Paul McClain       

I have heard that the three topics you are not supposed to mention in casual, social conversations are religion, politics and bathroom stuff. When I perused (one of the 14,000 most misused words in the English language) my recent posts I discovered that I have already written on all three of these topics. Fortunately, I do not consider this blog to be either casual or social, which brings me to my topic for today:
How the U.S. Can Achieve World Domination:
I was playing Medieval Total War II the other day and, as I watched my orange Moorish empire sweep up the Iberian Peninsula and across North Africa into the Middle East, I mused about how the U.S. is no longer considered the world's dominant force (oh for the simplicity of the atomic bomb. . .).
Then it hit me. What do I do in MTW2 when my people are unhappy and rebellious, I'm 6k florins in the hole and the dadgum Pope keeps bitching at me ex cathedra (used incorrectly because it sounds cool. Yes I did just want to say "bitching at me ex cathedra")? I summon up a huge army, attack the nearest capital, kill the inhabitants and loot the city! So easy.
Now of course you are saying, "Paul, this is the nuclear age. Your plan would merely lead to a holocaust and worldwide radiation!"
To which I would reply, "Siiiiiiiiiick" and then break out my copy of Fallout 3 to practice.
The only problem with the U.S.'s recent attempts for world domination is we gathered the troops (check), moved into enemy territory (check), killed the inhabitants (check) and forgot to loot their countries! Inexcusable! To paraphrase Slavoj Zizek, I'm fine with war for oil, but where the hell is my oil?
Any pasty white guy who plays RTS games (if you don't know what that means you're not a pasty white guy) knows that if you don't loot the other city, then you're still going to be in the florins red. What was the point of your attack? To provide peace and a democratic constitutional republic (no, the U.S. is not a democracy) to a nation in need of a liberator? This is world domination we're talking about, not Bono.
So President Obama, if you want to be the leader of a U.S. that is a world power, you need to start nuking some shiznat.
Calling up Jack Bauer couldn't hurt either.

Fact: With the secularization of Western civilization fewer and fewer people are identifying with the Christian church. While I'm sure the recession has led to some foxhole conversions, I feel like people need to know what has been going on for the past two thousand years. Qualification: What you are about to read is meant to be satire, not sanctimonious criticism. 
33ish A.D. - Some holy rollers get revved up and decide to talk about Jesus to Asia Minor. The Roman Empire has some different ideas, but groups of Christians end up meeting in houses, reading the Scriptures and arguing if dreidels and latkes are still OK.
100s. Some old fellas with big beards get together and decide on the canon. They throw out The Shepherd of Hermas because it is long (and who wants a heretical book in the Bible if it's long and boring) and decide to keep Revelation because of its potential for illustrated Bibles. They end their meeting by making the rule that the final test for canon vs. non-canon is if the book is endorsed by the early church fathers (them). Conveeeeeenient. 
312. Constantine is playing Medieval Total War 2 and he discovers that if you have a huge army you can be the head of the church. Fortunately, he also had a vision that he would be the head of the church so the priests decided it was OK. 
312-1517: Catholicism. Oh for the days when burning people at the stake was still PC. 
October 31, 1517: A German monk has a few too many pints and ends up putting 95 theses on a church door. The Pope refuses to recognize it because it's not in Latin and the Lutheran church is formed. The British druids read it and decide to start Halloween on that day and build a Henge of stone. This Henge becomes the biggest darn Henge in the world. 
1600's-1700's: Different preachers start traveling around and spreading Methodism. Unfortunately, when John Wesley came to America he lost the methods and everyone has been confused about what they believe ever since. During this period the Mennonites also formed so everyone would mix them up with the Amish. 
1800's: People decide that the coolest thing to do is have a retro-church movement and see whose church can be most like the church in Acts. The only loophole in their plan is that they forget that the world has changed a tiny bit in the previous 1800 years. 
1900's: Westerners decide to let non-white people into church only to discover that Jesus wasn't white! Then they try to let gay people into church, only to discover that this breaks one or two itsy-bitsy rules in the Bible. You know, like all of the Old Testament laws and most of Corinthians. 
2000's: The Muslims decide that they will blow up Americans since Americans are Christians. If only they would come over here and discover their mistake. 
So sure, the church has problems even though the Bible clearly states, "All people in the Christian church are perfect." Either that or, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." I forget. 

