Never before has the Poker Player Alliance been growing at the rate that it has for the last four month. 2007 has thus far been a phenomenal year for the growth of the largest organized group of online poker players who are now coming up on their 500,000th member. And although there is no celebration of special award planned for the moment that 500K members are on the books, the PPA should be celebrating the fact that in their numbers is the power to make some serious lobbying effort to legalize online gambling in the U.S.

This is precisely what the PPA has been doing for the last few years. With the current times being a "moment of truth", if you will, lobbying effort are now being heavily backed with what matters the most - Big Money. In 2006, the PPA spent twice as much money in direct lobbying efforts than in 2005. Putting $560,000 toward lobbying activities in 2006, the PPA has the numbers to compete with the casino gambling industry's heavy hitters like the MGM Mirage, who spent over $850,000 in lobbying campaigns over the course of 2006.

It is a given that with their increase in membership and the online gambling legislative timetables at hand, the PPA is dealing out more money than they were at the same time in 2006. There is something also to be said for the PPA's new Chairman of the Board - former Senator, Alfonse D'Amato, who obviously has the inside connection needed to give the PPA a strong footing in the U.S. politics. Not nearly as contingent will the success of the PPA's lobbying efforts be on their numbers as will be on the degree of activism that its members take to express their outrage of being denied the right to play online poker.

Being that the PPA is specifically geared toward poker playing and not online casino gambling, the association's current strategy is tu use the angle that poker is not the same as traditional casino gaming, which has essentially amounted to lobbying for a carve out from the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. Considering that the horse racing and fantasy sports betting industry's already are the benefactors of carve outs, the chances of the online poker industry getting the same are not entirely bad. However, those particular carve outs run deep in political mire - just ask Bill Frist and John Kyl.

Hopefully, the PPA is directing more of their energy to help push legislation authored by Congressman Barney Frank and so-sponsored by other influential members of Congress that would give individual state's the right to regulate all forms of internet betting, including online casino gambling. And hopefully, individual members of the PPA will make their voices heard to their respective politicians, which will have a great deal of influence on the PPA's grassroots effort to legalize online gambling in the U.S.