Legal wonks are getting all worked up about the Supreme Court‘s upcoming hearing of Christie v. NCAA, with one saying it had the “markings of a sleeper blockbuster.” Wrote Virginia Solicitor 
General Elbert Lin and deputy Thomas M. Johnson Jr., “The parties and their counsel give the case an Ali-Frazier feel. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie versus the National Collegiate Athletic Association and all four major professional sports leagues (the National Basketball Association, the National Football League, the National Hockey League and Major League Baseball). Former U.S. Solicitor General Ted Olson versus his successor (and his principal deputy) Paul Clement. For Supreme Court junkies, you don’t get much closer to the Thrilla in Manila.
“Congress can no more mandate that states not repeal or modify certain existing gambling laws than it can dictate to states how they must regulate radioactive waste or obligate state law-enforcement officers to conduct background checks,” Lin and Thomas added. The American Gaming Association‘s Stacy Papadopoulos piled on: “The harm of such federal overreach is more than purely structural,” she wrote. “Preserving a state’s autonomy to enact, enforce, modify, and repeal its own laws as it sees fit protects individual rights and promotes democratic accountability. [The Bradley Act‘s] effect on New Jersey’s long-running effort to legalize and regulate sports betting is a prime example of what happens when the people who are required to enforce a law are prohibited from changing that law to reflect new circumstances or evolving public opinion.”
OK, they’ve persuaded me. But I doubt you could sell pay-for-view tickets to the oral arguments.
* Donald Trump‘s mob associations continue to dog him like an ineradicable odor. This week the Guardian pounced on newly classified documents regarding a failed Australia casino push. It 
was rejected as being “dangerous” and “unacceptable … the Trump mafia connections should exclude the Kern/Trump consortium.” The Donald’s design concept drew praise, with terms like “rich, attractive and well-integrated,” and “strong public appeal” garlanded like laurels.
Aside from Trump’s Mafia proclivities, the criticisms of his joint venture were familiar ones: exaggerated projections of casino revenues, a lack of financial viability and “the tender is not financially viable on the basis of expected returns to equity investors.” In the end, Trump was deemed “unqualified” … something of an understatement when one recalls his serial failures in Atlantic City. Just imagine how much worse the Trump Taj Mahal bankruptcy would have been had not Trump been talked out of his desire to use real marble throughout the entire resort.
* Staying in the Pacific Rim, the fastest-growing casino market is … the Philippines. An investor note from Morgan Stanley projects a 25% growth rate for gross gaming revenue. What’s more, Okada Manila is expected to leapfrog Solaire Resort & Casino and City of Dreams Manila, capturing 32% of market share compared to Bloomberry Resorts‘ 30% and Melco Resorts & Entertainment‘s 25%. Okada Manila had a December opening so soft that there’s was no gambling taking place, but this doesn’t stop analysts from projecting a $1.2 billion gross by 2019. At maximum capacity it will have 500 tables and 3,000 slots.
* Galaxy Entertainment and Melco’s designs on Japan may be in peril. The government of China has imposed an outright ban on overseas investment in gambling, which it characterizes as an “irrational” use of capital. Morgan Stanley calls it “part of the 
precautionary package to prevent a rebound in capital outflows. Policy makers are also concerned about the potential investment loss and financial risk related to the takeover of ‘trophy assets,’ a lesson they might have learned from corporate Japan in late 1980s.”
Said Zhou Hao, analyst with Commerzbank AG, “China wants its money to focus on specific sectors that can help boost long-term growth potential. The new policy also tries to close the loophole of suspicious capital outflows and possible money laundering.” This isn’t the first time someone has voiced the fear that Chinese casinos could be acting as a laundromat of cash.
* To win at blackjack at Harrah’s Las Vegas you need only get to 11 … if you’re playing Easy Jack, a new game being field-tested while it awaits Nevada Gaming Control Board approval. It’s a home-grown product, developed by students at the University of Nevada Las Vegas‘ Center for Gaming Innovation, a marvelous incubator for outside-the-box thinking. Companies and gaming labs are always trying to improve on traditional blackjack but, with the growing popularity of table games, it only behooves them to keep making further attempts to ring changes on old formulae.
