Blackhole's persistence got me thinking about credibility and all that.

So I was sitting here, thinking about the Guys and Dolls lines regarding the Jack of Spades spitting cider in one's ear, and I began wondering about the inestimable MDawg's challenge regarding his casino won/loss statements.

Now I realize the challenge is silly on the face of it, because he could play at 30 casinos and choose which won/loss statements he shows anyone, but I decided to look up why the won/loss statements are not considered good enough for the IRS.

I checked a tax law site and read, "the 'disclaimer' language states that the information contained in the casino won/loss statement is not reliable or accurate."

Well, that means nobody providing won/loss statements to a player is on the hook for them being accurate in any way. There's no regs or laws regarding that. Huh, well that is wild. That opens all kinds of faux won/loss statement opportunities.

And it also turns out that the IRS "does not regulate the format or time of delivery of won/loss statements." So if, say, a big player wanted his statements provided particular times and not provided particular times depending on casino and results, he could undoubtedly negotiate that. So he could honestly report that he hadn't gotten statements from Casinos A, B, and C and had from D, E, and F by, say, January or March or July.

So anyone trying to set up wagers regarding their casino won/loss statements could very well be running a pure financial scam, a la the strudel vs. cheesecake wager in Guys and Dolls.

Probably a real bad thing for a site owner to allow those kinds of "challenges" on his site, I would say. Reeks of a financial scam.