David Mckee's Stiffs & Georges - Current

Moving Day Has Arrived.

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:31:00 -0700

This is the last entry on the old blog system.

Please alter your book marks to reflect the new WordPress site:

dmckee.lvablog.com

On the move

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:02:00 -0700

This will be the last S&G posting before we relaunch our new format. In the immortal words of Lt. Col. Jack O'Neill, "Well, I suppose now is the time for me to say something profound. [pause] Nothing comes to mind."

See you over at WordPress.

Ya think?

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 16:10:00 -0700

From the latest news bulletin "blasted" by the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

"Las Vegas police are investigating a shooting on Sahara Avenue near Nellis Boulevard in which a man was struck in the head by gunfire today.

"Police spokesman Ramon Denby said the man appeared to be seriously injured."

No kidding.

Quote of the Day

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:02:00 -0700

"If C.C. Sabathia starts game one of the World Series, the Yankees will know they have won tonight." -- Fox Sports baseball analyst Tim McCarver, sinking to bathyspheric depths of belaboring the obvious, early in Sunday's game six of the ALCS. (The Yankees won and it probably won't take until Wednesday night for them to realize it.)

Adieu F-bleau, hello Hollywood?

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:37:00 -0700

Look what just fell into the S&G mailbag:

Beginning January 1, 2010 Penn National Gaming will partner with RPM Advertising to develop and execute a brand identity for Hollywood Casinos. The full service assignment will incorporate research, brand development, media planning/buying, creative execution, production services and direct marketing. Penn National, one of the top five gaming companies in the world, owns and operates seven Hollywood Casinos across the country including facilities in Aurora, IL; Bangor, ME; Baton Rouge, LA; Grantville, PA; Lawrenceburg, IN; Bay St. Louis MS; and Tunica, MS.

Forgive me if I have a coughing spasm after reading Penn National describe itself as "one of the top five gaming companies in the world." I suppose it would depend on your definition of "top" (number of facilities and/or employees, market cap, etc.) but in an industry that contains MGM Mirage, Harrah's Entertainment, Wynn Resorts, Las Vegas Sands, Boyd Gaming, Station Casinos and even woebegone Trump Entertainment Resorts, the best Penn could hope for in terms of name recognition would be eighth place. (Enter RPM, stage right.)

As for the marketing alliance, given the timing of the belated decision to try and unify the brand, it looks like Penn is going to attempt a Harrah's in reverse: acquire a Strip property (Fontainebleau) and then create a company-wide brand-loyalty program to incentivize customers to visit its shiny new megaresort.

Sounds a bit cart-before-horse to me but, after today's bulletin, it's no stretch of the imagination to suggest that F-bleau could soon become Hollywood Las Vegas or some close variant thereof. At least in terms of brand equity, it would represent a step or two up from F'bleau, whose name recognition factor is now entirely negative.

Green shoot? Weekday room rates for early December at Vdara have nudged upward to $145/night (from $129) according to J.P. Morgan analysts.

What's wrong with this picture? The media night for Wayne Newton's new Tropicana show, Once Before I Go (could we have that in writing?) looks more like a Dancing with the Stars tour stop. In addition to former contestants Sabrina Bryan and Jennie Garth, four DWTS regulars -- including Cheryl Burke and Kym "Tina Sparkle" Johnson -- will be on hand.

Except for Ms. Johnson, who's presumably in town to rehearse current partner Donny Osmond, the quartet is available because they've all been eliminated. (For instance, Alec Mazo helped Olympic swimmer Natalie Coughlin dance her way to a premature exit.)

Trouble is, they'll be in the audience and the Wayner will be onstage. Wouldn't you prefer the reverse proposition? And since Newton is strictly a short-term proposition for the Trop (six months and out), would it be too much to hope for a Vegas offshoot of DWTS as his successor?

Quote of the Day

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 22:06:00 -0700

Moral: A posh accent may make you sound smart but does not confer actual knowledge upon you.

Quote of the Day

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 17:46:00 -0700

"Steve Wynn was the worst offender on that score. Last year, he used his aircraft for a $1 million of personal travel, which Wynn [Resorts] shareholders paid for. To do $1 million worth of travel, I worked it out that you’d have to fly to Hawaii and back every week for a year to rack that kind of a cost up." -- investor activist Eric Jackson, founder of Ironfire Capital, on the subject excessive perks in the casino industry.

Programming notes

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 17:15:00 -0700

The time has come, the walrus said, to switch over to WordPress, so regularly scheduled S&G mirth and merriment will be temporarily suspended whilst we learn the new setup. My apologies for the temporary lack of service.

Secondly, thanks to those of you who have been e-mailing Question of the Day suggestions. However ...
... the keeper of the QoDs, Webmistress Jessica, requests that you fine ladies and gentlemen use the regular question-submission form (found here) rather than employing S&G as a back channel. I apologize if this causes any inconvenience or hard feelings, but that's the word from upstairs.

Well, actually, it's from downstairs -- but you know what I mean. Anyway, I'd like to keep the people who sign my paychecks happy, so I'd be much obliged if you'd do as the lady requests. Are we OK?

Quote of the Day

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:52:00 -0700

"For some people, just being a woman is a pre-existing condition." -- Dr. Nancy Snyderman on the subject of HMOs and their propensity to cover Viagra ... but not in-vitro fertilization or birth control pills.

Quote of the Day

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 17:28:00 -0700

Penn National Gaming "has not lost its senses and, [contends] that at the right price and through the right vehicle (and only with a sizable strategic partner who would bring something special to the project, presumably some hotel experience), its involvement in Fountainebleau could make sense.” -- quote from Penn's 3Q09 earnings report, according to J.P. Morgan analyst Joseph Greff. This is the first we're hearing about joint-venture F-bleau partners, though.

Comrade Spam strikes again

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 14:03:00 -0700

I'm buried deep in other projects this week but I wanted to surface long enough to apologize for the recent barrage of spam in our "Comments" threads and e-mail alerts. Judging by some of the URLs involved, it looks like our old nemesis Comrade Spam is back and the Russkie bastard has learned some new tricks. Since he's figured out how to mask his IP address, it may be awhile before we figure out how to block him, but we'll work on it, I promise you that.

Also, at some point S&G will switch to WordPress (which just busted out a new mobile format). That will mean a new look and format (including extra bells and whistles). I'll let you know as soon as we have a firm launch date.

MGM: CityCenter worth $4.88 billion

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:37:00 -0700

MGM Mirage has announced that it's writing off approximately $1.3 billion (i.e., taking an "impairment charge") against CityCenter, with $348 million of that chalked up to falling real estate values. (Some $174 million of that will apparently be fobbed off on MGM's partners, bringing MGM's writeoff down to $1.1 billion.) The value of MGM's half-share of the project has been restated at $2.44 billion (a 31% decline). No word yet from Dubai World as to what it thinks its half of CityCenter is worth.

Kirk Kerkorian's Tracinda Corp. shook a rhetorical fist at Wall Street, stating in a press release that there is "substantial unrecognized value in MGM and CityCenter that is not reflected in the market value of MGM’s stock." It's nice to know that even mega-corporations can feel underappreciated.

Bottoming out? Air traffic into and out of Las Vegas was almost flat, year over year, -1.2% in September, helped by passenger-load increases -- and I don't mean those hefty people who take up two seats -- on nearly every domestic carrier not named US Airways (-26%). Considering that international traffic was -21%, this is augurs well for a return of domestic consumer confidence in Sin City. And, yes, flat is the new "up."

Pennsylvania: Rendell intervenes. Never accuse the Keystone State Lege of acting in haste. The table games bill is still mired in conference committe, prompting Gov. Ed Rendell (D) to wade into the fray. Rendell's magic number for the amount of revenue table games must yield in fees and taxes is $200 million. To get there, the guv believes the tax rate must be 16%. But he's closer to the GOP position, warning that the higher levies favored by Dems would "kill the golden goose" and deprive Little Johnny's school of needed funding. Meanwhile, Rivers Casino continues to disappoint, with the lowest revenue-per-slot in the state.

Finally, a taker! Out of left field, a contender has emerged for the orphaned casino license in Cherokee and Crawford counties in Kansas. You'll recall that it was awarded to Penn National Gaming, seemingly ages ago, but Penn -- spooked by nearby tribal competition -- all but spat on the license before leaving in a huff.

Enter Ozark Trail Gaming, a consortium of Kansas businessmen, offering to build a $225 million, 900-slot, 30-table casino. After some bad experiences with carpetbagger casino developers trying to dictate terms to the Sunflower State, you have to think the Kansas Lottery Board will look kindly upon this native-son effort.

ColSux loses again. A $41.5 million summary judgment has been slapped on Columbia Sussex for abrogating its purchase of the President riverboat in St. Louis (now the property of ColSux arch-foe Pinnacle Entertainment). Regulators for Missouri didn't like the looks of ColSux and its CEO, William J. Yung III (above). The latter pulled his license application and used that as an excuse to void the President purchase, but a federal district judge wasn't buying it.

The former President owners were also suing ColSux for jacking up parking rates for casino patrons by 560% (no, that is not a typo), a truly Yungian move. If poetic justice were served in this case, the court would award the ship to ColSux. Since the President's days on the water are numbered and Yung will licensed in Missouri only in his wildest dreams, trying to dispose of that near-worthless asset might be the aptest punishment of all.

Ohio slots slip sliding away?

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:21:00 -0700

A sample conducted by the tag team of TruthPac and Strategic Polling finds support for the Ohio casino initiative backed by Penn National Gaming polling below 50%. Casinos still have a slight edge (48%/43%, with 8% undecided) ... so in theory the ballot measure should squeak through, so long as the undecideds split down the middle.

If, however, "likely voters" means so-called "values voters," then Issue 3 could be in serious trouble. Only 30% of Democrats polled were against putting casinos in Toledo, Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland -- but 58% of Republicans gave it the thumbs-down. It should be noted, though, that a Dayton Daily News poll released three weeks ago had Issue 3 winning in a 59%/38% wipeout.

From the mailbag: An East Coast reader writes, "I live in Washington, D.C. Only a tiny 1%-2% of the D.C. television market is in West Virginia, yet I'm surprised to be seeing several TV ads to legalize table games in Charlestown, West Virginia -- home of a racino (I've never been there). I hadn't even known that was on the ballot. Anyway, if they are buying D.C. TV for a Jefferson County, W.V. issue, they sure are spending boatloads of money -- not too surprising, I guess."

Well, this did come as a bit of a surprise to me ... but it makes sense in retrospect. Not in terms of influencing votes: However, with table games an inevitability in Pennsylvania, a push for casinos in Ohio, slot parlors (slowly) ramping up in Maryland, etc., the advertising blitz is probably a means of preparing ground for after the election. Should table games be voted in, D.C.-area gamblers will know Charlestown has them and may think twice about driving to Pennsylvania and points northeast.

A deal @ Vdara

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 11:32:00 -0700

Just as I said, CityCenter is becoming the mid-market epicenter of Las Vegas. Today's mailbag yielded a $129/night offer for Vdara, plus $50 in amenity credits -- more evidence of the downward pressure CityCenter is exerting on the Strip. But anything that means greater affordability for John Q. Public is A-OK with S&G. Besides, having bunched as much as 85% of the new room product at the upper end of the market, companies like MGM Mirage were bound to have this come-to-Jesus moment sooner rather than later.

Only in Nevada

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 18:17:00 -0700

To end the week on a note of levity: For the second time this year, both Gov. Jim Gibbons and Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki got it into their heads to be out of state simultaneously. (One senses that they don't consult each other about scheduling or much of anything else.) Which means that -- also for the second time this year -- the Silver State was briefly helmed by state Senate President Pro Tempore Mike Schneider. Let's just say that, given this opportunity, Acting Gov. Schneider didn't let it go to waste.

Elsewhere in the Silly File, we find New York-New York holding auditions for a spokesman. They're being politically correct and saying "spokesperson," but considering that aforesaid person is going to be dubbed Vinny "The Man," I have a faint suspicion that members of the gentler sex aren't going to be in the running. The winning candidate must "have the most New York swagger" and be adept at gluttony: Winning a hot dog-eating contest is a prerequisite for would-be Vinnys.

I love New York. Seriously, Manhattan is my favorite place on Earth. (However, it is a poor vantage point from which to write about the casino biz.) Which is why I think promoting its Vegas knockoff through the persona of a dese-dem-dose palooka is a notion so creaky and archaic it needs a walker. Not for nothing has a colleague already dubbed this "the dumbest promotion of the year." I concur.

Jim Murren to the rescue. The CEO of MGM Mirage is going to bat for Sen. Harry Reid. The latter's got the casino moguls (Sheldon Adelson, excepted) in his corner, if nothing else.

Quote of the Day

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:32:00 -0700

"I predict a rough winter for Vegas. Swine flu may not be a pandemic, but it may really mess with the casino business. It could make the economic downturn look mild." -- a locally based casino-industry expert, in an e-mail to LVA.

Aria drives prices ... down

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 16:23:00 -0700

Contrary to repeated assertions by J.P. Morgan, it would appear that MGM Mirage is putting out promotional specials for Bellagio ... and very aggressively so. Note however, that Steve Wynn's masterpiece is maintaining its price point and Aria is the one having to come down to meet it.

Also, an unscientific survey of mid-week rates parallel to Aria's opening shows that what the CityCenter flagship is doing is sucking the air out of the rest of the Strip, especially other MGM properties. Even Wynn Las Vegas is down to $159/night that week (quotes were predicated on a three-night stay).

The absolute bargain was Downtown's Golden Gate ($12.71) and unless you count Hooters and fellow bottom-feeder Wild Wild West, the lowest on-Strip price was $21.21 at MGM's Circus Circus. The Sahara ($22.40) and Imperial Palace ($25) were close behind. They were ever-so-slightly outpriced by the Riviera ($27) and Tropicana ($29.33).

As for other properties in the lion's den: Excalibur ($31), Luxor ($48.37), New York-New York ($50), Monte Carlo ($58.62), the Green Monster (aka MGM Grand, $70), Mandalay Bay ($72.55), The Mirage ($76.50), THEhotel ($93.29), Vdara ($109) ... with only the Green Monster's Sky Lofts ($600) outpricing Aria.

So, MGM, are you sure this oligopoly business model is the way you want to go? I'm just askin'.

