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Vegas Casino Boss Bets Heavily Against Dems
Flamboyant, controversial Las Vegas casino owner Steve Wynn wants to tip the odds against what he calls Obama's "socialism lite" agenda.
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The chairman of Wynn Resorts Ltd., which operates casinos in Nevada and Macau, China, announced this week that he plans to throw himself into defeating Democratic candidates in the 2010 midterm elections. His comments called to mind the powerful political apparatus he built in the 1990s as part of his Mirage Resorts that registered thousands of voters and poured millions of dollars into the coffers of Wynn's favored candidates. Indeed, he indicated he may establish a Wynn Resorts Political Action Committee.
In 1994, Wynn declared, "We're in the political business now," and set about building a formidable political machine that funded candidates and gaming lobbyists throughout the country. With polling, voter registration, and get-out-the-vote canvassing operations as sophisticated as any national political party, Wynn was soon considered the most powerful figure in the state of Nevada. "Steve Wynn's control over politicians is all-encompassing,'' a former Las Vegas City Council member told The New York Times in 1998. ''It's overwhelming. Either you work for him or he tries to get you out of office.''
In addition to hosting fundraisers at his lavish resorts, he can be expected to provide campaign information to his 14,000 employees and their families. While he can't dictate how his employees will vote, in previous election cycles he issued a voter guide with stars next to the names of his preferred candidates.
Wynn has been on the talk-show circuit in recent weeks, accusing Obama of mishandling the economy and claiming government work programs foster communism. While highly critical of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Wynn, a Republican, had warm words for Nevada's senior senator, Democratic Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid. "My friend of 40 years will protect Americans from this kind of foolishness," Wynn told the Las Vegas Review Journal. "Remember, Harry is a conservative Democrat from Searchlight."
Rival casino executives at MGM Mirage and Harrah's Entertainment were quick to respond that Wynn's opinions were not reflective of all Las Vegas casino operators. Meanwhile, under the gamblers-usually-stick-together rule of thumb, Michael and Sharon Ensign -- the casino-owning parents of scandal-ridden Nevada Republican Sen. John Ensign -- each donated the maximum $4,800 to Reid's re-election campaign, according to federal filings. Onetime rivals, the two Nevada senators formed a "nonaggression pact" in 2000 to focus on the interests of their home state. With gambling the leading industry of the state, such bi-partisanship is nothing new when it comes to Strip politics.
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Sally Denton
Sally Denton is an investigative reporter and the author of six books, including American Massacre, The Pink Lady: The Many Lives of Helen Gahagan Douglas, and, with Roger Morris, The Money and the Power: The Making of Las Vegas and its Hold on America.Related Articles
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Comments (12)
beckjr2000
6:17PM Oct 21st 2009
(1) 
libslie0066
6:20PM Oct 21st 2009
(3) libslie0066
6:22PM Oct 21st 2009
The American People have no reason to trust you, or believe that you will submit your version of the original deceptive, outrageous piece of legislation that started all of the opposition across this Country.
The fact that you have publicly written off all the opposition as lunatics, trouble makers, and the fringe right in this Country tells me that you are so far removed from the feelings of the people in this Country its outrageous.
All local, State, and Federal elections going forward will send a message to you, and your tight nit group of left wing fringe legislatures that won't be hard to interpret.
The Democrat Party needs to take its party back and soon, or it will suffer for years to come.
No Nationalized Health Care, No reduced benefits for Seniors, No benefits in this legislation for Illegal Aliens(and that includes no Amnesty for existing illegals), and absolutely no new taxes on the backs of people that work for a living.
You are supposed to be a leader, you think you are a leader, and neither could be closer from the truth.
Every time you address an issue, you ignore common sense, you protect those in your party that don't belong in Congress, crooks, tax evaders, and organizations like Acorn.
All those in Congress that continue to ignore the American Public will not survive their next attempt to return to Congress, the voters will say NO.
Its just plain unbelievable to me that a person who is given the trust of the people to serve in Congress can do the kind of poor job you have done, and are still doing.
I hope your piers remove you from your position as soon as possible.
I hate writing such a negative letter, but your performance is so bad, its impossible to ignore.
If it was up to me, you would be fired on the spot.
No need to respond, there is nothing you could say that can undo the damage you have already done to the nation. You are one of the most unpopular members of Congress I have seen in 40 years of following the process.
