Reykjavík Grapevine - 25.09.2009, Side 30

18
the reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 15 — 2009
Veltusund 3b, v.Ingólfstorg
s: 445 4445
Shish Kebab
Falafel
Shawerma
entertainment | Poker
opinion | Drugs
Stakes Is High
Grapevine Visits The Icelandic Poker Championship
The War On Drugs, The War On You
Gambling has been a touchy subject in
Iceland over the years, especially when it
involves cards being dealt, small and big
blinds. Yet there seems to be a loophole
in the law, and thus last weekend around
200 poker players gathered at the Nordica
Hilton Hotel to compete at the Icelandic
Poker Championship. The 200 were of
course hoping to take home the title of
Iceland’s best, as well as seeing a portion
of the 6.000.000 ISK Grand Prize find its
way into their bank accounts.
The hotel’s two halls were packed
with players and you could hear vari-
ous shrieks of “YES!” or (indeed)
“NOOOOH!” sounding from the tables,
as players either saw their stacks grow
higher or—as the game is apt to go for
most—smaller and smaller. Tensions
were high and so was the temperature;
the rooms got hotter and hotter with ev-
ery passing hour of play. Fourteen hours
later, at two in the morning, only thirty
players had any chips in front of them,
advancing to the second day of play.
The tournament saw its share of Ice-
landic celebrities (or what counts as celeb-
rity in Iceland) putting chips into the pot
and contributing to the cash prize. Olym-
pic silver medallist Sigfús Sigurðsson
could not repeat his 2008 Beijing success,
going out on the first day. TV comedian
Auðunn Blöndal made through the cut to
day two, only to be eventually taken out
by the would-be champion, much to his
dislike.
23 hours of poker
On day two, the poker playing com-
menced at noon with thirty players
competing for a seat at the final table.
It appeared as if most of the players had
managed to get some sleep, although the
game was on the slow side in the begin-
ning. Fortunately, their play picked up
and some five hours later only nine re-
mained to earn a seat at the final table.
The atmosphere was thick with tension,
and it didn’t take long until players were
going all in, before leaving the table—all
out.
After 23 hours of poker, it was Axel
Einarsson who wound up as the last man
standing, beating Matthías Vilhjálms-
son’s hand with a pair of Queens over
Axel’s suited Joker, Eight of hearts, taking
home a cool 1.5 million ISK. Vilhjálms-
son did not leave empty handed, his sec-
ond place warranting a little over a mil-
lion ISK. In third came Logi Unnarsson
Jónsson, with 700.000 ISK.
So it would seem like tournament
poker is here to stay in Iceland, as the
police left the event alone, and next year’s
event is already in the planning stages.
Short and to the point is the
word. Here is some com-
mon sense: With an eco-
nomic deathblow being dealt
to a crumbling country, keeping assets
in the country is paramount. Bearing
that in mind, I contend that a police force
stretched severely thin is better spent on
pressing matters of actual socially detri-
mental crime rather than non-issues like
domestic cannabis growing.
Marijuana, having now thankfully
evolved from an import to a self-sufficient
homegrown market, harms only the user,
not your average taxpayer. The herb is
neither lethal nor conducive to violence or
crime. All it fosters is a lack of ambition,
giggling fits and a mellow, creative high.
And some mad munchies.
According to news reports, 800 kilos
of raw material have been seized in a se-
ries of overachieving police raids. This
equals perhaps half a ton of end product
at a street value of over 2.250.000 ISK,
roughly, according to ridiculously in-
flated post raid prices. With the keeling
currency and the re-emergence of smug-
gling, a conservative estimate of a mark
up doubling wholesale to street price,
for that huge batch, we’re looking at a
shipping out of 1.125.000 ISK in sorely
needed currency to countries such as
Denmark, the Netherlands and Morocco.
The crux, however, is that the more
weed seized, the more local demand is
exposed, and with ever added exposure
of want, the need for de-criminalization
is laid bare. With a populist force of de-
mand, although not yet fully emerging to
speak their mind from out of the shroud
of taboo, an outburst of indignation will
at some point erupt as a response to
ceaseless bullying by the narrow-minded
forces that be. And when the people will
take no more, the police know from bitter
experience, law and order will be crushed
under the heel of the masses.
Currently, 240 convicts are waiting
to serve their term within the seriously
over crowded Icelandic prison system,
most of whom are guilty of crimes worse
then herbiculture. Locking industrious
green-fingered gentlemen up seems like
a mindless police crusade, engineered to
regain respect for a law keeping institu-
tion much maligned during the last year.
Politics are naught but a hunt to ful-
fil the populist stated wants and needs,
yet this is not reflective of its true inner
opinion. They will never admit defeat in
the war on drugs. A war on drugs is, how-
ever, only a war on the human condition,
and the human condition cannot be van-
quished.
Hence many man-hours, endless tax
payer money and column upon column
of newsprint is wasted on chasing man-
kind’s very own tail. Whatever one’s poi-
son, an addict as well as the casual user
will fill his or her need no matter the
price, making any preventive measures
but an added hurdle, conducive to crime
within the sphere of harder substances,
rather than a social benefit.
Complete legalisation is therefore the
only way and the benefits are both social
and medicinal as well, regarding quality
of life for thousands of casual users. This
far outweighs any claims of increased
abuse, claims that bear no proof by statis-
tics from de-criminalized countries, and
which, if they did, the policing expendi-
tures saved along with the added income
from taxation would no doubt comfort-
ably finance any additional need for reha-
bilitation.
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