AP Blackjack Is Over

[Overkill]

There is only one basic rule that leads to success in the game of advantage - always strive to be on top. Everything else is particular.

If I understand "strive" correctly, "all bets are off" when it comes to morality, etc.? This of course is a problem.

My opinion: if you have already got involved in this "business" of dirty money, the sooner you realize that everything is good here, the more chances you have to "be on top"

No, everything is not good here. And now I think I understand your perspective better: there is no part of your behavior that you deem morally redeemable? It doesn't have to be dirty money. **In my view, the key is dishonesty, or, what I have heard it defined as, "intent to deceive."** Suppose I am driving to work and am going to be 10 minutes late because I didn't leave myself enough time. Along the way to work, I encounter a traffic jam, which makes me 10 minutes later than I would have been without the traffic jam. So, without the traffic jam, I would still have been 10 minutes late, but with the traffic jam, I am now 20 minutes late. The boss says, "Why were you late?" If I only say "traffic jam," that is dishonest, because it is only partly the truth and intended to conceal that I would have been late anyway.

And regarding what another poster wrote about what others think: It's not that I care about what others think of me, it's about caring what I think of me. At least partially as a result of 12-step recovery work, I have adopted what some would call a fairly rigid code of honesty. While still in active addiction, I once considered robbing a pizza delivery person of their pizza!! I also stole from the University of Florida bookstore (and a few years later went back and 'made amends' by reimbursing them). I had/have been taught in recovery that I might 'slip' back into my old, destructive ways if I crack the door open to dishonesty. Indeed, the spiritual principle behind Step One is honesty, "rigorous honesty." Some of you will recognize this lingo.

I once had a pit personnel asked me how I did so well one night. (Looking back on it, I think my win was more due to luck than skill/advantage.). I told him that I play at home and learn on the internet, or something to that effect. (It was honest, but, truth be told, I did not go into detail about what I thought was responsible for my win, which was my mistaken perception that I had an advantage through XYZ. I believed this to be 'honest enough.').

As I write this, I see more and more how the line between 'right' and 'wrong' with respect to certain scenarios is gray in this area. At the risk of folks judging me as some kind of honesty maniac and throwing out my entire argument "along with the bathwater," I do not even feel comfortable with, for example, ratholing chips. It feels, and is, slippery; I am trying to blatantly, tangibly, deceive the casino's assessment of my current financial standing. Is it my money? Yes. Do they have a right to know how much I have in chips? Yes. If I can't agree to these two questions, I should not agree to play at their casino.

Last but not least is the old "yeah, but they do it too" argument, which is WRONG. Just because someone wrongs me does not allow me to wrong them. This is something we learn in kindergarten in response to our proclamation "Yeah, but he hit me first." "Don't repay evil with evil" is indeed biblical and is a very important mantra because without it, it's 'game on' in terms of immorality. Just because I consider the casino crooked or dishonest or whatever does not, according to me, permit me to treat them the same. Again, the buck can stop with me. If I think the casino is crooked, then I don't need to be there. I can legally fight them. But stooping down to their level is unacceptable because it hurts them and hurts me. It's a lose-lose and does nothing to contribute to a solution toward 'justice.'

Since I consider the very fact of beating people for money against them as a voluntarily dishonest act towards them,

I disagree with this statement as it is written. If one is of "sound mind" (and not, for example, a street junkie whom I can easily and honestly beat at his street game but in so doing would take his last dollar), I can do a lot of preparation and hard work to arm myself with skills necessary to beat them. They are putting themselves in a position to lose their money, so I don't take responsibility for them. My responsibility lies with being able to walk out the door knowing that I can look my granddaughter (I don't have grandkids yet, unless you count a St. Bernard or a Dachshund) in the eye and tell her how I won the money.

So, I believe one can have integrity and be very honest and still be an advantage player.

The above is admittedly not easy, and I am not perfect. But it is what separates "the men from the boys, the women from the girls" and is the kind of thing your kids will remember about you after you are gone.