(This was originally a response to a comment on my previous Q6 but it was so long I decided to post it here).
Good sir.
I. It is true that I focused primarily on how you bet your hands and not hand quantity (and quality). I also concur that the terms tight and loose are used far too often. The part of "style" which these terms modify, however, is precisely the number of hands played. Of course, the HA is de facto a loose player and the passive player also tends to be loose (mostly due to inexperience). The widest variation is between tight, aggressive (think Dan Harrington and Phil Gordon) and loose, aggressive (think Gus Hansen and Mike Matusow). Yet, in my column I chose to ignore the tight/loose side of the equation for now.
II. You are correct that I should have qualified at the beginning of the column: all of these styles are meaningless against bad opponents. In fact, against the typical loose, passive play of low stakes online and home games, I tend to play a very straight forward game of getting in cheap and betting for value. The presupposition of my article, therefore, is that you are up against opponents with a least a medium amount of experience and knowledge of the game (i.e. don't call a raise of 4x the BB with 83 off-suit).
III. I highly disagree with you on the inexperienced all-in play. I have seen hundreds of pre-river all-ins from bad players, especially holding 2 face cards or 2 suited cards pre-flops or with top pair post-flop. I too used to be perfectly willing to push all my chips in the middle with KJs, which is what makes playing high pairs aggressively so profitable for the experienced aggressive player who is getting his chips in 4-1. (You may recall that the first tourney I won I took Drew Curle's AA in with KJs and sucked out a straight. Horrifying.)
IV. You are absolutely correct that the good player does not have a single style. A good player instead knows the styles and attempts to create an image and then exploit people's interpretation of this image later in the game. The most important thing is to know when to change gears when the situation demands it (i.e. adding antes in a multi-level tournament or getting no respect for your pre-flop raises). Finally, knowledge of the styles can help you assess a situation. I have had very profitable sessions playing all 3 styles (yes even passive). Mathematically, however, the aggressive styles cater to the experienced player who can read opponents and add deception to his/her game with continuation bets, multiple bullet bluffs, semi-bluffs etc. If you took a poll regarding my style, I think you would be surprised to see how people disagree about me regarding me style with respect to both APHA and TL. Which is exactly what I want.

First, for David: If you want to be an animal, you should be an armadillo, sloth or opossum, all of which sleep for at least 80% of each day.

Main Topic: Playing Styles in Texas Hold 'Em
Generally, poker players use four terms in discussing playing style.
1) Tight: Plays fewer hands.
2) Loose: Plays more hands.
3) Aggressive: Bets and raises more.
4) Passive: Checks and calls more.
Today I want to ignore the first two terms entirely and expand the second two terms to three possible approaches/images one can use at the poker table: passive, aggressive and hyper-aggressive.
Note: I am going to use "he" and "she" at random so I don't have to put "he/she" every time.
A. Passive: Generally, the passive player checks and calls more than he bets and raises. Not many experienced players use this approach. Why? Simple mathematics. When I call someone's bet, here are the ways I can win the hand:
1. My hand is better than my opponent's hand.
2. I outdraw my opponent (pre-river).
When I bet, here are the ways I can win the hand:
1. My hand is better than my opponent's hand.
2. I outdraw my opponent.
3. My opponent folds.
Of course, there are situations in which my opponent will not fold which are:
a. The pot mandates a call.
b. My opponent is a pay station who calls anything.
In general, however, the added chance that my opponent will fold make betting and raising better than checking and folding (remember we are talking overall style, so this excludes plays like slowplaying, calling with the correct odds etc.).
Conclusion: The only time an experienced player uses this style is when she is a super-reader playing against a hyper-aggressive opponent.
B. Aggressive: So now the problem is, when do I play aggressive and when do I play hyper-aggressive (these are styles so I don't need adverbs here English people)?
The upside of playing aggressive is I get a better read on my opponent with pre-flop chop bets and raises (i.e. information/position plays) that define my opponent's hand. This works well in tournaments with slow levels are at a regular game in which you know your opponents. Doyle Brunson said that in poker, you should constantly attempt to force your opponent into a decision for his chips. When you play aggressive poker, you force mistakes. For the more inquiring minds, I would define aggressive as a player who raises when entering first pre-flop, raises 4-1 pre-flop when there have been previous callers, continuation bets at least 40-60% out of position and 60-80% from position. This style works especially well against opponents of lesser playing skill and experience.
C. Hyper-Aggressive: One of the interesting features of this style is that is has emerged only in the past five years or so. My theory for this is that the rise in professional and good poker players necessitates a more volatile style that obfuscates positional reads and hand quality. The hyper-aggressive player comes in 95% pre-flop with a raise, continuation bets 80-100% out of position and 95-100% from position. This player has no qualms with re-raising with rags and senses weakness from lesser opponents. As the saying goes, the best defense is crazy-ass offense. If I will raise three off the button with 58s and AK, how will my opponent have any idea what I have? The major advantage of this style is that it forces your opponent to make decisions before the flop and after the flop, turn and river. The best part is, because you bet like crazy, your opponent can't tell if you're holding the rags or nuts. The major downside of this style is that you will have huge swings in your stack size because you raise if your opponent checks to you with 7 high or top set. The goal of hyper-aggressive play, therefore, is to blind out your opponent so when they show down the nuts it hardly dents your stack or to frustrate him until he attacks you and you show down a better hand. This style is really fun but . . .
WARNING: Hyper-aggressive play only works against skilled or timid opponents. I have played at tables with people who will call off their entire stack with any two cards. In that situation, you want to shift to aggressive play and value bet over and over and over.