<crickets>

Great O'Day in the morning

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:15:00 -0700

Peepshow star/trainwreck-in-progress Aubrey O'Day likes to speak her mind, for whatever it's worth. Evidently the recklessly candid utterances of Ms. O'Day were worth not one, not two but, yes, three dispatches by Richard Abowitz.

The fascination is understandable, given an interview subject who readily owns up to being unhappy and describes her demi-celebrity as "fame-ish-ness." O'Day's costar, Holly Madison may have been dubbed "Queen of Vegas" but when Las Vegas Weekly tried to wrest similar prose mileage out of her, the result was better than Sominex. Strangely, I find myself rooting for the id-on-the-loose that is O'Day to go the distance here in Vegas.

A Bronx Tale. Kudos to Sheldon Adelson for rolling the dice on Chazz Palminteri's virtuosic one-man show, whose run has been extended for another week. Yours truly finds it a rather warm-and-cuddly depiction of Mob life but both Mike Weatherford and Joe Brown express nearly unmitigated enthusiasm. Whichever way you slice it, it's still three thumbs up for Palminteri.

Wynn still happy. If the Chinese government's aim in applying further curbs to Macao is to "tamp ... down" the Cotai Strip™, where Sheldon Adelson™ aims to build "Asia's Las Vegas™" no wonder Steve Wynn is a happy camper. Anything that handcuffs main rivals Las Vegas Sands and Stanley Ho is good news at Wynn HQ, especially with Encore Macau coming on line soon. How boring life would become if Wynn and Adelson ever suspended their running verbal gunfight.

Signs of the Times

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:08:00 -0700

In less than an hour, Steve Wynn is going to make an extra-special, triple-secret, top-hush "entertainment announcement" via a Wynn Resorts Web-cast. Don't tell anyone but ... he's going to reveal that Garth Brooks will be playing Encore.

Which we know partly because it's been the worst-kept secret on the Strip and even more so because it was announced today in Nashville at 7 a.m. Vegas time. But we're all s'posed to pretend that we didn't hear anything and it's all going to be a big-ass surprise and whatnot. Yeah, that's the ticket.

This underscores how ill-tuned the casino industry is to the news business -- and furthermore, how it still hasn't made the adjustment to the global village of online media. People like Wynn (or Jenn Michaels over at MGM Mirage) continue to operate as though the daily newspaper were the only game in town and people's primary source of information.

Sorry, but what happens in Nashville no longer stays in Nashville until the next news cycle. It makes it to Vegas in the blink of a Tweet.

Vintage Vegas/Matt Goss. Both are reviewed by Richard Abowitz, who makes a number of thoughtful observations re lounge acts in general. He's a bit lenient on both Zowie Bowie and the Gossmeister, IMO. Vintage Vegas is so bad you'll want to see it so you can talk about it at parties. Goss is just bad and in a very uninteresting way. If a yawn could wear a white suit, it'd be Matt Goss.

Quote of the Day

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 11:38:00 -0700

"In a lot of places along the coast it looks like the hurricane hit yesterday." -- NBC reporter Charles Hadlock, reporting today on the condition of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, four and a half years after Hurricane Katrina.

Signs of the Times

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:50:00 -0700

Snapping away last night at the 10th anniversary performance of Fantasy, which introduced new cast member Angelica Bridges: a slew of credentialed photographers, wiedling professional-grade equipment ... and Robin Leach, taking pictures with his cell-phone camera. That's right: a fucking Cell.Phone.Camera.

To this the profession of photojournalism has come? Pathetic.

Macao giveth, Macao taketh away

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:41:00 -0700

Casino operators in Macao better make the most of the recent relaxation of visa quotas into the enclave. What the government gives with one hand, it partly reclaims with the other. Casino expansion remains out of the question and the minimum age for gambling would go up to 21, from 18, under a bill draft soon to be put forward. (Steve Wynn can afford to be sanguine, as it's far more likely to impact his mass-market-oriented competitors. Investors didn't share his enthusiasm.)

If Wynn -- who continues to toe the Peking party line -- comes out a winner, facing negligible "obstacables," Lawrence Ho is the presumptive loser. As best S&G can ascertain, the curtailment of gambling in residential areas is aimed at his Mocha slot routes, one of the younger Ho's bread-and-butter enterprises.

Another proposal awaiting action by the Macanese Lege would cap table-game inventory. Writes J.P. Morgan analyst Joseph Greff, "we believe the Macau government believes the timing is right to implement these initiatives given the completion of the commission cap rule and the resumption of growth in the industry ... if the number of tables will be limited to 1,000 per operator, [Las Vegas Sands] may need to modify its future expansion plans, as it is already over the limit, while SJM will need to close down some of the older tables operated by the third parties, as it too is already over the limit."

None of this appears to bode especially well for Sands' long-in-coming IPO, although it remains to be seen whether this is a bonafide legislative agenda or simply a warning to inhibit growth. The news, however, managed to cast a pall over Sheldon Adelson's planned resumption of his Cotai Strip™. Also, it's not as though the Macanese government and its casino-owning subjects don't have to worry about an upsurge in gambling back on the Mainland.

Detroit, briefly. The depression continues to eat into Detroit's casino revenues, -2% last month. Despite a -6.5% drop, MGM Grand Detroit remains the big cat, grossing $42 million. Second place is up for grabs, though, as MotorCity continues to fall back (-7%) toward upstart Greektown (+12%), which is closing the gap, grossing $28.5 million against $33.5 million for MotorCity.

Hope for Boardwalk?

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 16:08:00 -0700

As you know, S&G puts more stock in year/year comparisons than sequential ones, but the most recent set from Atlantic City affords a slender reed of hope. With the help of tighter slots, A.C. held its September decline to 6%, the lowest of 2009 and the smallest drop in over a year. Even perpetual dog Resorts International had a good month, up 4% y/y.

Both in dollar volume ($63 million) and growth (6%), the leader was -- no surprise -- Borgata. In fact, the Boyd Gaming property made more than the four lowest-grossing properties (Resorts, Atlantic City Hilton, Trump Plaza, Trump Marina) combined. The two lesser Trump properties slipped below the Colony Capital ones, so one doesn't know whether to feel good for Colony or sorry for Trump Entertainment Resorts. The handover of Resorts Int'l continues to proceed slowly, as regulators enter uncharted waters with understandable caution.

Percentage-wise, Showboat, the Hilton and the Plaza had the worst of it, while gainers included Harrah's Atlantic City (3%) and even the Tropicana (1%). But the bloom is off the Trump Taj Mahal rose; it fell back to the middle of the pack, grossing $36 million.

One unexpected factor in the city's bump was a late-September, gay-themed promotion at the four Harrah's Entertainment properties. For all the lip service paid, year after year, to diversifying Atlantic City's appeal, Don Marrandino and his Harrah's colleagues backed up the talk with meaningful action.

Dead casino walking: Trump Marina

Back at Trump, its CEO, Mark Juliano declares "The real question is how long until we get back to the results we saw in past years, which is the question everyone in every business has." No, the real question is: On what planet is Mr. Juliano living? And: Do they have oxygen up there?

The math is inexorable. Excluding three months of sub-2% growth, Atlantic City's revenues have going one way -- down -- for the last seven quarters, often by double-digit margins. Casinos in Pennsylvania continue to ramp up, Delaware is talking very seriously about casino expansion, slot parlors in Maryland are in train and then there's prospect of additional competition from the greater New York City area.

Instead of asking "Where are the snows of yesteryear," S&G modestly suggests the Boardwalk's casino braintrust ought to be thinking about how to move forward into a future of diminished (i.e., more realistic) expectations.

Up the road, now that the novelty factor has worn off of Sands Bethlehem (above), the $724 million casino remains mired in fifth place. The solution? More and bigger promotions, it would appear. Judging by the lukewarm response to Sands and to Rivers Casino, the Pennsylvania market isn't big enough to support casinos built with Vegas-sized budgets.

Quote of the Day

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 12:05:00 -0700

“Chickens gained valuable rights in California on the same day that gay men and lesbians lost them.” -- Ronald M. George, chief justice of the California Supreme Court, on the caprices of the state's initiative-and-referendum system. A ballot measure regulating chicken coops was passed in the same election cycle that saw Proposition 8 overturned.

Leaving Las Vegas

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 18:17:00 -0700

At least 28,000 have done so over the two years-plus (probably more when you allow for the people still moving here). What are the likely consequences of Las Vegas' pegging its future on a one-trick economy? And is it going to be like one of those Rust Belt cities (like Pittsburgh) that turned it around or one of those (say, Detroit) that continues to decline?

Those questions and others are posed in a splendid article that connects most of the dots regarding Vegas' economic plight. One of the most disturbing points raised by Las Vegas Sun reporter J. Patrick Coolican is that cities doing well at present tend to be ones that possessed robust institutions of higher learning -- and invested in them. Neither can be said of Nevada's dismal education system, the recipient of savage budgets, thanks to our governor and the ever-feckless Lege.

If Las Vegas' future hinges on well-funded and -respected academic institutions, then the near-term prognosis is grim.

Speaking of Detroit, casino owners and politicians there may be casting a wary eye on rising pro-casino sentiment in Ohio. In whichever form casino gambling is legalized by Buckeye State voters, it stands to take a big bite out of Motown casino receipts -- and sap state and local revenue collection, too. A helpful Detroit News map shows precisely which Detroit, Indiana, Pennsylvania and West Virginia casino operators have reason to be fretful about the emergence of a casino industry next door.

Like their Strip brethren, tribal powerhouses Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods Resort Casino went all-in ... into debt, that is. Now that it's time to pay the piper, they find themselves in binds comparable to those facing non-tribal casinos. However, they have fewer options for relief, as they discover the downside of being a tribal operation.

Dog's breakfast at Tiffany's. Few readers of this column can probably afford to buy anything at the Tiffany mega-boutique that will be part of the Crystals mall at CityCenter. However, it will make for some lovely window-shopping. (Click on the pictures to see them in a larger size.)

Atlantic City reprieve. Although New Jersey's three-way gubernatorial race is up for grabs, casino owners can take one consolation. Whichever of the two leading candidates is elected, continued opposition to racinos is promised.

More Mariah @ The Palms

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 15:45:00 -0700

Since the last S&G upload of Mariah Carey performance footage from The Palms drew an above-average number of page views, here's a sequel. Carey presides with great charm over an onstage marriage proposal during last Saturday's show. There's also a nice bit of va-va-voom 92 seconds into the clip.

Good times ahead?

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 14:58:00 -0700

New Yorker economic columnist James Surowiecki puts current consumer-spending strends in perspective -- and what he finds should gladden the hearts of casino owners. Basically, he finds historical evidence the current tendency toward thriftiness will soon pass. Of course, when Americans' savings rate (now 6%) dipped below 0%, that should have been a canary-in-the-coal-mine moment for heedlessly expansionist gaming moguls. But they'd probably laid off the canary in order to "maximize shareholder value."

If wishing made it so ...

... Chicago would have had a casino a long time ago. Some city parents think they've found the perfect site, but it's still a long shot. Just keep it out of the Loop, OK? Seriously, downtown Chicago is looking livelier than it has in a while and doesn't need a big-ass casino plunked in its midst. The likelihood that it would be Windy City version of, say, a classy anomaly like MGM Grand Detroit is pretty remote.

So much for speculation that Australian casino magnate James Packer would get into the running for Fontainebleau. Seems that Packer is buying up Crown Ltd. stock instead. (Indeed, why would Packer write off his F'bleau investment, then double down on the failing development?) Packer has raised at least $772 million by disposing of non-gaming assets and appears on course to make a takeover bid for Crown, of which he owns 40% at present.

Oh me of little faith

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 16:40:00 -0700

Pardon a smallish digression from the world of games to something truly important ... baseball. With painful memories of the '04 and '05 postseason meltdowns acid-etched into my mind, I've not been able to summon the intestinal fortitude to watch either of the first two Red Sox/Angels games. (And postseason Angels games really take a toll on one's stomach.)

Now, with the Halos up 2-0, I'm wondering if it's safe to peek between my fingers as the series repairs to Fenway Park. My gut-twisting gut-level feeling is that this series goes the full five games, which is my recipe for pure torture. But ... Angels pitchers seemed to have conquered their fear of BoSox hitters and shut them down.

Besides, I've been wrong before about this team -- 1,000% wrong about Bobby Abreu, who's been a tremendous influence for the better. His superb plate discipline has been worlds away from the bizarre flailing of Vladimir Guerrero (which you can only get away with if you're Vlad and can lift a far-outside pitch over the fence in straightaway center). Patient at-bats were the key to the Angels' '02 World Series run, which made up for less-than-dominant starting pitching. If there's an Angels/Yankees ALCS, it'll be a contest to see who can take more pitches: a real tortoise-and-hare match.

At least the Angels and BoSox share a common adversary: the umpires. "Country" Joe West and C.B. Bucknor are showing yet again why they are two of the worst in MLB ... although seemingly every American League playoff game this year (including the Metrodome miniseries that finished the Detroit Tigers) has been plagued by truly craptacular umpiring and amazingly poor calls. If this were the NFL, these clowns would be relegated to working late-season Rams/Raiders games or some purgatorial equivalent.

Speaking of the Yanks, I can't hold out much hope for my old home team, the Minnesota Twins. All the Homer Hankies in the world aren't going to do it for a pitching staff that can't hold a lead against the Bronx Bombers, and it pains me to type that.

Thanks for your indulgence. We now return to our irregularly scheduled blogging. As soon as I find my Rally Monkeys, that is.

P.S.: It's a damnable shame that our server won't load previously unused images into the blogs. 'Cuz I've got a great Philly Phanatic photo that would be perfect should they make it to the Fall Classic.

Quote of the Day

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 16:31:00 -0700

A few more Congressional pleasantries like this one and we'll be right back to the good old days when political opponents settled their differences with pistols at dawn or simply by beating each other senseless.

Quote of the Day

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 12:41:00 -0700

"But even his fans know that none of the dreams have yet come true, and a prize for even dreaming them can feed the illusion that they have." -- Time columnist Nancy Gibbs on today's Nobel Prize shockeroo. Then again, a Peace Prize once went to Henry Kissinger, so it's as though the Nobel committee is without a sense of humor.

What's a Trump casino worth?

