What do President Obama, the Russian mob, Tobey Maguire, hedge funds, Olympic figure skaters, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Bill Clinton, A-Rod, France, and the "London Whale" have in common? They're all connected (more or less) to a complicated web of money, celebrity, politics, and illegal poker that may have cost one innocent millionaire an ambassadorship in France.
When New York federal judge Jack Weinstein ruled last week that poker is indeed a game of skill, he based the decision off defendant Lawrence DiCristina's 120-page report that included this striking chart showing the difference in earnings between the ten best and worst poker players in a study.
The Feds say Howard Lederer and Christopher Ferguson's website defrauded players
Novelist Colson Whitehead thinks he can break the trend of famous faces leaving early
ESPN pulls poker programming in the wake of FBI crackdown
The government is making arrests and shutting down the biggest poker sites
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