Question and Answer:

Avid reader Matt from Danada, Illinois asked this week:
"Do you ever play hands blind? Tips/advice?"
I have never played a hand blind. If I were in a situation in which the pot odds necessitated a call, I might consider playing that round of betting blind. The only time I have seen a blind raise work is when Ellis Powers did it to put his opponent on tilt and then took his stack when Powers' opponent made a tilted re-raise. When my opponent raises blind, I like to purposefully look at my cards and then call or re-raise. This makes it look like my hand is good and, when it is, my opponent might not believe me and I'll take her stack. I might also play a hand blind if there were a side bet involved that gave me positive equity, but I've never had someone give me that offer.

Cheers.

This is a tenuous time in the history of the U.S. The government is still raging with battles over loans. The Dow is nearing its lowest level in ten years, there are threats in New York from Pakistan and more big-business economic troubles than I can count on my abacus. I believe, therefore, that it is time for the middle American to put down the remote, turn off the Colbert re-runs and take a stand (or sit). Which is exactly what I am going to do right now regarding the male/female toilet seat debate.
If I had a yogurt covered pretzel for every time I have heard a lady say, "Put down the toilet seat," I would be a type 2 diabetic. Yet, in the home I tend to agree with these ladies because of the fact that the spray from flushed toilet covers approximately a six foot radius. In the workplace, however, this becomes a different topic altogether because the there are no lids on the toilet. Be flexible ladies. Grab a piece of toilet paper and put the lid down yourself. Do you even realize what happens when you complain enough about keeping the seat down?! I am going to have to break this as gently as possible.

Guys will urinate with the seat down.

According to my scientific calculations, the spray from a 6'0" male's stream hits the water with a velocity of 30 m/s, causing the spray to spread for up to a 3 meter radius. Furthermore, from the age of two to eighteen, a male's aim improves approximately 15%, which translates to 4 cm. It's a guessing game out there ladies. I'm not even going to go into night-time forays into the water closet. Factoring in outside variables such as wind, sense of balance and singing aloud, the certainty of any urine actually staying in the toilet becomes about 23%.
Conclusion: Ladies, stop complaining about the lid. You want it up. 

When I ran a query on discussing the detrimental effects of males washing their hands, my data showed that the divorce rate in the U.S. would increase to 3/4 households. Some things are best kept secret guys.

See Gamische I

Quote: “I hope that someday we will be able to put away our fears and prejudices and just laugh at people.” - Jack Handy

Sign of genius: Latrell Sprewell, when asking for a raise in salary from 20 million to 22 million explained his reasoning saying, "I just need to feed my wife and kids."

Confession: I eat M&M's by color thus: Blue, Green, Red, Orange, Yellow, Brown.

Album I am listening to right now: Disraeli Gears by Cream.
Impression: Hendrix meets Dylan meets early Chris Martin light. 60's Brit. blues that made Clapton famous. Good for those who like the aforementioned artists and rock that is easy on the ears.
Track I am singing right now: "Your Baby Has Gone Down the Plughole."

Book I am reading right now: The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Impression: Confused. I'm 10 pages in.

Film I wish I were watching right now: Across the Universe
Impression: Beatles musical that gets better every time. Music fan? watch it.
Track I am singing right now (simultaneously with "Your Baby"): "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" off of White Album.

Cheers.