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 15:07:00 -0700

Only $14 million in cash (plus a $100 million equity infusion), according to The Donald. Bondholders say, we'll see your $115 million and raise you $100 million. The latter would recoup at least some -- but not very much -- of their $1.25 billion debt under their plan, while Das Trump would send them away virtually empty-handed. (Moral: When Donald Trump asks you for a loan, take a page from Nancy Reagan and Just Say No.)

The bondholders' assignment of a $75 million valuation to Trump Marina seems awfully optimistic for what is, in essence, a corpse that can't be sold. In essence, the real value proposition is resurgent Trump Taj Mahal, with the other two casinos scarcely better than throw-ins. The Marina is, if anything, an albatross around the company's neck. Still, given that CEO Mark Juliano is going to exceptional lengths to champion the Trumpster's bid, which is a big "screw you" to the debtholders, here's hoping Judge Judith H. Wizmur holds firm for a more responsible solution.

Ho: No! "I don't see major resorts opening for the next couple of years now," says Lawrence Ho. thereby raining pessimism on the expansion plans of Las Vegas Sands, Wynn Resorts and Galaxy Entertainment. The younger Ho also speculates upon the Chinese government's motivation for throttling, then somewhat relenting upon travel to Macao. Interesting tidbit: Marketwatch.com reports that "Venetian Sands" [sic] has cut its number of table games by 25%.

Nevada revenues in. And yeah, they suck. They're much less sucky than usual (-9%), showing an upward trend in baccarat plus two locals-oriented bright spots in the form of Aliante Station and M Resort. It's unclear, though, how much of the growth generated by the last two is new business vs. redistribution of dollars from elsewhere in the valley. The Sun's analysis is far more informative than that found in the R-J.

Wait 'til next year. That's the timeline for casinos in Massachusetts. Even though western Mass looks like slim pickings, lawmakers will probably have to put a casino there just to get the bill onto the floor.

Penn bid falls. Lenders to bankrupt Fontainebleau won a small victory or two, as the judge overseeing the case seems determined to keep lead developer Jeffrey Soffer as far from the disposition of F'bleau as possible. (Soffer is both a debtor and creditor on the project.)

F'bleau, for its part, revealed that Penn National Gaming's offer is now "substantially less" than $300 million, but would include money to replace the windows that are reportedly falling off the building. (One more reason not to build a Strip megaresort tower flush against the "pedestrian realm.")

Groundbreaking today for the long-awaited SugarHouse casino in Philadelphia, under the shadow of a stick-it-to-SugarHouse tax that's been proposed in the Lege. Table games, meanwhile, might be off the table in the face of a $200 million lawsuit. You see, non-racino casinos are allowed to have 5,000 slots (in return for a $50 million fee). Small "resort" casinos -- known as "Category 3" -- only have to $5 million and get 500 slots (accessible only to guests). That's proportional, obviously, and seems fair.

However ... lawmakers want to tilt the playing field by giving Category 3 casinos 30% as many slots as, say, Rivers Casino or SugarHouse, instead of 10% ... and open those games to the general public, not just guests. Of course, the state can't go to the one existing Category 3 casino and ask for another $10 million -- can it? Casino operators are also solidly behind the GOP position on table games: $10 million upfront plus a 12% tax. But, unless House Dems completely capitulate, the gaming bosses are unlikely to get what they want, at least where the tax rate is concerned.

Penn whiffs again. Although Penn Nat'l was supposed to be a bidder in the bankruptcy auction for the Lone Star Park racino, it evidently didn't get into the action and the track went to the Chickasaw Nation for $27 million. (A lot less than Harrah's Entertainment paid to get into Ohio.)

Which means that if/when gambling is legitimized in Texas, the Chickasaws will have a double advantage (parimutuel + tribal status), while Penn will be looking at yet another missed opportunity. Penn's corporate strategy is a baffling alternation of rashness and hyper-caution.

In other tribal news, much-criticized National Indian Gaming Commission Chairman Phil Hogen is gone, thank God, and with him his new, more-restrictive Class II rules. Hogen was justly pilloried for attempting a rollback of hard-won gains in what games tribes could offer. His new rules reflected Bush administration paternalism toward tribes and while they're officially postponed for a year, I think it's safe to say they're dead.* No wonder Rep. Dan Boren (D-OK) is smiling. Watch out for that doorknob, Mister (Ex-)Chairman.

(* It's probable the same thing would have happened under a President McCain, as either candidate would have brought a more enlightened attitude to D.C.-tribal relationships.)

Supporters of video gambling are starting to push back in Illinois, at least in rural, conservative McHenry County. So far it's been the urban areas where this expansion of gambling hasn't been gaining traction.

A repeal of UIGEA continues to gain ground in the House of Representatives, even if it got pulled off the floor in the Senate. (Thanks for nothing, Harry Reid.) The money quote, literally, is a reference to an amendment Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) which would would specify that "corporate taxes owed on regulated Internet gambling activities are collected, as they currently are from the land-based casino industry." [emphasis added]

If that means what it implies, it would remove the spectre of industry-wide federal gambling taxation from the discussion and leave taxation to the states. If not, then the nose of the federal casino-tax camel is still sticking through the legislative tent. And you know where that leads.

We've seen a nationwide gaming tax get shot down during the Clinton administration but there are desperate times, obviously. Republicans like Mike Huckabee and Rep. Steve King (R-IA) have been looking to sock it to casinos at the federal level for some years now, so I fear it could have bipartisan support, should such a debate come to pass.

It's playoff time. A tired, flat-footed Minnesota Twins squad looked positively dreaful last night, flailing at outside pitches from C.C. Sabathia (if you couldn't reach that slider in the first inning, your arms aren't going to be any longer in the seventh, son). Cliff Lee made short work of the Colorado Rockies (besides, Jim Tracy can't win in the postseason), the St. Louis Cardinals look set to continue their tradition of postseason underperformance and my Anaheim Angels are forever reduced to a quivering heap of Jello in playoff games against the Boston Red Sox. Why am I having visions of brooms?

Case Bets: California crisis, M cutbacks, "Guiding Light" in LV, etc.

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:50:00 -0700

Ist California kaput? That's the question posed by the The Observer and it makes for troubling reading. If Gov. Jim Gibbons (R-NV) is right that tourism from California is the carotid artery of Nevada's economy, then the Silver State is -- to put it politely -- screwed. A good thing the Lege didn't follow Midnight Jim's advice and shut down Nevada's outreach efforts in China.

Speaking of which ... Amidst a flurry of economic developments and positive indicators in Macao, the casinos of Stanley Ho are backing off the expensive VIP trade and going mass-market. (Translation: "We're coming after you, Sheldon Adelson.") Thanks to reader mike_ch for the link.

Colossal buMMer. Breakfast has just been eliminated from the offerings at the M Resort buffet. Unless one lives nearby (a relatively small clientele), M is a heckuva long detour to make for breakfast, so this economy move is understandable ... but depressing all the same. No casino buffet gets higher marks from LVA readers.

That's a bit weird. Stay with me here, folks. CBS cancels Guiding Light, replacing it with Let's Make a Deal, which is shot at the Tropicana Las Vegas. So what should be coming to Vegas in December (at The Rio) but a Guiding Light farewell tour -- yes, Reva, Josh and the whole kit 'n kaboodle. How much you wanna bet they won't be taking in a LMaD taping at the Trop? The only way to make this scenario more Banquo's Ghost-ly would be for the soap convention to be held at the Trop, too.

P.S.: Better get your tickets now before the 'Otalia' fans scarf them all up.

Company. Performances resume at UNLV tonight and it's a must-see. Mind you, the Review-Journal praises the Stephen Sondheim revival with faint damns, while the Sun's review reverses that formula. But I'd pay to see it again, which I don't say about many shows in this town.

Case Bets: Corzine, Penn vs. MTR, Pinnacle, Manilow & strippers

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 15:06:00 -0700

Forbidden by New Jersey law from directly contributing to political campaigns, casino companies are making an end run through Virginia. Harrah's Entertainment, Boyd Gaming and IGT are among those funneling campaign cash into a reverse version on the Underground Railroad. No wonder Gov. Jon Corzine (D) is able to carpet-bomb his opponents with advertising, if he so chooses.

Hey, big spender. The New Jersey gubernatorial race may be chump change compared to the cash being expended in the battle over Issue 3, which would permit four Vegas-style casinos in the Buckeye State. This is boiling down to a proxy fight between Penn National Gaming (pro) and racino specialist MTR Gaming (con). You'll recall that the Ohio Supreme Court nixed Gov. Ted Strickland's plan to unilaterally add slots to the state's horse tracks, which might have given MTR a level playing field with Penn.

While I can understand why Penn or Harrah's would be willing to pay 23% in taxes in Iowa or 27% in Kansas, it's mind-boggling that Harrah's would be chomping at the bit in Rhode Island, where the rate is 73%. Oy vey!

A green shoot. The Baton Rouge Business Journal reports that Pinnacle Entertainment is inking contracts to begin driving piles for its Lake Charles project. Called "Sugarcane Bay" and budgeted at $407 million, this is the first positive movement we've seen out of Pinnacle in a while (unless you count its hijinks with the President license up in Missouri). Good on them.

Manilow on the move. The Las Vegas Hilton has confirmed what all suspected: Barry Manilow's contract expires Dec. 30 and will not be renewed. As we reported in Question of the Day, it's nearly a done deal that he will now set up shop at Paris-Las Vegas, whose main showroom has gone long unused.

Good luck trying to get the Vegas constabulary interested if your car is stolen or your home burglarized. They're too busy going undercover to get lap dances. As Richard Abowitz notes, rampant prostitution on the Strip goes unchecked in the meantime. It's an open secret around here, although many of the "working girls" look downright scary, so you have to wonder how they turn tricks, especially in this economy.

Signs of the Times

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 14:02:00 -0700

You know the casino industry's in the crapper when, next week, Spectrum Gaming Group is hosting a conference entitled, Distressed Gaming Properties: The State of the Industry. This is so hot-of-the-presses Spectrum hasn't even got the registration page up ... yet.

Quoth Spectrum's e-mail blast: "With the recession battering gaming jurisdictions from Connecticut to Nevada, a new sector of the industry has come to the fore: distressed operations. Investment firms now have funds that specialize in distressed gaming assets, regulators are being asked to deal with situations they never considered, and operators are turning to outsiders to either right their operations or provide interim management services. In this session, experts will discuss the benefits and risks to distressed Gaming M&A, and how regulations and bankruptcy court can impact a successful takeover. They will also discuss how to properly apply multiples, and how EBITDA can be enhanced by skilled operators."

Maybe Penn National Gaming CEO Peter Carlino should attend this before he goes all in on Fontainebleau. His spokesman says Penn "is evaluating other Las Vegas opportunities." They may have "evaluated" Planet Hollywood right out of their grasp and passed on God knows what else. But F'bleau? That's a keeper. Yeah.

Render unto Caesars Palace ...

Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:29:00 -0700

When I first read about this, I thought it was something from The Onion. It's not. (Although it has inspired one online satire already.) My favorite part ...

Combat Harmful Addiction: combating addiction by using modern terms for it, such as "gamble" rather than "cast lots"

'Cuz, you know, casting lots for Jesus' cloak sounds like a respectable American activity for the whole family whereas everybody knows that to "gamble" for His garments -- never mind take a pull on Megabucks -- makes you just plain Evil and, without doubt, on an express train to Hell.

(And, hey, who's anyone to say those Roman soldiers at Golgotha were gambling "addicts"? Judge not lest ye be judged! Or so those notorious softies in the Catholic Church taught us.)

Faulty Towers. When it comes to taking the blame for the truncation of the Harmon(ini) at CityCenter, all parties involved constitute a bunch of signifying monkeys. Tony Illia explains how, yet again, failure is an orphan.

From the mailbag #8

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 15:08:00 -0700

"Doesn't the IOC realise it will be winter in Brazil in August, 2016?" -- comment Blackberried in by a reader, regarding the award of the '16 games to Rio de Janeiro. Y'know, I'd been wondering about that myself. The average August temperature in Rio hovers between 66 and 78 degrees. Not frigid but not exactly torrid, either. Meanwhile, the IOC promises to keep an eagle eye on the betting lines for the Vancouver games in 2010.

From Jeff in OKC, regarding the recent National Coming-Out Day promotions on the Strip: "Casino ads need a gambling reference in their marketing, I found it cute. If I want to offend easily, I would say that 'Two queens are more fun than a straight' suggests that straight people are inherently less enjoyable than gay people, and NY-NY doesn't want my money. I think we can always be offended, if we look hard enough."

From kerr_mudgeon, on the growing possibility that Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman will tilt at the 2010 gubernatorial race: "I don't think he'll run because the odds are less than 50% in his favor as a non-partisan + he'd not want to disrupt his family by taking a job in Carson [City] - BUT if he runs and wins, he'll start pushing immediately to move the state capital to Las Vegas (maybe to take over one of the partly-built Strip complexes in/near bankruptcy)."

It's not the worst idea I've heard. Nor is this ...

Singapore is building an expansion of its ocean-liner terminal, enabling it to berth four cruisers at a time. The good news for Las Vegas Sands and Genting Bhd is, obviously, that this means more potential customers for their ultra-megaresorts. The not-so-good news is that the new berths won't be ready until late 2011, by which point both casino-based resort will have been open nearly two years.

Everybody's got a private equity fund these days, like the 21-year-old owner of a Persian resaturant in Maryland. Youthful Artin Afsharjavan claims he's got the scratch to buy Trump Entertainment Resorts, prompting Trump CEO Mark Juliano to reply, "Show me the money."

Hey, if some kid wants to throw as much as $500 million into acquiring five (mostly) bottom-of-the-barrel Atlantic City casinos, including Resorts Atlantic City and the A.C. Hilton, I'd like to see the color of his money, too. If it's for real, TER and the others ought to pluck the guy clean. You don't get a pigeon like this every day.

Macao's blockbuster month

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:23:00 -0700

A flurry of good news to end the week, starting in Macao:

September, the first month affected by a relaxation of severe visa restrictions imposed on the mainland, saw a 53% jump in Macanese gambling revenues. In terms of market share, Stanley Ho opened a big lead on Sheldon Adelson, 30% to 20%, with Melco Crown Entertainment close behind with 16%. The remainder of the market was divvied between Wynn Resorts (14%), MGM Mirage (10%) and Galaxy Entertainment (8%).

