The irony of a self-proclaimed 'grassroots' organization telling grassroots activists they should start their own organization seems to be lost on the new PPA President. It seems antithetical to me, and it's not the first time I've heard it from the PPA.

You'll have to forgive me for being triggered

Of that I have no doubt. But it didn't answer my question.

Well, we think the PPA is that group. Why must we reinvent the wheel?

Make up your mind lol

That's great! Be that group. There are so many ways that the PPA could help state activists well short of throwing them cash.

I don't think you were ever accused of such. But to date the PPA has not been at all eager to help grassroots activists, myself included, and there is so much they could have been doing.

Let me close with this ... My relationship with the PPA over the years has been a bit contentious. The PPA has pretty much rebuffed all of my requests for help over the years, 'do it yourself' being the gist of their position.

But despite my frustrations spilling over on the pages of this forum, I have always respected Rich and John, and we've shared information on each others activities wrt the fight here in Washington State. While I'm disappointed the PPA wouldn't use its positon to inspire and assist grassroots activists, I'm equally disappointed to see it fall by the wayside. I don't believe the PPA has been game-changing, but it surely has been a net positive.

Curt. It not like I'm "asking for money" for myself or a personal agenda. I'm simply reaching out to see if anyone wants to keep PPA afloat. If the answer is no, that's fine. I'm not trying to force PPA on anyone.

I don't think you or Martin have claimed that I've ever been anything but 100% supportive of anything either of you have wanted to do or that I've ever been anything less than 100% supportive of PPA helping. I've done as far as to propose you and Martin as state directors (which Martin accepted) to facilitate that.

I'm sorry to see this devolve into another PPA bashing thread when we're on the precipice of survival, but the question before us is clear and straightforward. Do we want a continued organized effort through PPA, do we want to start from scratch, or do we want to sit back and hope industry has sufficient lobbying power to pass legislation without player advocacy? We need runner-runner to survive, so everyone still interested should be looking at how we can have option #2, as option #3 is what happens by default.

That wasn't even implied

Funny thing is, I want the PPA to stay afloat. I see this as an opportunity for the PPA to embrace a true grassroots role. The combative posture taken whenever players dare make a suggestion on how a player-repreentative organization could help those players is on you and not us.

Words of encouragement are great, and being able to come on your show and talk about what we're doing is also great. But damnit Rich, I asked for help, many times and was rebuffed. All one has to do is read the threads I've started to see that.

I didn't take the state director position precisely because I felt it would hamstring me, force me to take the Pokerstars party line, and frankly if I was going to sell out, I wasn't going to do it without getting paid.

Im sorry you see all criticism as bashing. There are shortcomings, we've pointed them out. You stubbornly refuse to even acknowledge our criticism is legitimate

Recapture your identity as a grassroots, player representative organization, and you'll have a better chance of getting player support.

Without being hamstrung by Pokerstars, the PPA could, if it chose to, look at other ways to bring online poker to the 40 states that Pokerstars is NEVER going to serve.

Probably the best way to bring online poker to those states is thru state lotteries. For those states, there would never be more than a single operator anyway. As a partner, government would get a far better revenue share than they would thru taxation.

And state lotteries can join together to form interstate lotteries (Powerball, MegaMillions) and share liquidity. It is an approach that should be taken seriously. It's just not one that Pokerstars will support.

I never saw PPA is being connected to the Stars' agenda at all. Rather, state legislative gaming fights are tough -- and expensive. We never had the capacity to go it alone. Rather, we can assist when industry (and not only Stars) is willing to push a state forward through a lobbying effort. And, as you learned (and already knew, of course), no state will move forward without knowing who will be providing services. Even the lottery route has that limitation.

Anyway, I sought to keep PPA operational for the first part of 2018 to try to give us all a chance to come together to stand up for the game and to save what we have organizationally. Regarding this thread, I am disappointed to see no support. I expected at least something along the lines of "I had issues with XXX but am willing to give Rich / PPA a chance here." I'm not sure I deserve the attacks and vitriol (more in the NVG thread than here), but I guess I don't get to be the arbiter of that.

This thread is veered way off course from the simple announcement, so I'll go ahead and lock it up.