Frank J. Fahrenkopf Jnr. is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the American Gaming Association (AGA), and despite the fact that in the past, the AGA has been vehemently opposed to the idea of online poker, they are now saying 'it’s a safe bet'.

This AGA announcement was timed to coincide with the special Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade Subcommittee hearing which was held just a couple of weeks back. Now he is of the opinion, that federal guidelines to regulate and license online poker in the US would ~ "protect U.S. consumers, keep children from gambling on the Internet, and provide the tools law enforcement needs to shut down illegal Internet gambling operators. It would also create new jobs and tax revenue at a time when our country sorely needs both."

But what has changed his tune?

According to him, it is technology that is the key; this has now proven itself to be able to be successfully adapted for e-commerce processes which are now acceptable to the AGA. Although we are not sure how technology is so substantially different from a few months ago, which now makes it acceptable to the AGA. One can only assume he means in terms of the fact that jurisdictional licenses are the order to the day, for example – like we see in Canada, the UK, France, Italy, Spain and Denmark.

Fahrenkopf said that the AGA supports and approves of state regulation and licensing, although we all know that passing a federal bill would be best. So, he adds – following federal guidelines on offering internet poker. It is his contention that poker is "substantially different than other forms of gaming," we know it has always been this way. He also goes on about the fact that Americans have "historically played and continue to play poker', and that unlike other types of online gambling, poker is played – player vs. player - which makes it a game of skill. Other forms of gambling games are played against the house, which intrinsically makes them a game of luck.

What we find very strange, is that these facts regarding online poker have been well-known all along; and that this support for online poker from the AGA only came about after the biggest online poker brands operating in the USA, were closed down by the DoJ.

Prior to this, although we had the 'technology' and poker was still a game of 'skill', the AGA had no time or support for online poker. What has changed between April 2011 and now? It almost seems obvious that these big online poker brands had to be gotten 'out of the way', to allow for the AGA to announce that the playing of online poker is now a safe bet. Although we are by no means a fan of conspiracy theories, it all seems too good to be true; that a huge house of cards should be made to fall, in order to make way for the sudden credibility of this game?! Is something rotten in the State of Denmark?