Is Melco's City of Dreams (above) eating into nearby Venetian Macao's business? On the surface, it certainly looks plausible. Given the immensity of the facilities he's building on the Cotai Strip™, Adelson ought to be getting more bang for his pataca.

Vegas hearts gays. Earlier today, I was asked to reflect on my nearly 11 years in Las Vegas. It's been full of surprising twists of fate -- who ever thought Steve Wynn would be forced out of the Mirage brand he'd created, just for starters?

But I sure as heck never imagined I'd open my e-mail box at work and find the following casino promotions, all keyed to National Coming Out Day (Oct. 3):

"Two Queens Beat a Straight" (New York-New York)

... or the slightly more innocuous ...

"COME OUT and Celebrate at Luxor"

(Luxor was smart and didn't offer Criss F. Angel tickets as part of the, uh, package)

In the Vegas of even a few years ago, "Boys' Night Out Package at Excalibur" would have had more of a frat-party connotation. MGM Grand plays it safe with a "His or Her Getaway" which sounds like a generic singles-oriented deal. Even so, we're actually seeing progress from the days when Vegas marketed itself as a synonym for a very debauched and jaundiced vision of male heterosexuality.

There's nothing like a depression to make this a party town of equal-opportunity decadence. After all, LGBT dollars spend just as fast as straight ones.

$545 a night. That's what Mandarin Oriental is asking. If you read the fine print, you'll note that (through March 31), if you buy a room night at that rate, you'll get a comped night, too. Which makes the effective rate $272 and change. By current standards, that's still steep ... but maybe staying in a 392-room hotel instead of a 4,000-room behemoth is an intangible added value. What do you think?

The sins of the father

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 13:06:00 -0700

For all the brouhaha about Mike Ensign funneling 96 grand to his son's mistress and three of her four family members, the smoking gun (in the form of a canceled check) has not surfaced. Until now:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Things are getting so bad for Ensign fils that even his confessor and gynecologist, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) is pushing him under the bus. But, more importantly, if there's any doubt as to why states like Kansas should not be granting casino licenses to Mike Ensign, now one need only flourish a PDF of the 96-dime check he wrote to the senatorial concubine and her pimp daddy.

The good news is that Ensign Junior is merely a U.S. senator and not -- as he once was -- a middle-tier executive in a major casino firm (with an enabling Dad sitting atop the company). The Senate can withstand negative PR far better than the casino industry.

If Johnny Casino can ride out this latest scandal (and it doesn't seem likely), then the fun really begins. Odds are the Gov. Jim Gibbons would appoint himself to Ensign's seat rather than be ignominiously voted out of office next year. He could just think of it as a long, taxpayer-subsidized vacation.

Quote of the Day

Tue, 29 Sep 2009 14:55:00 -0700

"Mr. Taylor, do you want to be heard?" -- Judge Susan B. Handy to accused cheating-ring mastermind Richard "Mister Casino" Taylor, moments before Taylor barfed all over Handy's courtroom floor.

"You're no one if you're not on Twitter ..."

Fri, 25 Sep 2009 13:11:00 -0700

Since one might as well not have existed without being bookmarked, re-Tweeted and blogged, S&G has a Twitter feed that should be open for business as of this moment. Since Twitter is ampersand-hostile, it's just StiffsGeorges. I'm still working on who to "follow," although Joel McHale was a no-brainer.

Big Trop shakeup

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 17:16:00 -0700

During his absent-minded interregnum as Tropicana Las Vegas CEO Scott Butera nearly denuded the casino of on-property entertainment. Only the hasty re-signing of Xtreme Magic left the Trop with a show in the house. Over time, Butera's people added a slew of second- and third-tier acts.

"Too much," said some. Those "some" would appear to include new CEO Alex Yemenidjian. Virtually unpublicized Beatles tribute act Penny Lane? Gone. Impressionist Rich Natole? Going soon. Bobby Slayton? Going a little later, perhaps. (Anthony Cools' track record as a producer is looking dire.) Although I've heard good things about the new venue created for Soprano's Last Supper and Hypnosis Unleashed, apparently they will be relocated elsewhere within the Trop.

To no one's surprise, Dirk Arthur will yield the prime-time slot (where he was, in all honesty, a placeholder) to incoming Wayne Newton. The Wayner will keep the Tiffany Theater warm until a Trop-owned show replaces Newton's morbidly titled Once Before I Go.

The Harmon Theater's ill-publicized Tickled Pink has also closed and it sounds as though that place is experiencing cash-flow problems. Normally, I'd be sanguine that departing acts would soon find new homes elsewhere in town. However, in these desperate times, entertainment has been one of the first items on the chopping block, so the evicted performers can probably use all the positive vibes they can get.

Casino explosion in Ohio? Not only will Buckeye State voters get to say "aye" or "nay" to Gov. Ted Strickland's creation of racinos, the state could get as many as 11 gambling venues -- not the seven Strickland envisions. Another ballot measure (pushed by Penn National Gaming) would authorize four casinos in four major Ohio cities. Minimum capital investment will be $250 million and the tax rate would be set at -- Ouch! -- 33%. Somehow, I doubt that will scare anybody away.

And they're off! Congratulations to Ocean Downs, the first racino approved in Maryland. By June, reels should be spinning on the first 200 of an eventual 800 slots, to be fully phased in within 11 months.

O'Day meltdown at "Peepshow"

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 14:39:00 -0700

Do you think that Peepshow's producers are just maybe beginning to regret hiring loose cannon Aubrey O'Day? The former insta-band member canceled her second-ever performance of Peepshow because somebody (surprise, surprise) snapped a photo of her, topless, and posted on -- where else? -- the Internet. And don't bother Googling it because Ms. O'Day's lawyers have done a very efficacious job of banishing said photo into cyber-Siberia. The lady's apologia pro tantrum sua is a doozy:

O'Day's finger-wagging might carry more authority were it not coming from someone who flaunted her birthday suit in Playboy magazine (where she actually looked much less attractive than in the supposedly sans-makeup video confessional). Also, if you're going to show your "naughty bits" to the public and charge good money for the privilege of seeing them, one's physical appearance becomes fair game. (And, besides, name one intelligent person who cares what Perez Hilton thinks.)

Anyway, Ms. O'Day might want to enjoy Las Vegas while she still can, because in three months (or less) she's going to be Aubrey O'Who?

If you want to see a good show, skip the trainwreck at Planet Hollywood and head on up to CSN, where -- for the next two weekends -- Reefer Madness: The Musical is the best entertainment money can buy.

From the mailbag #5

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 12:26:00 -0700

Our Comment-Eating Server has been at it again, so here are a few reader remarks that got devoured in cyberspace (where no one can hear you scream at your computer) ...

With regard to "Gambling Scandal Ensnares Eight More":

This is disgraceful! How dare the Federal government interfere with private enterprise like this? Undoubtedly the casinos' self-government practices would have detected these infractions, right?

If -- and I'm not sure about this -- you're referring to tribal casinos, all generalizations are false, including this one. The Tran Organization took down 26 scores that ran the breadth and depth of casino industry: Strip resorts, locals casinos, backwater Isle of Capri operations, U.S. ones and Canadian ones, the smallest tribal casinos and the biggest, too. Even Barona Casino & Resort, which prides itself on being ahead of the industry, technologically speaking, got taken. The moral I draw from this is that too much stock is being put in game-protection technology and not enough in the human component. All the king's PTZ cameras and all the king's digital scratch pads don't know what a "false shuffle" is.

Another reader caught a hasty slip-up I made, when I wrote that Harrah's Entertainment's "$10 million a year for energy conservation isn't even 'a blimp on the radar' when it comes to Harrah's gargantuan annual budget. Heck, it's less than 2/3 of CEO Gary Loveman's compensation package for 2008 alone."

Maybe his compensation has gone down since 2002? I don't think so:

"Loveman, himself, is doing a bit better too: His business school professor's salary, approximately $120,000 (before consulting fees), is now well over $3 million, including stock options. He shuttles between his Boston-area home and Harrah's casinos around the country in a corporate jet. He has long since traded in his professorial Honda Accord for a Ferrari F-355 Spider. After 12 years in the same house, the Lovemans are currently building what neighbors describe as 'a very large' house in the Boston suburb where they live."

Maybe he's riding in a "green" corporate jet now?

Good point. What I was trying to compare was Harrah's $60 million in energy savings over six years. That is less than 2/3 of Loveman's $92 compensation for 2008. (His base salary for '09 is $1.9 million.)

And with regard to labor strife at Trump Plaza:

"While the casino's latest appeal is tied up in federal court, Trump Plaza management has refused to bargain at all.

"Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc., which owns Trump Plaza, has said it expects to win in court. The case was first filed in September 2008.

"The court could side with the casino or uphold the National Labor Relations Board's ruling requiring the casino to bargain.

"'Throughout this entire process, it has not been our intention to attack any dealers who have chosen to support the union,' Juliano continued."

... David, you said "Kudos to Trump Entertainment Resorts CEO Mark Juliano for going out of his way to soothe potential animosity between labor and management."

- I would say: Kudos to Juliano if Trump would bargain in good faith with the union that won the election. As it is, Trump Entertainment Resorts owns & controls Trump Plaza and refuses to dignify their employees with negotiations that they voted for.

That's a major reason that we need passage of a "card check" law, which includes heavy fines against employers like this who refuse to negotiate (for years) with their workers' duly elected representatives.

Fair enough. And finally:

I don't gamble on the Internet because of security concerns with unregulated offshore sites, but I agree with this comment [same blog entry, under ["Health care reform + Internet gambling?"]: This is great! Ron Wyden is an innovative and responsible law maker. As an Internet gambler, I'd be happy to support American-based companies, and pay my patriotic taxes, instead of sending my "business" to Costa Rica.

Thanks to everyone for corresponding.

Penn hearts F'bleau ... maybe

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:24:00 -0700

So the much-bruited suitor for stalled, bankrupt Fontainebleau has been "outed" and it's ... Penn National Gaming. Ace reporter Alexandra Berzon, late of the Las Vegas Sun, broke the story. However, she notes that Penn and F'bleau have been dickering for three months: "Talks could still fall apart at any moment."

Given the criteria that Penn CEO Peter Carlino has been citing for any major casino purchase, F'bleau is an illogical choice. It's expensive, it's unfinished, it's location-challenged, it's a high-end property in a depressed market, it has a problematic condo component (read: units that will never sell) and, most of all, it's a snakepit of litigation. Plus, the cost of completion seems to escalate by the hour and is currently pegged at $1.5 billion.

Remember, Penn balked at paying $1 billion-plus for The Mirage, a turnkey, trouble-free resort. Meanwhile, Harrah's Entertainment is snatching Planet Hollywood right out from under Penn's nose and the company whiffed on a chance to acquire newly ascendant Greektown Casino in Detroit. Go figure.

A Penn spokesman "could not confirm or deny" the Wall Street Journal story. We'll take that as a "yes."

Aubrey has landed. As in "O'Day." Webmistress Jessica has forwarded the following from Holly Madison's Twitter feed: "@hollymadison123 Damn! I can't take one day off work without everything going to hell in a handbasket! Back to spreading the positive energy!" Like I said, word from the wise is that Madison and new Hitler-lovin' co-star Aubrey O'Day are anything other than BFFs.

Worst Trend Yet

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 20:07:00 -0700

This is the sort of bottom-feeding move you'd expect from Columbia Sussex but not from Hyatt. Suffice it to say that if casino-hotels try this cheapjack number in Atlantic City, Detroit or Las Vegas, there will be holy hell to pay, especially the next time the collective-bargaining agreement is up for renewal. As it is, some hotels (*cough*Tropicana Las Vegas*cough*) have tried to operate with skeletal cleaning staffs and one shudders to imagine the consequences.

Terror at Sam's Town?

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:33:00 -0700

On Sept. 15, local blogger Flipchip reported that Sam's Town was being swept by a crime wave. There was, he wrote, a "rash of robberies," including two perpetrated against his wife. She was, he wrote, "then berated by the on-duty slot manager and he implied that since this was her second time to be robbed it was something she was doing that was causing the trouble."

Flipchip's entertainingly lurid chronicle describes the Boyd Gaming flagship property as having "fallen into a state of dereliction along with the surrounding neighborhood" (and I was just looking at houses near there), plagued by an "apparent lack of adequate security has made the joint easy pickings for the fleet of foot crooks." The blogger has subsequently been inundated with "horror stories of robberies, purse snatchings, and threats from the gangs often seen trekking through the casino."

Having been put wise to this story by Jean Scott, S&G rang up Boyd spokesman David Strow, who had seen Flipchip's posting and called it "highly, highly exaggerated." A Sam's Town crime wave? "That's ludicrous," said Strow, who described the problem as being confined to a lone snatch-and-dash bandit who was grabbing small amounts of cash from patrons (ranging from $3 to $100+, in one instance) before getting away. Security officers have long been in place at every Sam's Town exit, Strow added -- although that still begs the question of how the Boulder Highway Bandit manages to keep eluding apprehension.

"Some of this language is completely false," Strow said of Flipchip's narrative, noting in particular the allegations of gang activity. That, he said, is apparently a reference to the casino's younger patrons and "is ludicrous."

As for the Boulder Highway Bandit, "We are on the lookout for him," stated Strow. "Sam's Town patrons have nothing to worry about when they're on property."

Well, except for that one guy running around grabbing cash. Moral: Keep your friends close and your money even closer.

'Phantom' fans hit Vegas

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 14:36:00 -0700

Heaven knows, there are conventions for soap operas, sitcoms and every iteration of science fiction (I've been to more than a few of the latter). But a fan convention for a Broadway show? That's unheard of.

Yesterday, fans of Phantom of the Opera hit town for the first-ever Phantom con, at the Venetian, where they'll score some face time with director Harold Prince and the Venetian's resident Phantom, Anthony Crivello. (You have to give Sheldon Adelson props: If Glenn Schaeffer had been running the Venetian, he'd have turned down Phantom on the grounds it was free publicity for Paris-Las Vegas. But Adelson knew a good thing when he saw it.) The Venetian has even rolled out a package of goodies to keep Phantom fans on-property. Smooth move there, Rob Goldstein.

