[morgant]

you are providing a salary for the casino employees, their families, the surrounding areas of the casino emerge with businesses to cater to tourists and so on and so on. if any profession were truly bereft how could it sustain itself? i have no numbers whatsoever but poker overall as an industry must be pretty large and provide income in one way or another for many different people involved the game directly or indirectly. now saying it is bereft leads me to believe your deeper feelings about the game might be in line with the average joe who feels it is just a dirty game, or that opinion has rubbed off on you a bit. but most anything that provides the transfer of money and stimulus to the economy has some value. poker's level of positive impact might not be as great as a doctor who is working in underpriveleged areas to fight malnutrition, but the taxes paid on poker(in general) do trickle into those sorts of goverment programs as well.......