Ah yes, February of an inauguration year. That heady time when the newest president makes rousing speeches, vows never again to kiss a baby, tries to figure out where Dubai is and, finally, meets with his cabinet (I can say "his" here unless you count Laura in Battlestar Galactica as a U.S. president) to discuss how he has no idea what the hell he is doing. Fortunately, the president can always look back upon a history of executive bungling and realize that his esteemed position has been steeped in presidents who also faced the same dilemma and charted as their course of action total indolence with a dash of incompetence. Not that we are here to go through a brief, pop-culture history of the president but since we're on the topic: 

A Brief, Pop-Culture History of the Presidents
The first president of the United States was George Washington, which is convenient because his first name was the same as the king of England's and his last name was the same as the U.S. capital. After the CIA bled him to death for chopping down a cherry tree, John Adams became president and was subsequently played by Anthony Hopkins.
Thomas Jefferson was the next president and he dashed off the Declaration of Independence (and then got to vote on it), the statue of Virginia for religious freedom, founded the University of Virginia and then slept with one of his slaves, causing everyone to forget the first three items. 
The next president was Martin Van Buren, the best choice for a U.S. history quiz when you have no idea what the answer is.
Van Buren was shortly followed by Abraham Lincoln, who was so important no U.S. child up to the age of fourteen can identify a president excluding Lincoln.
Then followed a period during which John D. Rockefeller was president, but most of you reading this probably have no idea what I'm talking about.
Along came Teddy Roosevelt the rough rider. He became president because of the endless cartoon caricature possibilities he provided and he promptly spent his tenure in office shooting animals. 
The next president was Taft who was really, really fat. 
Then F.D.R. (no one actually knows his real name) ascended the throne of Washington and saved the nation by assigning everyone a nine digit number. 
The next president was John F. Kennedy. He slept with Marilyn Monroe. 
Richard Nixon became president but no one wants to admit it. 
Nixon was followed by Clinton, who slept with Monica Lewinsky. Unfortunately for him, she was not as famous as Marilyn Monroe so Clinton was impeached. 
Then Bush became president and everyone complained about him for eight years. He owns the record for the president who inspired the most bumper stickers. 
Barack Obama is the current president and, now that he is elected president, no one has any idea what he does. 

Cheers. 

I was chatting with my man Drew the other day and he said, "Paul, you give a lot of good advice, but what is the worst play you've ever made in a poker game before?" 
Now I've made a lot of bad calls and ill-advised bluffs in my time but the worst hand that I have ever played was a series of mistakes that cost me my whole stack. It went like this. 
I was playing a tournament style single table game with a flat buy-in winner-take-all and I was down to about 60% of my original chips and was the short stack at the table. According to my calculation of how many blinds I had left, however, I was still somewhere around M=14 which is no cause for panic. Action folded around to me one off the button.
I took a glance down at my cards and behold! AA! Considering my image as a loose aggressive player, I raised 3x the BB. This was probably the only good play I made this hand because I had been showing down a lot of sub-par hands that I had raised pre-flop. 
Then, to my surprise, the man on the button (a tight, conservative player) raised 3/4 of the pot! Excellent! I love action when I have aces. The blinds folded and then I made my first mistake. I re-raised 1/2 the pot. Now the re-raise was the right idea, because people know I love to put pressure on pre-flop raisers. Yet, I only had about 50% of my chips in front of me, about M=7. Also, I was out of position, another reason to get all my chips in the pot and avoid any post-flop decision-making. I know I was trying to entice a re-raise from a tight player who I knew had something, but if someone is going to make the 4th raise pre-flop he/she are also going to call your all-in. Furthermore, as the short stack I had passed up an opportunity to apply maximum pressure as a loose, aggressive player. A cardinal sin! My opponent called. 
The flop came 983 rainbow. Not so bad for someone who has AA. I bet half the pot, hoping to induce a raise from a big pair and then . . . MY OPPONENT CALLED. The alarm bells should be going off folks! A tight, conservative opponent who knows my style well and then merely calls me on a non-flushing, non-straightening flop! If this doesn't scream set I don't know what does.  
The turn: K of the 4th suit. I push all my chips (not many at all) into the middle. My opponent goes into the tank and calls after a minute with a set of 3's. I'm at 2 outs and the river is no help. Tourney over. 
Mistakes: 
1) I was short-stacked and out of position. Put all your chips in the middle early! Sure, you could say that I would have lost everything anyway when the flop made a set for my opponent, but most tight players don't call off half their stack with a low pair pre-flop. Also, there's a big difference between getting sucked out as a 4.5-1 favorite and losing your stack with 2 outs. I did the latter when I should have done the former. 
2) I did not have enough chips left to apply any pressure on the turn. A continuation bet on the flop is completely out of order when an anemic bet on the turn won't do anything. I should have gone all-in on the flop. Actually I should have gone all-in pre-flop. It takes a man to call of half his stack with a low pair that is probably a 53% favorite at best (low pair vs. 2 overcards) and a 85% dog at worst (low pair vs. big pair). Maximum pressure is best.
3) I pushed all in against a good opponent who smooth-called me on a terrible looking flop. Terrible! Even M=7 is better than M=0.
4) I went broke with a pair. The biggest mistake in NLH is playing an over-pair too hard and losing your stack. That's what I did. 
(Note: The average winning hand in NLH is two pair.)
T.J. Cloutier said, "The problem with a big pair is you either win a small pot or lose your stack." I wish I had listened to him. Overall, a terrible hand. At least I haven't made the same mistake since. 