Having recently passed its third anniversary, the Vegas-ized Phantom looks well on its way to blowing past Mamma Mia!'s six-year milestone. We could easily be celebrating its 10th anniversary come 2016. Yours truly gets name-checked in Steve Friess' interview with Prince. My only quibble with the story -- and it's a very minor one -- is that it doesn't mention Prince's original stagings of Stephen Sondheim's Company and Follies, two of the high-water marks in Broadway history. And if you think Phantom is a "downer," take Follies out for a spin sometime:

As for fan conventions, except for the annual Star Trek hootenanny at the Las Vegas Hilton, Vegas doesn't do such a great job of attracting them. We've got to work on that. And when Stargate SG-1/Stargate Atlantis/Sanctuary star Amanda Tapping graces a Vegas stage, we can say, "Job well done."

Deathtrap. Sometimes there are shows that warrant venturing away from the comfort zone of the Strip. Las Vegas Little Theatre's production of Ira Levin's Broadway hit is not one of them.

Salvation for Nevada?

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:59:00 -0700

Former Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval has made it official: He's stepping down from the federal bench to challenge incumbent Gov. Jim Gibbons. That means Midnight Jim can start packing up the governor's mansion. Maybe he already is. Whatever he's doing, he's not attending to the state's crumbling tourism infrastructure. This dereliction of duty is reprehensible at a time when Las Vegas, Reno and points beyond need all the traffic they can get.

I've dealt with Sandoval in the past and he's a class act. Heck, unless Oscar Goodman throws his martini glass into the ring on the Democratic side, I might have to re-register as a Republican to vote for Sandoval in the 2010 primary. Sandoval may be fairly conservative but he's capable and widely respected, two qualities one does not associate with Nevada's current governor.

Midnight Jim has given us nearly three years of unmitigated cronyism, scandal and incompetence, and Nevada cannot be rid of him and his do-nothing "leadership" soon enough, in my opinion. Thank you, Sheldon Adelson and especially J. Terrence Lanni, along with any other gaming CEO who helped foist this buffoon upon the Silver State.

If you've sent me an e-mail and haven't heard back, it's because our current e-mail platform is -- what's the technical term? -- fucked. So I apologize for my apparent bad manners. Also, we cannot upload new imagery into the blogs. Which means that, for instance, an extremely droll image forwarded by kerr_mudgeon cannot be viewed at this time. Which really sucks.

To make matters worse, some subscribers aren't receiving automatic notifications of new blog entries because these are being randomly kicked back by the dozen. So I apologize for that, too. Our LVA tech people are doing their best but they're fighting a multi-front war right now. Thanks for your patience.

Harrah's buying spree

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 17:33:00 -0700

Thanks to reader Todd Bristow, who tipped me to Harrah's Entertainment's $89.5 million purchase of Thistledown Race Track, near Cleveland. Thoroughbred Times reports that over half of that amount ($47 million) is a "contingency" payment. The extra 47 mil would kick in if legislation is upheld that would allow conversion of Thistledown to a racino. The track is one of several assets being disposed of by bankrupt Magna Entertainment. If Harrah's can't step up to the plate, Penn National Gaming and Pinnacle Entertainment are in the on-deck circle.

As you've probably heard, Harrah's is also gobbling up the debt carried by Planet Hollywood. It's a strategic move, considering that Harrah's already owns acreage that extends back from Bally's and Paris-Las Vegas to Koval Lane and then wraps south around Planet Ho. It's also been posited that this could be a "passive investment," a gamble that Planet Ho will come back in a big way in the future. Sounds rather iffy to me but stranger things have happened.

Mind you, this is also the same Harrah's that has been buying back its own debt at distressed rates (most recently at 67 cents on the dollar) and restructuring payment schedules like mad to stay ahead of an avalanche of $19 billion-plus it owes on its LBO. Harrah's creditors, are you feeling like suckers yet?

Or perhaps the money is coming from sugar daddies Apollo Management and Texas Pacific Group. Apollo has already been kicking the tires of Fontainebleau and may well be the "potential buyer" who's poised to take the keys to that Edsel. Even with Harrah's skill set, a high-end condo-hotel like F'bleau would be new business model with which to tangle.

At least the likely scenario is that Harrah's would be merely the mechanic, pocketing a fee for trying to get F'bleau up and running. Gives new meaning to "cash for clunkers," no? (Then again, Penn Nat'l may be smarting so much from that thwarted breakup fee in Ohio that it decides to buy F'bleau as a bank-shot means of getting back at Harrah's. Who knows, when CEO's egos have been bruised.)

As the cherry on top, Harrah's furtive move on Planet Ho inspired the following "No shit, Sherlock" headline, courtesy of the Las Vegas Review-Journal: "Harrah's debt purchase could lead to takeover, analyst says." Gee, ya think? I look forward to, "Beginning of autumn could lead to lower temperatures."

Vegas snubbed again

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 02:03:00 -0700

So the Death Star decides to drop by Planet Earth and where does the Imperial Fleet choose to spend its shore leave? San Francisco?!? Doesn't the Empire know Las Vegas is America's leading vacation destination, is renowned for its shows, nightclubs and high levels of inebriation, has legal prostitution just across the county line in Pahrump, and is generally a real bargain right now? Boy, is Oscar Goodman going to be demanding an apology from Emperor Palpatine or what? Harry Reid may even make an almost sort-of forceful speech on the Senate floor or, scarier still, read extensive passages from Searchlight: The Camp That Didn't Fail. That'll show those Vegas-scorning Sith!

Quote of the Day

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 19:03:00 -0700

"Kanye West is the biggest piece of shit on earth. Quote me," says Pink on her Twitter feed. So we did.

The real 'death panels'

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 16:10:00 -0700

They're here and they're called HMOs. And business is booming. Since I need to spend the afternoon tinkering with new S&G format, here's a digression into the world of "maximizing shareholder value" -- which has had a different sort of baneful effect (but a considerably less malignant one) in the gaming industry.

Postscript

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 14:08:00 -0700

In detailing our blogging woes, I forgot to mention that we can't send e-mail today either. So if I owe you a response, I apologize and will get back to you as soon as we're able.

In the meantime, I'm still trying to recover from the ordeal of trying to hear Matt Goss, in his new Palms show. But if you find Justin Timberlake too edgy, Goss is your man. The ladies love him; the air was rife with cougar-esqe pheromones Saturday night. I'm only surprised no panties were flung onstage. As for his singing, I'm not convinced that ex-CIA director Porter Goss wouldn't be an improvement.

Please stand by ...

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 12:27:00 -0700

Technical problems continue to afflict our blogs. Those of you who are subscribers had many of your e-mail alerts bounced back to us last weekend. Also, *new* photos cannot be uploaded -- only ones that have been posted on the blog in days of yore. Hence, no photographs of the late Shadow, nor of Newt Gingrich's gavel, never mind something really important like the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino fire.

As a consequence, we're looking at moving to a different software (suggestions are appreciated). Hopefully, all of the 1,500+ existing S&G entries will make the transfer ... keep your fingers crossed. Maybe this will be the end of the Comment-Eating Server, too. We can only hope.

Quote of the Day

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 21:39:00 -0700

“[It might] make for a pretty cool prop for a ‘Couples Seduce Teens’ episode.” -- adult filmmaker Allison Vivas upon receiving -- supposedly by mistake -- the Entrepreneur of the Year Award from a group founded by Newt Gingrich. The award? A replica of the former House Speaker's gavel.

From the mailbag #4: California, tech troubles & 'resort fees'

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:02:00 -0700

Reader Kerr Mudgeon is less than amused by a recent dig at the cuisine offered by Commerce Casino to California firefighters. He writes: "The firefighters can go to numerous other nearby eateries if they don't like the FREE meals offered by the Commerce Casino -- same as paying casino customers can eat at other places if they choose. Sound like 'looking the gift horse in the mouth.'"

Good news from IT: Our "austerity regime" of no photos and no links will, it is promised, be ended today. I can think of several potential blog entries yesterday that went unwritten because no linking capability was available, so this should put some wind back in S&G's sails ... although some might say a lack of wind is the least of this blog's problems.

It's absolutely imperative that you read our 9/10/09 Question of the Day. No, I didn't write it. Our hard-working research duo of Jessica & Tanya did. (Also, Steve Friess recently mis-credited me with the Today's News column; that's a J&T Production, too, along with the occasional assist from Anthony Curtis himself.)

Aaaaaaaaannnnyyyyy-way, today's topic (and it's only online for one day) is the pernicious Vegas phenomenon known as the "resort fee." The winner of the Sustained Greed Award goes to longtime gouger Station Casinos. Station's Green Valley Ranch is also the premier resort-fee offender ($25).

Others who provide optional amenities -- of varying desirability -- in return for the fee include Bellagio ($25), The Mirage ($15), Planet Hollywood ($5) and Gold Coast ($3, which actually buys you quite a lot). The geniuses at Morgans Hotel Group get the Steal the Stripes out of Your Socks Award for charging you $7 for "in-room safe, parking, minibar (but not its contents), bath products, and a plasma TV."

There's a word for that Hard Rock Hotel & Casino practice and the word is "chintzy." As our researchers note, "For hotels to presume to charge guests for amenities that they have no intention of availing themselves of, but cannot avoid, seems a very counter-productive measure that can only generate ill-will."

Kudos to the following fee-eschewing properties: Venetian, Palazzo, Wynn Las Vegas, Encore and anyplace owned by Harrah's Entertainment. Yes, Harrah's. I tip my fedora to you, Gary Loveman.

Optimism in Macao, euphoria at CityCenter

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 17:33:00 -0700

Relaxation of stringent visa restrictions from Guangdong Province came a full four months sooner than expected, starting Sept. 1. Now, residents will be able to visit Macao once a month instead of quarterly. While this has prompted J.P. Morgan to raise its price target on Las Vegas Sands stock, analysts also fret that Sands may overreact and go pedal to the metal on its unfinished Cotai Strip™ hotels.

Those same analysts are bullish on the manufacturing sector, though. They think casinos will be more willing to reinvest in the slot base as 2009 draws to a close. Also, the onward march of casino expansion means more jurisdictions and facilities to whom IGT, Bally and WMS can peddle their products. They're 'meh' on regional casino operators like Penn National, Ameristar Casinos and Pinnacle Entertainment, due to flattish performance. (Penn could catch a break in Kansas, though I still think Cordish Gaming has that sewn up.)

But that's a rave notice compared to the long face Morgan analysts pull when pondering Boyd Gaming's prospects. They cite the slow-to-recover, promo-driven locals-casino market in Las Vegas ("trickle-down" economics of the worst sort); Atlantic City's critical condition -- "the best-case scenario here is that [Borgata] would do less bad" than most of A.C. -- those blah regional metrics and new competition for the Blue Chip riverboat in Indiana, which had been looking like 2009's feel-good story.

Intriguingly, the prospect of a Strip acquistion is floated in lieu of a 'stalking horse' bid for floundering Station Casinos. Boyd's still got enough unused borrowing capacity it could even swing an acquisition of The Mirage (with money to spare), not to mention some of the lower-hanging fruit, which now includes Planet Hollywood. But if the J.P. Morgan guys are gun-shy concerning Boyd ...

They're over the moon about MGM Mirage's CityCenter: "we are increasingly under the belief that City Center will be a new must-see property for both domestic and international gamers/travelers that should drive solid visitation volumes to the Strip in 2010. We were impressed with the massive 18m-square-foot complex ... a new type of high-end product for the Strip that should garner increased trips. It has a very contemporary feel that is different than anything else on the Strip, with lots of natural light and high ceilings, interesting room product and, for a massive property, ease of getting around from one 'neighborhood' to the next."

More good news comes in the form of a press release from Commerce Casino (in Commerce, Calif.), which rolled out the welcome mat for a group of undoubtedly weary firefighters. A strike force of 30 Bay Area-based firemen is being housed in the casino's hotel, with the casino comping all meals and picking up most of the hotel tab. Let's hope that such civic-mindedness spreads through the industry like -- if you'll forgive the analogy -- wildfire.

In case it matters, "super-starlet" (yes, that's the official term) Holly Madison has been given a 12-month contract extension at Peepshow, so she's obviously earning her pay. Also, I've heard through the grapevine that she and incoming Aubrey O'Day do not get along, so the timing of the Madison announcement should make clear who's got the upper implant in this situation.

'Peepshow''s little Hitler problem

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 16:20:00 -0700

Congratulations (not!) to the producers of Peepshow, whose rent-a-headliner stratagem has finally blown up in their faces. They're replacing a Jew (Shoshana Bean) with a fan of the leadership abilities of -- I kid you not -- Adolf Hitler. Oh, and she's a googly-eyed admirer of Fidel Castro, who -- among other offenses against humanity -- ran the casino industry out of Cuba.

Of course, this town has a tycoon or two known for cozying up to the authoritarian regime of Singapore and the downright despotic one in Peking. So perhaps Ms. O'Day's pathetic excuse for a brain will just be a 48-hour story ... but that's what we thought about Sen. John Ensign's escapades, at least until Mike Ensign's role as payola daddy came into play.

(Thanks to Richard Abowitz for the heads-up on this one.)

A reader informs me that the site LasVegasDowntownNews.com appears to be defunct. I couldn't get it to load either and blogger Jeff Burbank's output was sporadic at the best of times. Has this site gone the way of all flesh? If anybody has the skinny on this, please let S&G know.

"Oh shit!" headline of the day: Seen at Huffington Post, "Harry Reid to take the wheel on health care." That's like finding out the one family member who's certifiably incapable of navigating the driveway is going to pilot the family car up Mount Charleston.

Many thanks ...

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:06:00 -0700

... to everyone who wrote in and overwhelmed us with messages of condolence regarding the late Shadow. Time doesn't permit writing individual replies to each and every one of you, although you have touched my heart deeply. So thanks go out to Steve Kallis (and I would imagine the Humane Society thanks you, too), Jeff in OKC, Jason the poolman, Richard Abowitz, arm53, detroit1051, Frank P., William Heckel (check out his Web site), Jinx (ditto), Aaron, Jim and smudger.

The apartment still seems very empty without Shadow's graceful -- if sometimes surprisingly obstreperous -- presence. Her brother, Mr. Bit, needs a lot of comforting. Fasolt is pretty much the same as ever.

Eventually the painful memories will recede and the good ones will take their place. Right now it's difficult to visualize Shadow other than as I last saw her, lying on the veterinarian's table, emaciated and misshapen, with her stomach bloated by the tumor. Her eyes seemed to say, "Let me go," but you're never adequately prepared for when they bring her back with a catheter sticking from her forearm, let alone for when you have to tell the vet it's OK to administer the lethal injection.

