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Alaska Lottery Winner Goes Back on Promise
Alaska Lottery Winner Goes Back on Promise
Last year there was outrage when a sex offender won a lottery in Alaska that was intended to help victims of rape and other sexually based crimes. Lottery winner Alec Ahsoak, a three time sex offender, won the $500,000 jackpot. When the winner was announced a local television station received an email stating that Ahsoak was a sex offender causing widespread anger.
Lottery winner Ahsoak was assaulted on a downtown Anchorage Street by a person wielding a tire iron or metal pipe. Ahsoak later said he would donate $100,000 to Standing Together Against Rape. Mr. Ahsoak has gone back on his promise and the Anchorage based charity said they had never heard from him said executive director Nancy Haag.
Ms. Haag said the group is looking forward and will not dwell on Mr. Ahsoak’s broken promise. Ms. Haag stated, “I know that probably in the moment he probably was very excited and probably thought he could do more with his money than he really was able to.”
Lottery winner Ahsoak, who kept $350,000 after taxes, has kept a low profile since the attack. Efforts to reach Ahsoak have been fruitless and no one is answering the door at the midtown inn where the lottery winner lives. Lottery operator Abe Spicola was the first to announce that Ahsoak intended to make the large donation after news about Ahsoak’s past surfaced.
Spicola, owner of Lucky Times Pull-Tabs lottery which operated the lottery said he does not want to bring any more hardship on lottery winner Ahsoak. He also said that people need to remember that perpetrators of sexual abuse often have been victimized themselves. Some of the parents of Ahsoak’s victims think that all of the money should go to his victims.
Spicola said that Lucky Times will sponsor another lottery to benefit Standing Together Against Rape. Hopefully history will not repeat itself.
Many states now check lottery winners against law enforcement databases for outstanding warrants, unpaid fines and back child support. Had this private lottery had the ability to check such a database this travesty probably would not have happened. Several states in the US are toying with the idea of allowing online lottery ticket sales. State lottery websites offering online lottery tickets could be easily connected to several law enforcement databases. Most lottery players have indicated they would welcome the ability to go on the internet and make an online lottery purchase. Hopefully lotteries will consider going online to prevent a repeat of the Alaska travesty.
Common Poker Tells
In order to become a winner at the game of poker, you need to master the common poker tells. A “tell” is any kind of behavior or reaction by someone that you’re playing with that can tip you off about their hand. You may also have “tells” of your own that tip off your opponents. There are even online poker tells.
Now, you should not get the idea that knowing about common poker tells is going to make you a great poker player. It’s just one part of a total plan that includes position knowledge, the ability to calculate pot odds, understanding things like the 4/2 technique for betting, and things like that. Understanding tells involves the psychological component of your poker strategy, a component that is also very important but won’t win you games all by itself.
When you are sitting with people for a while, you can start to get to know their unique little habits that may be their unique tells. But you can use knowledge of common poker tells to even be able to pick up on online poker tells without needing to see the other person, because some of these can come through even online.
First, whenever a player acts like he has a weak hand, he probably has a strong hand. The opposite is also true: acting as if you have a strong hand probably means you have junk. This is behavior that can come through even as online poker tells, because you can pick it up from the betting patterns of the online players. One thing to keep in mind, however: experienced poker players know how to deliberately give off false tells, and they may use false tells to their great advantage and really burn you in moves like the Squeeze Play. Try to ascertain the experience level of your opponents early on.
Common poker tells that you can pick up on when playing in person with people that tell you that a player probably has a good hand include: acting disinterested in or despairing of a hand but staying in; nervous behaviors like heavy breathing or shaking hands (these probably have a very, very strong hand); and looking at chips just after looking at hole cards (they’re figuring out how much they should bet because they have good stuff).
Now, what are common poker tells indicating a probable weak hand? These would be: instead of heavy breathing, holding their breath; and glaring at other players (kind of the silent version of trash talk).
There are even a couple of common poker tells that can reveal a middle of the road hand, a drawing hand: after the flop, if players are re-checking their hole cards, they are double checking to see if they got the exact card they need for a strong hand or if they still have a good possibility of getting it on the next deal; and, if they seem like they are thinking a great deal before calling a bet, that’s because they are–they are doing careful mental calculations of risk because they have a hand that contains possibilities but is not (yet) a winner (this may be a online poker tell).
Once again, knowing common poker tells gives you a competitive edge–and it can teach you how to really fake out your opponents as you gain experience. One of the best sources for learning about poker tells is ‘Caro’s Book of Poker Tells’ by Mike Caro. Pick up your copy and become a Texas Holdem master of the tell-tale signs.