A few years ago in the early days of my poker playing experience, my friend and poker player Matt Hayre (whose skill is undoubtedly superior to mine) brought to light a very interesting idea. One day when we were playing with some guys on our floor, Matt entered the pot with a sizable raise and everyone folded. Nothing to strange about that. Except as he was raking in the pot Matt flashed his hole cards to me (I had folded prior to his raise) and showed me he was holding 72 off-suit. Later, Matt told me "I wanted to make those 2 cards useful for something). Even I, the beginner knew that 72 off is the worst starting hand in poker! Matt had just pulled off an audacious and skillful bluff with the worst 2 starters in the game! 

Or had he?

When people are trying to read if you are bluffing, they typically look at you and try to get a "read" on the situation. Unfortunately, most people do not have a bluff tell that regularly occurs. This forces the potential caller to look at the betting patterns and see if what you have done looks like a bluff or a value bet. Which brings about one of my poker theorems (that actually belongs to Juan Carlos Mortenson and I'm sure he took it from someone):
Paul's Bluffing Rule I: Your primary goal as a bluffer is to convince someone that you are not bluffing. 
Horribly obvious! Let's follow it, however, with the more subtle corollary.
The More Subtle Corollary to Paul's Bluffing Rule I: Your best bluffs are those that make it look like you've had a legitimate hand the whole time. 
If someone checks all the way to the river then suddenly fires a 1/2 to 2/3 pot bet into the middle with an anemic board showing, I smell a bluff. Sure, the could have been slow-playing a monster, but most people don't do that all the way down to a river because a monster is no good if you only get the blinds from it. If, however, this person brings it in before the flop with a raise, performs a continuation bet after the flop, bets the turn (or checks in some cases) and then fires on the river . . . I have no idea what this person has (besides huge stones if they actually were bluffing the whole way)! Juan Carlos says that his job is to convince you he has pocket aces every hand he plays. 
"So Paul, what the hell does this have to do with a 72 off-suit and Matt's amazing bluff?"
Answer: By choosing cards that determine his bluff and not any other feature of the table or situation, Matt is randomizing his bluffs. Sure, it's highly annoying to lay down a hand better than 72 to his bluff, but since he let the cards choose the bluff, the other players have no idea how to read him. Furthermore, by raising a standard amount, he could have anything from 72 to bullets. Thus, I would not describe Matt's play as gutsy. Rather, I would say that his bluff is merely a mathematically sound raise. In fact, I myself now bluff 72 and 85 offsuit every time I get them. 
The best part is, I just told you when I bluff and you can't do anything about it. 

Today, President Obama gave a short speech in which he addressed the current issues with which he is dealing in his first few weeks of his administration. 
"The economy sucks," he stated, pausing briefly to let this news sink in with the audience. "It really, really sucks."
Obama then went on to elaborate on how the rise in prices of everything and the huge number of job layoffs are directly related to the average American being neck deep in crap. 
"Everyone is losing money right now," he posited, "except me because I just became president. Thus, our country needs to collectively advance in the direction of change and hope." 
Then, with an elegant stare, Obama offered a solution for the crisis at hand.
"Move to New Zealand," he stated. "Move to New Zealand and become a herder of sheep my Americans. The cost of living is low and there is an abundance of fresh fruit."
After his speech, the heads of CNSNews.com were asked to comment on Obama's economic policies. 
"We think Obama's plan is ridiculous," they decisively stated, "because New Zealand is pro-gay marriage."