The debate about legalization of online poker still continues in the US.

But let us take a look at the overall effect of poker prohibition so far. The ultimate goal of the US Justice Department and the UIGEA was to eliminate the money flow that went into gambling websites, with hopes of bullying them into shutting their doors to American consumers. Let us grade them.

1. Eliminating money to poker websites on the internet was a complete failure. Merely several days ago, a friend of mine tried to make an account on Epassporte and then he deposited money into it through his bank that was issued with a Visa Debit card, so that he could get money into Absolute Poker. And after fifteen minutes, he succeeded in doing this whole process, with no problems whatsoever.

2.  Bullying poker websites into shutting their doors to American players ended up being merely below average. Although they convinced Party Poker and handfuls of other smaller websites to shut their doors to American consumers, other websites such as Full Tilt, Poker Stars, Absolute Poker, Bodog and Ultimate Bet still stay open to American players. This is solid proof that legal issues that face online poker did not get much of their desired effects.

So what exactly has this ban actually accomplished?

1. They have made it difficult for people to transfer their winnings into their pockets since some taxes cannot be paid unless they are obtainable from the bank.

2. They have caused the highly reliable and respected e-wallet called Neteller to completely close down its operations in the US, giving space to tons of scam operations.

Will US Government succeed in facing the fact that a wide array of American citizens thinks that poker on the internet should not get banned and a lot of poker websites, as well as online casinos, all around the world still accept American players?