than on 'spiritual matters'. His opposition to abortion I can understand, without agreeing with, but his opposition to birth control makes no sense at all to me, especially when considering the benefits of condoms in preventing the spread of AIDS. That's one reason why I felt uncomfortable watching the crowds in Rome. The first on the scene were the Italians. Italy has a fertility rate of 1.26 (see previous post). I cannot believe that none of those people used birth control. The whole thing seems so hypocritical to me.

But that isn't my main problem with the Pope. What irks me more about him is that like other Christians and Christ himself, he believed in hell. I will never understand how anyone can be considered moral who accepts the idea of eternal damnation as a punishment for crimes of finite duration. The very concept of hell is utterly immoral. The idea that you can avoid it by believing in something is absurd. What can an act of belief mean, when it's made under duress? And how can an act of belief be a moral matter in any case? No religion can answer that for me.