Near Super Bowl LVIII, a posted sign shows why Las Vegas is, uh, different

Posted on by February 4, 2024
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Sign, Nevada State Recycle, Las Vegas

Here’s more evidence that Las Vegas, host in less than two weeks to Super Bowl LVII, is, uh, different than other places. A sign posted prominently by the front door of Nevada State Recycle, one of Las Vegas’s leading recyclers of electronic and other items, lists material that won’t be accepted. The roster starts out rather unsurprisingly–asbestos, raw sewage, contaminated soil, radioactive waste, septic tank pumpings, etc.

Then–almost as an afterthought–there is the final entry at the bottom of what Nevada State Recycle won’t take, in red print, no less:

“Stolen items.”

Yes, in Las Vegas, folks have to be told they can’t get just ditch purloined property–maybe to get rid of the evidence–by handing it to a business establishment that doesn’t pay for donations. You can see the sign in the nearby photo. Continue reading →

New history of American Mafia deals a little with Las Vegas

Posted on by January 16, 2024
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Las Vegas MafiaThe one-liner is in terrible taste, but absolutely too funny to ignore. It’s found in the newly published Borgata, Rise of Empire: A History of the American Mafia (Volume 1), by Louis Ferrante, an ex-Mafioso himself. He describes the 1947 assassination of Las Vegas mobster Benjamin (Bugsy) Siegel, shot from a rifle nine times in the head at point-blank range while reading a newspaper in the living room of his girl friend’s Beverly Hills home.

“With Siegel’s blood and brains all over the newspaper,” Ferrante cracks, “it can be said that the Los Angeles Times got the story first.”

The line comes in “The Desert King Dethroned,” one of two chapters dealing with the rise (and fall) of Siegel as Las Vegas’ most famous resident mobster, despite the fact he lived in Sin City barely a year before his violent exit. But that’s largely it in the book for any history of the Mob and Sin City. Borgata volume 1 ends with the Mob being chased out of Havana after Castro came to power in 1959. This move is widely credited with focusing organized crime on Las Vegas, where gambling already at least was legal and mobsters could skim off winnings, uh, tax-free. I suppose we’ll have to wait for volumes 2 or 3, which Ferrante implies in his text already have been written. (Borgata, by the way, means mafia family, and Ferrante counts 26 of them across the U.S.). Continue reading →

Ho, ho, ho! Faux charity with no track record is back illegally ringing a bell in Las Vegas

Posted on by January 15, 2024
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faux charity’tis the holiday season, when folks are in a generous mode and perhaps have let down their guard. I’m here to warn you about a wolf in charity clothing–“Ray Wolfe,” to be specific.

That’s the new name of the computer-generated voice using soundboard technology that recently cold-called the New To Las Vegas world headquarters. “Wolfe”–I use quotes because there was no such person–wanted me to contribute to something called Police Officers Support Committee PAC, part of another something called POSC PAC. With a sense of urgency, “Wolfe” made an extremely quick general spiel about the urgent need to support law enforcement followed by an extremely quick ask for a donation.

I paused. “What will you use the money for?” I asked.

“Okay,” “Wolfe” said. “Goodbye.” Click.

Totally on the up-and-up, of course. Continue reading →

Las Vegas predictions for 2024

Posted on by December 14, 2023
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Las Vegas predictionsPublished last December, my Las Vegas predictions for 2023 were mainly meant to be satirical. Yet they managed to stumble upon a few grains of truth.

From the New To Las Vegas world headquarters, I divined that Cisco Aguilar, then the newly elected Nevada Secretary of State, would continue the policy of not enforcing a new state law requiring many telemarketers soliciting funds within Nevada for dubious causes to first register their cause with the state. During the year his office admitted this was true.

My prediction that the paid print circulation of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, then 45,383 and upwards of 215,000 as recently as 2015, would fall below 40,000 despite a sharp increase in the local population, proved to be spot on. The count dropped to 39,833.

I opined that Nevada’s unemployment rate would remain well above the national average. And it has. The national average right now is 3.7%. Nevada is 5.4%, or 46% higher. In fact, the Silver State has the highest state rate in the country.

Most of the other predictions bombed spectacularly: that Clark County School District Superintendent Jesus Jara would be fired and rehired yet again, Elon Musk would ban the words “Las Vegas” from what used to be called Twitter, the world-famous “Body in a Barrel” case on Lake Mead would be solved as a non-Mob crime (still no identification).

So with this mixed record, here are my predictions for 2024.They’re still mainly intended to be satirical. Continue reading →