However, Shadow was in the extremely ethical hands of Mountain Vista Animal Hospital, one of Las Vegas' greatest assets. They could have strung me along with false hope and thereby milked my bank account dry, but they were most candid about the gravity of the situation. Thanks to them, Shadow's suffering was relatively brief. I hope I'm so fortunate when it's my turn to shuffle off this mortal coil.

In the meantime, it's a little difficult to give a rat's patootie about what's happening in the casino industry. I'm sure you understand why.

Besides ... the fallout from last week's blog meltdown continues to descend. Our linking capabilities are temporarily kaput and the photo library has vanished. Hence the somewhat gray and bare-bones look of S&G these days. Darn, and I have this great screencap of Edward Quartermain looking for all the world like Sheldon Adelson ...

Quote of the Day

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 10:57:00 -0700

"You have no idea what you're talking about at all." -- Chad "Ochocinco" Johnson, speaking for millions of Americans this morning. The subject? ESPN buffoon-in-residence Skip Bayless. (I'm convinced that the only reason ESPN keeps Bayless around is because his ignorant proclamations generate such a heavy volume of hate mail.)

Quote of the Day

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 00:49:00 -0700

"Nevada Welcome Center: Closed" -- sign at the Nevada state line, Labor Day afternoon, epitomizing the can't-do spirit and general nonfeasance that have characterized the Silver State's tarnished fortunes under Gov. Jim Gibbons.

Shadow, 1993-2009

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 15:53:00 -0700

Jennifer & I just said goodbye to a faithful friend of 13 years, Shadow. A slim, sleek Norwegian Forest Cat, she came into my life on a fine autumn afternoon in 1996. I was still recovering from a broken engagement and, while taking a walk, came across a yard sale being conducted by a woman who was moving to Brazil. There, up for sale, was a beautiful blue-gray cat who was the spitting image of Buddy, my ex-fiancée's adorable Norwegian (who I missed far more than I did my ex).

As it turned out, Shadow also had an obstreperous brother, Bit (later promoted to Mr. Bit). Although I was only looking for one cat, I didn't have the heart to break brother and sister up, and took both. Shadow was well named, as she was invisible in darkness -- causing her to get tripped over and stepped on far more times than I'd care to admit -- and had the alarming habit of diving at your feet, an accident waiting to happen.

Unlike her brother, Shadow took to her new living situation at once. The only problem was the resultant friction between senior cat Fasolt and Shadow, which would never be resolved. They'd spend the next 13 years spatting. A couple of years after Shadow and Mr. Bit joined our family, job prospects in Minneapolis had dried up but multiple opportunities presented themselves in Las Vegas. So, in January 1999, my brother Vincent drove Shadow and Mr. Bit cross-country, while I flew Fasolt to Las Vegas. The climate seemed to agree with them -- to say nothing of the profusion of juicy birds who dwelt nearby. Mr. Bit did, however, take several days to emerge from his hiding place in the kitchen cupboard.

Fast-forward a decade, and Shadow was showing signs of decrepitude and weight loss. (She was always lighter than air, but still ... ) Her movements became stiffer, her lethargy more pronounced and she became reclusive. At first, I chalked this up to advancing age but eventually, she gave up on using the litter box, too. A number of medical tests failed to detect anything wrong.

As late as last Tuesday, Shadow was running about the apartment, having an episode of the 'nighttime crazies.' But, by Friday her belly was alarmingly bloated while the rest of her was emaciated and rail-thin. A visit to the vet brought the dreaded news: Shadow had a buildup of fluid in her abdomen and, beneath that, a tumor. Even a best-case scenario involving surgery and chemotherapy would only buy her a few more months on Earth. She was whimpering from the pain and the spark of her personality was all but extinguished.

We said our farewells as the last moments of Shadow's life ebbed away. Many tears were shed. Her body is gone, soon to be cremated, but her spirit will live in our hearts and minds and souls forever, for she is part of us in a way that death cannot sunder. Still ... I will miss feeling her sleeping across my feet or knees when I'm sick in bed ... chasing the dot of the laser pointer ... sliding across the linoleum in pursuit of a runaway twist-tie ... yelling at me when her dinner wasn't promptly served ... sulking if her water did not have ice cubes in it, per her preference ... dipping her right paw in aforesaid water and licking it off (making the water dirty for everyone else, but little did she care) ... burrowing her forehead into my wrist as though to say "Thank you," when dinner was served ... reclining regally in the nearest patch of sun ... and, perhaps most of all, "helping" her Daddy work by curling up in his lap at the computer desk.

At least once, I came back to find her sitting on the keyboard, as though to say, "No more Internet, Dad!"

Thanks for reminding me of what is important, Shadow. We will never stop missing you.

Facts are stubborn things, II

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 19:11:00 -0700

The only comprehensible explanation of Social Security I've ever heard was given at the 2000 World Gaming Congress by then-private citizen Al Franken. (And, yes, I agree with the late Robert Novak that it's basically "a Ponzi scheme.") Fast-forward nine years and now-Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) emerges as perhaps the first cogent voice on the Democratic side of the health care debate -- much more so than President Obama. Fortunately, "some YouTubes" were there to capture Franken in action at the Minnesota State Fair.

Regardless of one's political stance, this video is a remarkable example of the art of persuasion. But is it too late for voices like Franken's to prevail in a debate that's largely dominated by demagogues and dumbasses (I'm looking at you, Sen. Max "Kreskin" Baucus [D-MT])? Well, enjoy.

"Viva Elvis"

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 01:38:00 -0700

Obssessed? Moi?

Yes, Viva Elvis will be the long-awaited, enshrouded-in-secrecy title of the Cirque du Soleil show scheduled to debut this December at CityCenter.* Wow, they must have had to really burn the midnight oil in Montreal to come up with that one ... Speaking of name changes, Scarlett and her Seductive Ladies of Magic (at the Riviera) is now Abra-Ca-Sexy. Well, it's catchier ... The wheels continue to fall off the Riviera train: An Evening with Dean and Friends has closed, as has the dinner buffet (again) ... Lost in the bankruptcy tumult at the Greek Isles was the opening of a new show. Its cumbersome title is Chinaman: A Rock & Roll Comedy Experience. Moving right along ... By the time you read this, Rockstar: The Tribute should have reopened at the Harmon Theater after a disastrously short stint at the Wyrick Entertainment Complex (aka, "the Venue of Death") in Planet Hollywood. However, the Harmon has given it as much advance publicity as an IRS raid on a Vegas nightclub, so that's not a promising start ... In like manner, Beatles tribute Penny Lane tiptoed into the Tropicana without so much as a 'by your leave' ... Back at Planet Ho, Tony 'n Tina's Wedding evidently isn't performing up to expectations. Ticket prices have been reduced 13%-30%, although they're still steep ($63-$143) ... It looks like Deutsche Bank is going to wait a spell and open the Cosmopolitan in Sept.-Oct. 2010. Which, given that the Strip's been strangling on a glut of high-end rooms, is probably the wisest course of action. Wall Street's former Holy Grail, "another wave of megaresort openings," has become a phrase to be dreaded.

Ready for some good news? The most remarkable dancer of the late, lamented Sin City Kitties, Koree Kurkowski, is now part of the ensemble of Bite. The show is kitsch to the nth degree but it's entertaining in its own so-bad-it's-good fashion. The Stratosphere casino floor was pretty dead for a Friday night last weekend, but Bite was definitely packing them in. It's not as good as Sin City Bad Girls (at the Las Vegas Hilton) but way better than forgettable X Burlesque (at the Flamingo).

* -- the Viva Elvis revelation was let slip during last weekend's Michael Jackson festival at The Palms. I learned of it after being invited -- on 75 minutes' notice -- to co-host an episode of Steve Friess' The Strip Podcast, in which I am teased for being "obsessed" with Carmen Electra. I'll link to the edited version once it's available, so you can hear me date myself with a Barbi Benton shout-out.

This isn't Photoshop but an ad clipped from a Michigan newspaper, I kid you not:

The things you can find at the grocery store these days ...

No more "free" play?; Sahara sleaze; Donny & Tina; Criss F. Angel

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 17:29:00 -0700

In a decision that could have wide-ranging implications, Foxwoods Casino Resort and Mohegan Sun have been ordered to count (and pay taxes on) "free play" coupons as though they were revenue. This isn't a sock-it-to-the-players move like the one the Hawaii Legislature just pulled, taxing any money won at a casino (even if it's lost right back and then some). However, the ramifications for consumers if free-play coupons are targeted for taxation are discouraging. Play 'em while you've got 'em.

That stale "sleeping giant" analogy has been dusted off (and I use that verb advisedly) for some pimpery of the Sahara. On the glass half-full side, classy and romantic dinner spot House of Lords has been revived. It used to be a perfect place to take your Special Someone and hopefully will remain so. It's just off the main casino floor -- the most Moorish-themed part of the Sahara and the best "retro" experience to be had in town. (Almost everything else of newer vintage is bland grind-joint crud that needs to go.)

As for the empty half of the glass, that'd be the news that owner Sam Nazarian continues to go downmarket with a vengeance. Because nothing says "classic Vegas" like a tattoo parlor and a biker convention. Worse still, the tramp-stamp place will be in the otherwise elegant main lobby, with extended weekend tattoo-ing times ... since you never know when you want to do something you'll regret the rest of your life.

This "desert jewel rich with history and nostalgia" will continue that tradition with "a wet wife-beater contest, bikini tricycle races, a bourbon paired beef dinner with leatherwear fashion show, and an all-you-can-eat beer fest BBQ with one lucky rider winning a 2009 Harley Davidson Cross Bones bike." It's probably just a matter of time before Nazarian converts the big rear parking lot to a trailer park, too. That's Sam Nazarian for you: "class" with a capital "K."

"Tina Sparkle," flanked by Donny Osmond (evidently still in his pajamas) and Marie, who's looking damn fine from here.

It's old news that Donny Osmond is going to be on the next season of Dancing with the Stars, but I hadn't known he was going to be paired with Aussie Kym Johnson. The latter is known to my Better Half and I as "Tina Sparkle" (it's a Strictly Ballroom thing), which would make for great DWTS levity next season, except ...

... for the soul-crushing news that the gorgeous and talented Cheryl Burke has been twinned with the repulsive (and potentially prison-bound) Tom DeLay, one of "Casino Jack" Abramoff's band of Beltway scoundrels. (Was scum-tastic sleazemeister Rod Blagojevich not available?) Bad luck for Cheryl, good news for DeLay because Ms. Burke could be matched with a tree stump and get aforesaid stump into the final three. If she could carry a woodpile like Cristian de la Fuente to the finale, DeLay should be easy lifting. It looks like he's got the requisite arboreal quality.

Does Criss Angel have compromising photos of high-ranking MGM Mirage executives? The company's "branding" him now, evidently having convinced itself that Believe is beyond wonderful ... and never mind that 11-year-old O regularly outdistances Believe in ticket sales by several country miles. Having sunk $85 million into this Cirque du Soleil turkey, MGM is evidently going to stick with it until the last dancing rabbit is hung.

The Yung & the heartless

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 16:20:00 -0700

Our good buddies at Columbia Sussex, who still maintain toeholds in the Las Vegas and Lake Tahoe markets, continue to make friends in time-honored fashion. For instance, with dicta like:

"Fire the old lady in sales." (A more detailed version of the story is here.)

Yup, sounds like the ColSux we know and love. No matter how outstanding Charlotte Thomas' performance was, she committed the unspeakable crimes of earning a living wage and, worse still, being old. Now, it's a well-established fact that ColSux owner and CEO William J. Yung III is no spring chicken himself. I wonder how he'd feel if the bankers who underwrote his multibillion-dollar buying spree in 2006 said, "Fire the old duffer in the executive suite"?

Companies that fire talented people -- like a woman of a certain age who doubled sales -- just to save a few grand on the bottom line and have some more-nubile faces around the office deserve to fail. And, with that kind of thinking, they inevitably will.

(If nothing else, this saga will give one a renewed appreciation of why Faust, given the choice of sundry temptations, chose to be young again. Bill Yung probably had his name on a "cut sheet.")

Criss Angel, move over

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 13:26:00 -0700

Las Vegas has an aspiring pretender to the throne of King of Douchebags and it's ... well, who else but Jon Gosselin? He's been putting it around that he'll join forces with Europoseur Christian Audigier, whose apparel is de rigeur for those who truly aspire to look like the pond scum of society. Gosselin would be Audigier's new spokesdouche, in yet another demonstration of how water seeks its own level.

Electra-fying news bulletin

Fri, 28 Aug 2009 22:51:00 -0700

You asked, MGM Mirage listened. No, they're not offering free rooms at CityCenter but something much better: a 20-performance return engagement by Carmen Electra, who will put some spice back into Crazy Horse Paris in October. At $75 a seat, that sounds like a good deal to me. Make your travel plans now.

Don't you wish all news coming out of Vegas was this good?

Meet the new Trop boss ...

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:29:00 -0700

... largely the same as the old boss. Tropicana Entertainment's diligent efforts to get back into the Tropicana Atlantic City have finally paid off. Thus (nearly) ends a prolonged interregnum during which no clearly superior alternativves emerged. Well ... there was an extended flirtation with Cordish Gaming but butterfingered trustee Justice Gary Stein fumbled that away.

Since Carl Icahn's stealthy buy-up of TropEnt stock extinguished Columbia Sussex CEO William J. Yung III's ownership rights, the era of Attila the Yung has finally ended. Also, getting Stein out and private ownership back in is a transition that can't happen soon enough.

On the downside, Trop property prexy Mark Giannantonio (a Yung appointee) remains at the helm. Also, TropEnt CEO Scott Butera and his lieutenants did an undistinguished job of running the Tropicana Las Vegas before selling it to Onex Corp. They still have a lot to prove in Atlantic City.

Quote of the Day

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 15:49:00 -0700

"In a life filled with trials, Ted Kennedy never gave in to self-pity or despair." -- President George W. Bush, paying homage to the late senator (1932-2009).

Mena Suvari + douchebag = ...

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:00:00 -0700

... just another day at Palazzo. For all you aspiring members of the douchebagerie, study these men and their fashion statement carefully: This is the look-what-the-cat-dragged-in aesthetic that you seek to emulate.

