For years, I've done various charity fundraisers for lots of different causes. The most well-known and most successful have been the breast cancer marathons and walks my wife and I have done (closing in on 100K so far!) but I've also done my share of charity auctions and celebrity bingo events.

Recently, charity poker tournaments have begun to sweep the nation with a speed and fury not seen since the phrase "Baby fishmouth" caught fire over a wagon wheel table so many years ago. In the aftermath of Katrina, I hosted some charity tourneys at PokerStars, and a bunch of people came together to help raise over 120K for the American Red Cross, Phil Gordon has done some "put a bad beat on cancer" tourneys at Full Tilt, and there have been a few fundraisers for WPBT folks, too. Of course, not everything has been as awesome as turning a flush and continuing to get action from the guy who is chasing his non-nut straight. Last year, a group of anti-gambling whackos left Colorado and went all the way to Texas to stop a charity tourney, and it put a halt to charity tourneys all over the place.

However, poker players and charitable folks are resourceful, and charity tourneys continue to raise lots of money for lots of worthy causes, while giving people a chance to play a game that we all love. Yeah, it's been all kittens and bows, until some jerks recently held up a charity poker game in a Long Island VFW hall, and jacked around $50,000 from the players. The bandits also stole wallets and cell phones from the players, and in the linked article at Newsday, you can read the most heinous crime of all: quoting "The Gambler."