I'll bet my horse

This is definitely becoming an ongoing theme at PokerTime- presidents and people in the public eye (who sometimes shouldn’t be) who enjoy a good game of poker. We’ve already had a few posts about present President Obama’s love, and talent, for the game, as well as a string of other presidents before him.

It was a pleasant surprise to stumble upon yet another US president who, it has been recorded, loved playing poker. Warren G. Harding came into office in 1921 and has been noted as one of the less notable and more forgettable American presidents. He was criticized for his inability to make decisions and his tendency to be easily influenced by his crony cabinet members.

Being a less than average president is not the only thing America’s 29th president was criticized for. Although he was a big fan of poker, his poker skills at the game were apparently lacking. In fact, his skills in this department were so dismal that he once bet the White House china collection and lost it. In one hand.

Harding’s cabinet of crony’s was dubbed as ‘The Poker Cabinet’ because they all played poker with Harding several times a week. These poker sessions were rumoured to have lasted into the wee hours and involved heavy consumption of liquor. Devoting his energies to booze and gambling was frowned upon by the public and press. This was compounded when Harding ran out of chips and instead gambled away the White House China.

So while poker seems to be a presidential and White House tradition that has spanned back several generations, the skills to do well at it, it seems, are not.

There’s some really interesting information on how a whole lot of the US presidents, past and present, really enjoyed poker. It also implies that a lot of famous political manoeuvres where influenced by the game of poker.

Who said it was just a game?!

Barack Obama features prominently in the article. Apparently he usually leaves his weekly poker games a winner (no surprises there), and has used his poker skills to ‘break the ice with people he needed to work with in the legislature’.

Another interesting point the article makes is that poker is symbolic of the American dream and democracy, stating that ‘the dreamlike and in a way democratic fact that an intelligent, persistent and lucky amateur can rise and thrive among the professionals.’

So there it is: next time you get home at 3am after a lengthy  poker session, reeking of cigars and whiskey, say that you’re following the example of a long line of US presidents.