More than the presidency is changing at Borgata (with Travis Lunn having left to head up Mandalay Bay). Out goes the carpeting, to be replaced with the cool tones shown at the top of the above photo. Our man in Atlantic City is not pleased with the flooring switcheroo: “When Ocean Casino replaced their carpet a few years ago, the carpet colors were bright and attractive. Last year, Bally’s replaced their carpet. The carpet colors are bright and attractive. Did Borgata’s new, blue-tone carpet come from a discount carpet store? Shame on MGM Resorts International for the choice.” (We confess we actually like it.)
Bally’s Atlantic City grows more hostile toward the handicapped every day. Our correspondent shares a recent experience. “One of the two elevators to the valet was ‘out of service’ and the other ended up over an inch lower than the floor level. I had to put the elevator’s alarm switch on, so I could get my wife’s electric cart off the elevator. What was the response to the alarm? Nuttin’. Remember this was Bally’s.” The use of the past tense may be appropriate, especially with Soo Kim‘s company being so hard up for money.
That wasn’t the end of the Bally discontents, either. “Our region had very heavy rain and high wind on Saturday, so we stayed the whole day at Bally’s. We ate ‘dinner’ at the alleged VIP lounge. One of the two dinner choices was Mussels Fra Diavolo. The dish had two tiny mussels over spicy pasta. I sent it back and ordered the chicken over polenta (not a typo). It was a good-sized portion. It’s now Sunday morning, and, as usual, Bally’s Internet doesn’t remember me from yesterday. Next we go to Borgata and MGM’s system will remember me from the prior visit, even it it was months ago.” Yup, Bally’s Corp. has taken over as the casino chain where the customer almost matters (Caesars Entertainment used to enjoy that dubious honor, back during Gary Loveman’s reign of error).
The Casino Reinvestment Development Authority is evidently hard up for ideas of what to do with all its lucre. It just lavished a half-million dollars in post-Covid stimulus money on a questionable venture. “It is for UFC wrestling at Boardwalk Hall the end of this month. New Jersey is a disaster when it comes to spending money. [Editor’s note: Not half as much as Nevada.] The Covid funds should have been spent for something, anything medical, not for one stupid event that benefits a private entity.” Indeed.
While on the subject, Gov. Phil Murphy (D) also gave state bailout money to another Atlantic City event, this one a mite nobler. Murphy “‘rescued’ this year’s Atlantic City Air Show by grabbing $300,000 from the South Jersey Transit Authority. You may ask, why does the agency that oversees the Atlantic City Expressway and the Atlantic City Airport give away auto toll money and airport fees to an air show? Because Murphy already gave away $500,000 in unused Covid money to another entity [see above], and he had to get the dollars from somewhere else.” In other Murphy family news, first lady Tammy Murphy has declined to opposed Sen. Robert “Gold Bars Bob” Menendez (D), who now looks certain to lose his primary bid to Rep. Andy Kim (D).
Does all this mishegas make you want to reach for some loco weed? Stroll on over to the Boardwalk’s Claridge Hotel, where a $4.5 million lounge for consumption of wacky tebaccy is in the works. High Rollers is taking up part of the former casino floor, whilst trying to preserve the hotel’s historic look. Naturally, New Jersey and the CRDA are doing everything they can to thwart a new source of revenue, mostly through the imposition of red tape.
It’s not just conservatives who see signs of the Apocalypse in the coming of sports betting to North Carolina. Liberal columnist Rob Schofield is rending his garments today, saying the gambling ads are “a vexing sign of moral decline” in the Tarheel State. We think the fact that a Holocaust denier may be the next governor of North Carolina is an even more vexing indicator, but let’s let that pass for the moment. Schofield harkens back to the days when talk of gambling on collegiate sports “was enough to sound deafening alarm bells and prompt investigators to swoop in from all corners.” No longer and he rates that a Bad Thing. Schofield laments that sports celebrities “are paid vast sums to make an additive and frequently destructive product seem glamorous and alluring.”
In this shift, Schofield sees a collapse of old-school evangelical standards. He notes that the Christian right is silent on the issue, for the most part. He observes that, when it comes to greed and predatory behavior, the evangelical element seems to be all for it, or at least complicit: “For years, groups of the Moral Majority ilk have stood idly by as predatory lenders peddling usurious and addictive ‘products’ like ‘consumer finance loans,’ ‘payday loans’ and ‘car title loans’ vacuumed up billions of dollars from low-income households and regularly convinced lawmakers to enable their rip-offs.” But to equate sports betting and gambling with predatory lending? That strikes us as an argumentative bridge too far. Big Gaming is—or shouldn’t be—promising anything in return. It is gambling after all and even when it’s ‘gaming,’ no game comes with victory guaranteed.
Quote of the Day: “Right now it feels eerie, like it feels like an imitation of what it used to be … a place that should be full of life and vibrance just kind of slowly decaying until it inevitably falls.”—young Las Vegas photographer Alex Gassaway, who is documenting the decline and fall of the Tropicana Las Vegas. Wisdom from the mouths of babes.