TOP FIVE

Top Five Holiday Movies featuring Saturday Night Live Alumnus

For this issue's top five, we wanted a Christmas theme, but rather than doing the tired and clichéd top five Holiday movies, we decided to do one with SNL members. Besides we thought that It’s a Wonderful Life sucks.

5.) Scrooged: A modern re-telling of the Christmas Carol starring Bill Murray? Must be funny and it is.

 

4.) 8 Crazy Nights: A quote from his famous Hanukkah song, Adam Sandler and a number of other alums (Rob Schneider, Kevin Nealon and Jon Lovitz) appeared in this cartoon movie.

3) Planes, Trains and Automobiles: Not a Christmas movie per se, but one that dealt with the holidays (Thanksgiving). It featured Steve Martin teamed up with the late great John Candy and has some classic comical dialogue. “Please! Have mercy! I’ve been wearing the same underwear since Tuesday!”

2) Elf: Will Ferrell as a 6’3” tall elf, need we say more?

 

 

1) Trading Places: Eddie Murphy in his prime together with a drunken Dan Aykroyd in a Santa suit trying to smuggle a salmon out of a Christmas party equals some funny stuff.

 

POKER

Just in time for the Holidays, 888.com founder Avi Shaked has proposed a $1 billion private equity fund for investment use in Palestine. The deal is of course contingent on a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.

Joseph Hachem will have some extra Christmas money in his pocket thanks in part to his win at the second biggest poker tournament which was held at the Bellagio. Hachem won close to $3 million.

Poker will hit NBC in the New Year with the debut of Poker After Dark. Starting January 2, 2007 the show will be hosted by Shauna Hiatt. The show will air at 2:05 AM ET and PT

 

SPORTS

The NFL playoffs are nigh and not much is set in stone. Of all the teams still in the hunt, the Bears, Chargers, Saints, Ravens and Colts have clinched their divisions and the Bears have clinched homefield throughout the playoffs. The following are out of the hunt altogether: Miami, Arizona, Cleveland, Detroit, Houston, Oakland, Tampa Bay and Washington.

 

FEATURE

The Holiday season is in full swing. Hanukkah began last Friday, Christmas is set for this Monday and while you scramble to finish your last minute shopping, there will no doubt be Christmas Carols blaring on the mall PA systems. So in honor of the song, "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town," we present a naughty and nice list for 2006.

Bill Frist - Naughty

Shame on the former Senate Majority leader for attaching an ill-conceived Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act to an unrelated Safe Port Act. We’ve gone on ad nauseam about what’s wrong with it, but suffice to say it would be impossible to enforce properly.

Calvin Ayre - Nice

You’ve probably seen a lot of Calvin with promotions for his Bodog Fights and everything else (although he has been keeping a somewhat low profile the last few months) but the Bodog founder and his company have provided the gaming industry with a blueprint for how to properly acquire an online gambling site. By virtually all accounts, there was a seamless transition for all players when BoDog took over Bowman’s poker players, as well as WWTS’s operation. Welcome bonuses were given out, and whoever wanted their balance, now that a new company was running the ship, immediately received a payout.
That’s the way it’s done folks.

BetonSports - Naughty

Where do we start? After the stunning arrest of CEO David Carruthers this past summer, the executives and Board of Directors of this publicly traded company grabbed their coats and ran for cover. How does that saying go…”they folded like a cheap suit”.
Their reaction was an embarrassment, and worst of all, players were left holding the bag, as their accounts disappeared along with the scurrying rats. They still have no information if they will ever see a dime of their money (highly unlikely).
A lump of coal for all of them.

Tessa Jowell- Nice

Britain’s Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport is all for regulation and hosted an Online Gambling Summit on UK soil that basically discussed how to make the industry better, i.e. curbing youth gambling. 

Iowa State/Poker Players Alliance - Nice

A two way tie between the state of Iowa and the Pokers Players Alliance. The Poker’s Players Alliance made a call to arms for all proponents of online gaming to get out and vote in the November mid-term elections.

Jim Leach lost his bid for re-election and many people think it could’ve been the poker players that swayed the vote.