Can you believe that San José, Costa Rica is the seventh-best place to gamble? It might the best casino town of which you’ve never heard, with 30 
casinos and “a quite attractive exchange rate.” That’s the conclusion of a TravelTrivia.com survey. Other cities that made the elite list included New Orleans (“no shortage of tables and slot machines”), Reno (“a strong and vibrant casino community,” plus proximity to Lake Tahoe), Singapore “has busted out of the gate like that horse you wish you would have bet on” — no argument there, Monte Carlo (“the world’s most stylish gambling destination”), Las Vegas has to settle for the #2 spot because if you’re not in Macao you might as well not be in gaming. Writes TravelTrivia.com, “gambling tourism makes up 50 percent of the economy. That’s a lot! I’d bet it’ll be even more in the next few years.” Don’t let the central guvmint hear you. That’s exactly what they don’t want.
* There was one bright spot amid a litany of mostly depressing news from Louisiana: Video poker revenues were up 1%, bringing in $50 million. As for Eldorado Resorts‘ Belle of Baton Rouge, you wonder if Eldorado can carry that property long enough to sell it. Last month’s $2 million take can hardly have been enough to keep the doors open and the casino is riding a 22-month streak of uninterrupted declines.
* Something is on the upswing: casino self-exclusions in Macao. 291 gamblers asked to be barred from the enclave’s casinos between January and June this year, a 26% increase from last year. While the vast majority were made by the players themselves, 39 were from third parties, such as family members who felt the need to intervene. A strange quirk in the self-exclusion law allows you to pick and choose from which casinos you are barred, if so inclined. However, the self-exclusion policy has teeth. Break it and you’ll find yourself in the pokey for a year.
* Those liberal do-gooders who tut-tut about tribal gambling should visit Cherokee Indian Hospital, a state of the art facility made possible by the revenues from Harrah’s Cherokee in North Carolina. And, unlike their white counterparts, the Cherokee put a high priority on mental health. The psychiatric clinic is almost as big as the regular hospital. “It doesn’t look like a hospital, and it doesn’t feel like a hospital,” a tribal member said of the main facility. “It actually feels good to be here.” The Eastern Cherokee have opted out of the criminally under-budgeted, federal Indian Health Service, apparently with success. If so, they point the way for other tribes which might want to do likewise. Where the Cherokee go, other gaming-enabled tribes are almost certain to follow.
* Except for Danny Boyle‘s whimsical Yesterday there hasn’t been an Oscar-bait movie this year. Sadly, that changed last week when the instantly notorious trailer for Cats (so creepy that I refuse to embed it) landed on the Internet with a thud. Director Tom Hooper (The King’s Speech) is an Academy fave, and Oscar voters lurve musicals, especially bad ones and Cats will give you nightmares. Besides, it’s wall-to-wall CGI, which the Academy can never resist. (Ditto Dame Judi Dench, a terrifying Old Deuteronomy.) So take a dose of brain bleach, head for Atlantic City and put your money down on Cats. I just have this terrible premonition about it. “This Christmas, you will believe” warns the trailer, ominously. Or else.