Mixed prospects for Foxwoods

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 14:20:00 -0700

First, the good news. Lyle Berman has folded his hand in Kansas. His Lakes Entertainment is scrapping its own casino bid and taking a partnership role in Foxwoods' Wichita-area bid. Apparently Lakes is no closer to finding financing than when it started ... but neither is Foxwoods. Both companies will be digging into their own pockets to pay for the $225 million casino.

With 1,300-1,500 slots and 30 tables, the Foxwoods/Lakes joint venture will be smaller than any of the previous casino proposals for the area. A J.P. Morgan report also implies that hotel facilities and other amenities will be sloughed off onto a third party to be named later. So Foxwoods emerges the de facto winner and Mike Ensign is left to wonder how different things might have been had hadn't bailed out his errant son ... and to come up with incredibly lame excuses for his withdrawal.

Remember Philadelphia? No, there is still no casino in the City of Brotherly Love, even as some outstate facilities are into their second iteration. Having failed to open -- or even build -- its casino within the time period alloted by statute, Foxwoods is going to petition the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board for an extra two years.

It'd be a surprise if Foxwoods' request isn't granted. True, all Foxwoods has to show for itself is a much-criticized South Philadelphia site plan (which has been aptly likened to a big-box retail outlet) and a couple of possible fallback positions downtown. The way things look now, Foxwoods may be prodded back toward South Philly, though it's no likelier to find a friendly reception there than it's done anywhere else.

The alternative, however, looks far worse. Pennsylvania would have to restart the application process, select a winner and then pray it could open its slot house within the statutory 12 months. Which also means that Philadelphia has to go through site-review Hell all over again ... and casino opponents aren't going to be caught napping this time around. Could a new entrant accomplish more than Foxwoods by September 2011? It's highly improbable, given the rocky history of bringing casinos to Philly.

Goliath finds a home

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 16:38:00 -0700

Goliath sneaks up on erstwhile housemate Piglet.

After a week of foster parenting, we were able to find a good, loving home for Goliath (although it near to broke our hearts to see him go). His new family is set to spoil him rotten and looked like kids on Christmas morning when they finally saw his bandit-masked face. They'd already bought a "kitty condo" and toys for him, and word is that he's become comfortably ensconced in his new abode in nothing flat. The only adjustment problem may be that Goliath's idea of "playtime" is 2 a.m., something with which mere humans may have difficulty coping.

(According to our blogging software, this is officially the 1,500th S&G posting. Who'da thunk it'd ever go the distance?)

Quote of the Day

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 13:01:00 -0700

"At least he didn't go to the Mustang Ranch." -- Jane Lewis of Fernley, Nev., rationalizing Sen. John Ensign's extramarital antics. But Ensign would have done, in his own words, "nothing legally wrong" had he patronized the fine, upstanding (and perfectly legal) working women of the Ranch. As to drawing a line between straight-up paying for sex and showering your mistress, her husband, and her family with patronage jobs and other largesse ... that may very well be a distinction without a difference.

Frank Fertitta Jr., 1938-2009

Sat, 22 Aug 2009 18:25:00 -0700

There's a nice R-J obituary for the Station Casinos patriarch, although you won't find it in Saturday's online edition, inexplicably. You have to go back and root around in the "Breaking News" box from Friday. (By the time the R-J gets "this Internet thing" figured out, it'll have gone out of business.)

Over at the Sun, investigative reporter Jeff German has penned an even more thorough retrospective, with particular emphasis on the late Frank Fertitta Jr.'s philanthropic activities. Considering how many nastygrams have been appended to the R-J valedictory, one is thankful that the Sun elected to disable "Comments" for its obit.

Chintz thy name is ...

Sat, 22 Aug 2009 00:40:00 -0700

... Harrah's Entertainment. We've just returned from the formal opening of Matsuri. The 8 p.m. show started at 8:16, due in no small part to the fact that the Imperial Palace had one usher working the entire showroom. One showroom. One usher. By the time a reinforcement showed up, the damage had been done. (Oh, and the cocktails there are awful. It's enough to give temperance a good name.)

The new Imperial Palace bartender.

Matsuri itself is very good, that rare show which gives real meaning to the baneful phrase, "high energy." It's like all the fun, acrobatic parts of a Cirque du Soleil spectacle minus the fey pretentiousness. Or, as the saying goes, "All killer! No filler!" (Really.) The only regrettable element is Matsuri's playing in a venue that's badly understaffed.

Harrah's Entertainment: Where the customer almost matters.

Frank Fertitta Jr., R.I.P.

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:00:00 -0700

Bingo Palace: From little acorns did big casinos grow ...

The founder, patriarch and presiding genius of Station Casinos, has died after cardiac surgery at Cedars Sinai Hospital. Confirmation has been obtained by the Las Vegas Sun's Jon Ralston. (The R-J is presently AWOL on the story.) During his lifetime, Fertitta saw the company he founded grow from little Bingo Palace (now Palace Station) to an 18-casino powerhouse. Alas, he did not live to see it re-emerge from the bankruptcy into which his heirs toppled it.

S&G conveys its condolences to the Fertitta family and to Station employees.

11:59 p.m. for Midnight Jim

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 12:38:00 -0700

• Bad news for Gov. Jim Gibbons: Were he to run against former Attorney General Brian Sandoval (or rather, vice versa) undecideds would have to break 3-to-1 in Midnight Jim's favor for him to win the primary. Dr. Joe Heck and North Las Vegas Mayor Michael Montandon, thanks for playing; maybe you'd prefer to take on Sens. Harry Reid or John Ensign instead.

• Good news for Gibbons: The Mason-Dixon poll used a pitifully small sample (400 respondents), although the resultant margin of error -- 5% -- still doesn't afford Midnight Jim much hope. And even the anemically polling Rory Reid needs only 4% of undecideds to put him across the top vs. Gibbons, if the poll is to be trusted.

• Good news for Republicans: Sandoval would cruise to victory against any Democratic challenger. I've interviewed Sandoval in his gaming-regulator and AG days, and -- other than then-Sen. Richard Bryan -- he's probably the classiest public servant I've dealt with in Nevada (close third: then-Secretary of State Dean Heller). He's got my vote unless perhaps his opponent is ...

• Oscar Goodman. The World's Happiest Mayor will be made more joyful still to see himself trouncing both the spineless Barbara Buckley and the surprisingly unpopular Rory Reid. (The son does not also rise, it seems.) During Hizzoner's recent 70th birthday celebration, the Fremont Street Experience showed a montage of Goodman family photographs (births, weddings, bar mitzvahs, etc.). After the seedy sexual shenanigans of Messrs. Ensign and Gibbons, Oscar looks -- dare I say it? -- downright wholesome.

• Bad news for Goodman. Even he loses to Sandoval in the theoretical general election ... but the generous (6%) margin of error and large number of undecideds hold out a slim Reid, er, reed of hope.

I still say: Run Oscar, run! Goodman vs. Sandoval would be the best choice Nevadans have had in 12 years. Sandoval knows how the levers of power work in Carson City (unlike maladroit Midnight Jim), while a Gov. Goodman wouldn't be afraid to put some elbow grease and forceful rhetoric behind his budget proposals, unlike former Gov. Kenny Guinn. Nevada would be well-served by either of them.

Illinois does it again; Storm over CityCenter

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 15:07:00 -0700

A new law in Illinois that legalizes video poker statewide may have some unforeseen consequences. Namely, video gambling at truck stops throughout the Land of Lincoln. This represents a much bigger expansion than was originally sold to the public. Whenever you think Illinois' casino industry has finally hit bottom and might begin to recover from previous legislative sabotage, it gets pushed off yet another cliff. New casinos licenses may soon be available in Missouri (1) and Iowa (4-5). Riverboat operators in Illinois should seriously consider hoisting anchor and moving across the river.

CityCenter suit. This one alleges basically that MGM Mirage pumped and dumped its stock, and misrepresented its chances of funding CityCenter. The allegations may prove more entertaining than true but they will certainly make lively reading.

Wait Until Dark. If you prefer an evening at the theater to curling up with a lawsuit, you can't go wrong with CSN's presentation of Frederick Knott's 1966 thriller.

Just what the doctor ordered

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 14:29:00 -0700

With Eastern Division President Carlos Tolosa calling it a day, Harrah's Entertainment is dispatching Atlantic City native Don Marrandino to try and turn things around out there. (No word on whether the Alizma triplets will accompany him eastward.)

Marrandino's portfolio will encompass far more than Harrah's quartet of A.C. properties but his entrepreneurial flair is something that the Boardwalk and Marina districts could sorely use. Gross profits were down 20% in 2Q09, with only Boyd Gaming's Borgata (+8%) bucking the trend.

S&G wishes Marrandino luck in his new assignment. He'll certainly be missed back here. One doesn't know what to expect from successor Rick Mazer, currently Harrah's top man in Indiana. Following an exponential expansion of Horseshoe Hammond, it's become The Casino That Ate Everybody's Lunch. However, the re-branded Horseshoe Indiana, at the southern end of the state, has been losing market share. Maybe taking the Caesars name off the place wasn't such a good idea, after all? Harrah's bought a brand (Horseshoe) with great equity but has mostly bumbled thereafter.

Did you know that the Greek Isles is a gold mine just waiting to tapped? So says a flack for the new owners, who enthuses, "Although the current environment in Las Vegas is challenging, the property’s exceptional location, as evidenced by its proximity to the proposed Convention Center expansion and recent hotel/casino developments on the north end of the Strip, should provide the new owners with significant upside potential through a redevelopment or repositioning of the hotel as the market recovers."

Yup, between stalled, bankrupt Fontainebleau and a proposed Convention Center addition (unlikely under current austerity budgets), the Greek Isles is a can't-miss investment. Where else can you see so many parking lots and garages from the comfort of your hotel room?

But seriously, folks ... how did anyone ever get a $120 million appraisal (or an $83 million purchase price) on a hotel-cum-slot route that's losing over $1 million a year? If the Greek Isles were a dog, somebody would have put it down by now.

That half-assed wrap on the would-be-classy Mandarin Oriental has also drawn the attention of Steve Friess. And it turns out that The Rio isn't the only Harrah's property in Vegas badly needing a paint job, either. The Paris-Las Vegas balloon has seen better days, too. This sort of chintziness was only to be expected once Texas Pacific Group and Apollo Management got their claws into Harrah's, but nobody wanted to hear about it back in the day when the words "private equity" sent analysts and regulators into a delirious swoon.

Goliath, by request

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 12:35:00 -0700

For those of you have been asking about Goliath, here he is during last Friday's visit to Mountain Vista Animal Hospital:

At the time, he was understandably shy and a little bit frightened ...

... but on Monday he abruptly emerged from his shell and became quite gregarious. He's settling into foster-home life. Rascal, the resident male, has taken a paternal interest in Goliath and they've playing Hide & Seek, as well as curling up together. I do miss having Goliath around the office, though.

Quote of the Day

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:30:00 -0700

"Obama is deluded if he thinks this will win him any peace or respect or Republican votes. Weakness does not lead to consensus in Washington. It leads to more weakness. The Party of No intends to bring him down and will pile on. Obama has inadvertently demonstrated their strategy of vicious invective seems to be working."-- William Greider on President Obama's timid, appeasement-based approach to the health-care debate. I wish I could quote the whole thing but you can read it here.

Update: The previous blog entry, "This just in ..." has been augmented with the extended-play version of the "Heil Hitler" hoedown at Stoney's. In it, Connie McCrazy (or whatever her name is), reveals her 100-proof ignorance of several facts ... such as that federal funding of abortions is illegal. Probably shouldn't be, but it is.

This just in ...

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:17:00 -0700

If getting slammed in a Time Magazine cover story weren't indignity enough for one week, Las Vegas just made national headlines again -- and in a very bad way. That crackpot (below) has handed Vegas' detractors one more stick with which to belabor our noggins.

Reality check

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 20:10:00 -0700

It's sackcloth-and-ashes time at the Las Vegas Review-Journal, which ran another "The end is nigh" story about falling gambling revenues. (The Aliante Station Effect appears to have petered out in North Las Vegas.)

Yes, we're all the way down, down, down ... to 2004 levels. If we take the Wayback Machine five years into the past, we find the Nevada Gaming Control Board reporting a 6% increase in revenue from June 2003. And June '04 was an "off" month for a year that was distinguished by double-digit growth in casino revenue.

Aliante Station: played out?

That same August, the cost of the MGM Mirage takeover of Mandalay Resort Group inched past the $8 billion mark. "[B]ut Wall Street analysts ... said the merger still makes sense for investors and the combined company," wrote the R-J's Rod Smith. Weeks earlier, regulators signed off on the $1.3 billion Boyd Gaming/Coast Casinos merger; Station Casinos, Las Vegas Sands and MGM were all recording record-setting financial performances, and Harrah's Entertainment was girding itself for the conquest of Caesars Entertainment. Heck, the industry was feeling sufficiently bullish to absorb a 0.5% hike in the privilege tax. Read one headline, "State gaming revenue on a roll."

Had the industry lived within its means, today's narrative would be quite different. The Las Vegas Sun helpfully charts the inflation and collapse of the casino bubble, which lasted a good three years, peaking in October '07.

Unfortunately, when what went up eventually had to come down, some companies discovered themselves overexposed and with no margin for error. The likeliest victims, though, are the marginal, standalone properties which might find themselves squeezed out of existence as aggressive discounting by MGM and Harrah's brings quality Strip hotel rooms into the "affordable" realm (Or, as Phil Satre puts it, when the A-level product is priced below the B-level product.)

Valuable perspective is to be had by reading (or watching) this roundtable discussion with three men who dominated much of the gaming industry in the Nineties and early into the new century. Ex-Harrah's CEO Satre has earned the right to be a Monday morning QB. After all, he never did anything so stupid as strapping $30 billion in debt onto his company's back.

Former Station CFO Glenn Christenson seems deeply in denial at many points, though even he concedes, "It wasn’t so long ago that we hated conventions as an industry and now it’s critical to our operations. We’re severely damaged by that loss." But ex-Boyd prexy Don Snyder nails it when he describes "a false sense of security" pervading the industry, adding "I think we all got caught up in that."

2004, meet 2009, where "up" is the new "down."

Goliath awaits

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:32:00 -0700

A reader asks: "Doth thou humble Fasolt not feel intruded upon? Or does he reside at home whilst you work?"

The latter. Fasolt's sheer preponderance, not to mention his total aversion to the litter box, militate against taking him anywhere. However, he loves people and used to "assist" me at Casino Executive Magazine on select occasions. He's also got the good people at Mountain Vista Animal Hospital (one of Vegas' greatest treasures) eating out of his paw. He gets a hero's welcome every time he boards there.

Goliath, meanwhile, has found a foster home, which means he will not be a pleasant distraction at work. The "Colony Capital strikes (out) again" post was written with tiny Goliath asleep on my right knee. In two weeks, he should be ready for adoption, although we'd like to make sure he's going to a good home. At a mere 7-8 weeks, he's far better disciplined than some of my adult cats.

Quote of the Day

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:23:00 -0700

"[Ryan Miller can] lead the University of South Carolina to the SEC championship and the national championship!" -- Gamecocks head coach Steve Spurrier, exuberantly unaware that the student in question plays trumpet, not football. But never underestimate the power of a killer marching band.

Colony Capital strikes (out) again; Big Bleauh

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 17:02:00 -0700

Despite taking a 22% gouge out of expenses, Colony Capital and its Goldman Sachs sidekicks managed to convert a 2Q08 profit to a $10.5 million 2Q09 loss. Revenues were down $30 million (or 40%), half of that from diminished room bookings. Could the service cuts be driving the revenue plunge? It wouldn't be the first time we've seen "death spiral" management be a company's undoing.

It's certainly interesting to see the bracing effect the recession has had on Vegas casino execs. They, who once took convention business for granted and looked upon conventioneers as less desirable than gamblers, have had a salutary wake-up call ... hopefully not too late.

Colony also threw in the towel on Resorts Atlantic City, although it left CEO Nicholas Ribis behind to run the place. That means he will serve two Boardwalk masters: The Resorts mortgage holders and Colony, with whom he co-owns the Atlantic City Hilton and which Ribis has also been running (into the ground, some charge). What happens if it's in Resorts' best interest to steal business from the A.C. Hilton?

It's difficult to decide who was more foolish here: Colony, for borrowing 2.5X the value of a casino whose best days were behind it, or the bankers who secured $360 million in loans with a $140 million casino. Let the floggings commence!

Speaking of death spirals, when you can get an Imperial Palace room for $18 (as an acquaintance recently did), who'd stay in Mesquite? That exurb's travails continue drag Randy Black's oligopoly down with them. Scant competition appears to have bred slackness and complacency in the Mesquite and Primm markets. It may be mere coincidence that the competition-rich Laughlin market has suffered to a much lesser degree ... but I don't think so.

Defaulted interest payments, renegotiated loan covenants, drawn-out cash reserves ... these are some of the unappealing alternatives facing Planet Hollywood. No property's struggle is fun to watch but this one is sadder than most because there's been considerable reinvestment (and some stunning redesign) made to turn the ex-Aladdin into something viable. However, all Robert Earl's horses and all Robert Earl's men have come up a bit short.

Plummeting ADRs have precipitated this crisis and, although losses at Planet Ho have consistently narrowed (and continue to do so), this isn't the first time we've heard that Earl's place was really struggling. And, no matter what Earl does, his casino-hotel has intractable, customer-hostile design flaws that cannot be solved by any means short of implosion.

I've been given reason to believe that whoever ends up owning the physically and fiscally bloated ($4.4 billion, at latest count) Fontainebleau, it won't be Penn National Gaming (at least not unless it's free and clear, and presumably cheap -- a tall order). If Steve Wynn has indeed already spurned F'bleau that'd leave Apollo Management, which never saw a bad casino investment it didn't like, and this one's nearly $1.8 billion underwater.

F'bleau would also give Master of the Universe Leon Black a de facto Harrah's Entertainment property on the north Strip, although Harrah's needs to fill thousands more hotel rooms like it needs a gaping hole in the noggin. Considering that it costs Boyd Gaming $3 million a month to keep Echelon on ice, preserving the F'bleau monstrosity until such time as new rooms can be absorbed seems a better use of capital than trying to finish the accursed thing.

Shakeup at Sands. Geez, you don't think executives on the chopping block could have anything to do with Genting Bhd's rival project getting ahead of slow-moving Marina Bay Sands, do you? Naaaaah! After all, the executive situation at Las Vegas Sands has been so very tranquil this past year. Just ask William Weidner ... or Bradley Stone or ...

Blogging and cats ...

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 15:30:00 -0700

... do not mix well, as you can see:

Goliath, the one-pound, two-ounce kitten we rescued from the I-15 "on" ramp by Caesars Palace, is climbing all over Yr. Humble Blogger -- as shown -- and, more to the point, all over my computer keyboard.

Goliath has not, however, so much as paused on Joel Stein's controversial Time cover story ("Welcome to Fabulous Less Vegas"), thereby proving Rita Mae Brown's adage that a page upon which a cat will not deign to sit is probably not worth reading anyway. Goliath's reign as LVA kitten-is-residence will be brief; a foster home has been arranged, pending his eventual adoption.

Quote of the Day

Sun, 16 Aug 2009 11:44:00 -0700

"What makes the show powerful is not nostalgia for an America that few want to bring back — where women were most valued as sex objects or subservient housewives, where blacks were, at best, second-class citizens, and where the hedonistic guzzling of gas and gin went unquestioned. Rather, it’s our identification with an America that, for all its serious differences with our own, shares our growing anxiety about the prospect of cataclysmic change. Mad Men is about the dawn of a new era, and we, too, are at such a dawn. And we are uncertain and worried about what comes next." -- Frank Rich, on tonight's timely return of Mad Men and on its relevance. From where I sit, watching cable news, I wonder if more than a "few" want to bring back the America that Rich describes.

Saving money? Buy the Trop!

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 17:57:00 -0700

If you're looking for a bargain on the Strip, what about buying the Tropicana Las Vegas? The Las Vegas Review-Journal found that Onex Corp. got $440 million worth of equity (or a 61% share) for a Filene's Basement price of $137 million. That would make the "street value" of the whole Trop $228 million, or $6.7 million an acre -- a fifth of what Wall Street valued it at the peak of the Aztar Corp. feeding frenzy. Columbia Sussex won, Pinnacle Entertainment lost ... and Pinnacle wound up being the lucky one, as ColSux toppled under insupportable debt.

The Trop's "paper" value would put it in the Treasure Island class, at $733 million. But you'd need an electron microscope to find the Trop's recent EBITDA, so nobody's going to pay Phil Ruffin-sized dollars for the place now. New owner Onex is a private equity firm that dabbles in real estate and sundry other industries. However, unlike some recent bunglers in the casino industry, Onex had the smarts to hire Alex Yemenidjian to head up its casino efforts, first in Illinois and now on the Strip. Compared to those private equity confreres who bought into the industry at its apogee, Onex's Trop move looks downright brilliant.

Kitty rescue at Caesars; Stingy Station

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 13:43:00 -0700

As we were driving to LVA HQ this morning, we spotted a disoriented-looking little cat running through the Flamingo Rd./I-15 interchange, across from Caesars Palace. We were in a quandary about what to do until it turned and started ambling down the I-15 "on" ramp, heading straight for certain death. I ran down the ramp after it (the kitty's a fast little bugger), scooped it up in one hand and ...

Well, what to do? I am now the custodian of a small, tuxedo-patterned kitten who may be carrying God knows what infections. It's too docile to be a feral cat but it's definitely going to need a new residence. So if anybody reading this can lend a helping hand to a homeless kitty, contact me at dmckee@huntingtonpress.com. I could just plop the wee bairn out in the LVA parking lot, along with our resident strays, but they're all massive and it would be a very Darwinian situation, I fear.

Cheesparing at Station: The formidable Jean Scott has news of some recent and untoward developments at Station Casinos, as the bankrupt company resorts to new "economy" measures. While the Fertitta clan sinks approximately $90 million into Orange County mansions, they're recouping the cost of their poor business decisions out of their customers' hides.

Random observations: Last night, we celebrated my Better Half's birthday, partly at Cadillac Ranch, which seems to have an identity crisis. Its menu is slightly countrified (in a C&W sense), its walls are covered with photos of Baby Boomer rock stars (think Steven Tyler) and the video feed is heavy on hip-hop. Go figure. The root beer float is very good, though. At 10:30, as though by prearranged signal, an incoming tide of douchebags flooded the joint and we split ...

... the classy southern façade of Mandarin Oriental has now been marred by a building wrap, high up on one corner. It's small by building-wrap standards, managing to both spoil the view and look like a timid half-measure ...

... speaking of building wraps, Criss F. Angel has long since been evicted from the eastern façade of Luxor. A new wrap was placed on the northeast corner of Luxor's ancillary hotel, but it's also smallish and -- due to way the hotel's buttresses jut forward -- hard to see if you're driving into Vegas from the south. Then again, if I were MGM Mirage, I'd probably want to downplay with association with the widely ridiculed Mr. Angel, too.

Quote of the Day

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 13:05:00 -0700

"But what's missing, tragically, [from the health care debate] is a diagnosis of the real, far more fundamental problem, which is that what's even worse than its stratospheric cost is the fact that American health care doesn't fulfill its prime directive -- it does not help people become or stay healthy. It's not a health care system at all; it's a disease management system, and making the current system cheaper and more accessible will just spread the dysfunction more broadly." -- Dr. Andrew Weil, arguing that our current system is not only costly but cost-ineffective, delivering Third World-quality care. On another front, the White House is evidently selling us down the river on drug affordability and bringing back torture. That's what people should be worrying about, not "death panels" and birth certificates.

Fun with geography

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 21:29:00 -0700

Is there no end to Middle Eastern perfidy? You turn your back for even a minute and gosh darn it all if Egypt hasn't snuck through Israel and moved its whole doggone country to the shores of the Persian Gulf.

Looking on the brighter side, you can now say that a certain news channel couldn't find Iraq on a map and have it be literally accurate. Also, I guess this means our long-suffering troops are no longer stationed "in Iraq." It's too good to be true!

Karma's an S.O.B.

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 18:52:00 -0700

For the second time in a week, a defect in our blogging software caused it to crash just as I was fine-tuning a lengthy, multi-faceted (Russia, Macao, Missouri, Illinois and points east) collection of dispatches. I must have done something to piss off the cosmos because it's repaying me, with interest. Argh!

Anyway, please try to imagine that you're reading something really informative and wide-ranging in this space because what was supposed to be here now only exists as a memory. I had hoped to bring you some hard news today but all I've got to show for an hour's work is this futile rant.

I was just saying ...

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:55:00 -0700

... to a colleague that, given Atlantic City's dismal July numbers, a plea for governmental assistance had to be just 'round the corner. Well, whaddya know? In at least five instances, Atlantic City's casinos are run by companies that just reported profitable quarters, while four more just changed hands for pennies on the dollar. Not to mention that Colony C(r)apital, owner of the remaining two, supposedly was willing to put some or all of $244 million into bankrupt Station Casinos.

I don't mean to sound unsympathetic, but ... considering that Garden State citizens are being asked to tighten their belts, forego tax rebates and the like, if the casino industry needs $20 million to market itself then it can damn well pass the hat and raise the cash in-house. Besides, there's something unseemly about "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" capitalists clamoring for guvmint subsidy, especially in a state filled with people who are in much greater need. (Yes, I know these are interconnected issues but we're talking casinos that gross hundreds of millions of dollars every month. They're not exactly paupers.)

The article's final paragraph (misleadingly) implies that Trump Entertainment's three casinos, the Tropicana Atlantic City and the two Colony properties are all in danger of closing. But might Atlantic City be better off with five -- or six, if Revel can be finished -- strong casinos, whilst the sicklier ones are put out of their misery?

A reader posed that question to me ... and now I pass it along to you.

Some local blogger ...

Tue, 11 Aug 2009 14:52:00 -0700

... has taken to railing on behalf "the pre-born." So, by logical extension, that makes those of us who are no longer fetuses "the pre-dead." Now there's a cheery thought to take us through the week.

Stanley Ho, ailing monarch

Mon, 10 Aug 2009 12:02:00 -0700

Not many of us make headlines by waking up in the morning and saying something. But when the future of over 50% of Macao's casino market hinges on A) your health and B) your plan of succession, and C) your name is Stanley Ho ... well, it's a big deal. Macau Daily Times is reporting that the elderly Ho is both conscious and articulate. However, it's also saying that he needs further surgery to extricate blood clots from his brain. My suspicion that the gambling oligarch suffered a stroke (or something very close thereto) and not a simple slip-and-fall -- was first reported -- is hardly dispelled by this latest news.

For reasons I was in the midst of outlining last Friday, just before the Big Computer Freeze destroyed it all, we're far from out of the woods on this. Also, the gathering of family members around the patriarch's sickbed is -- due to various business agendas -- somewhere between courtiers hovering around an ailing monarch and vultures circling potential prey.

Alas, all that must go onto the back burner until I deal with some outstanding business that includes reviewing L.A. Comedy Club at the Four Queens and Tickled Pink at Planet Hollywood. We had some extra time before the latter last night to contemplate CityCenter. Whether one likes it or not, it's going to make several nearby properties -- I'm looking at you Monte Carlo and especially New York-New York -- look very antiquated, bordering on tacky. With a few exceptions, the Wynn-initation themed resorts are proving to have surprisingly short shelf lives.

When hackers attack

Fri, 07 Aug 2009 15:35:00 -0700

Unlike the now-debunked ATM scams at the Riviera and The Rio, this is the real deal, as it played out at Mount Airy Casino in the great state of Pennsylvania:

Quote of the Day

Fri, 07 Aug 2009 13:34:00 -0700

"There was a time I greatly respected Mike Ensign for what he accomplished in the gaming industry. After his son John's affair broke the news I wondered how this would affect the reputation of his father. Then we find out that his father and mother paid off the Hampton's [sic] in what has become a monumental scandal. In the end this has greatly reduced the reputation of the Ensign name in Las Vegas. Actually so much so that Ensign has become synonymous with hypocrisy." -- "LVPaco," commenting in the Las Vegas Sun. The elder Ensign's "pattern of generosity" to Doug and Cynthia Hampton has complicated his attempts to obtain one of Kansas' four casino licenses. Also, GOP efforts to field a candidate against Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) have been torpedoed by Ensign Junior's wayward penis.