Repectfully Resentful,
Bob/Illinois
(9) callandrew
7:23PM Oct 21st 2009
(-5) bonbon
2:37PM Oct 23rd 2009
basic healthcare
and
socialized medicine.
(1) bonbon
2:39PM Oct 23rd 2009
I am a Professional Registerd Nurse, IE an RN
licensed by the State of NY
(1) libslie0066
6:23PM Oct 21st 2009
Barack Obama promised "transparency" and to give the public five days to read the bill, but Sen. Jim Bunning's amendment to require the bill, along with a final Congressional Budget Office score, to be posted online 72 hours before the vote was defeated. Reps. Brian Baird, D-Wash., and Greg Walden, R-Ore., have been trying to get the House to agree to post the bill 72 hours before the vote. Most Republicans have signed on, but the Nancy Pelosi leadership is unwilling.
The Democrats still hope to rush the bill through unread. The 1,100-page stimulus bill was posted online only 13 hours before the vote ... More
Barack Obama promised "transparency" and to give the public five days to read the bill, but Sen. Jim Bunning's amendment to require the bill, along with a final Congressional Budget Office score, to be posted online 72 hours before the vote was defeated. Reps. Brian Baird, D-Wash., and Greg Walden, R-Ore., have been trying to get the House to agree to post the bill 72 hours before the vote. Most Republicans have signed on, but the Nancy Pelosi leadership is unwilling.
The Democrats still hope to rush the bill through unread. The 1,100-page stimulus bill was posted online only 13 hours before the vote, and the 1,200-page cap-and-trade bill was posted only 15 hours before the vote.
Obama promised that the health care bill would not cover illegal aliens, but Sen. Chuck Grassley's amendment to require immigrants to prove their identities with photo IDs was rejected.
Obama promised that if you like your current health insurance, you won't have to change it, but Sen. John Cornyn's amendment to assure present insurance owners that they wouldn't have to change their coverage and that they could keep the coverage they have with their current employers without government driving up cost was defeated.
Obama's appointment of 34 czars includes a health care czar, but Sen. John Ensign's amendment to require any health care czar to be subject to the constitutional Senate confirmation process was defeated. Obama's new regulatory czar, Cass Sunstein, defends removing organs from terminally ill patients and from deceased people, even when they did not consent to be organ donors.
Obama promised that under his plan, "no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions," and his press secretary, Robert Gibbs, tried to divert attention from this bold lie by obfuscating the Hyde Amendment. But the Hyde Amendment is not a law; it's a one-year-at-a-time rider that applies only to current Medicaid programs, and it would not apply to the health care law.
The Democrats five times (twice in Senate committees, three times in House committees) defeated amendments to prohibit the health care plan from spending federal money or requiring health insurance plans to cover abortions. They also defeated Sen. Orrin Hatch's amendment to respect the conscience rights of health care workers who do not want to perform abortions because of moral or religious objections.
One amendment that did pass was Sen. Maria Cantwell's amendment, which would give the secretary of health and human services the power to define cost-effective care for each medical condition and to punish doctors who treat high-cost patients with complex conditions. That has been Obama's goal from the beginning and inevitably will lead to the "death panels" Sarah Palin warned about.
Former Sen. Tom Daschle, who was scheduled to be health and human services secretary or health care czar until he had to bow out, said that the law should be written in generalities so the bureaucrats can fill in the details. Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, brother of chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and a key Obama health care adviser, may be behind the stimulus legislation that will send "embedded clinical-decision support" to doctors via computer to warn them about what is "appropriate" and "cost-effective," backed up by the threat to impose financial penalties on doctors who are not "meaningful users."
The Democrats' health care "reform" would carry a trillion-dollar price tag, vastly increase the national debt hanging over our children and grandchildren, impose socialist control over one-sixth of our economy, and force us to obey totalitarian dictates. The mandate on employers to provide health insurance would result in lower wages and fewer jobs.
The mandate on individuals to buy health insurance or pay a penalty, even threatening jail for those who fail to conform, amounts to a massive tax increase on individuals and families whose health insurance may lack all the new federally specified requirements.
Obama's "spread the wealth around" policy is evident in the big expansion of Medicaid combined with large cuts in Medicare. Former Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt says that the combination of mandates to buy insurance, guaranteed issue, and community rating amounts to massive income distribution that is hidden from public view and not even debated.
Finally, we are subject to the deviousness of what House Minority Leader John Boehner calls the 70 phantom amendments, which were added in secret after the bill was voted out by the committee. The bill may be even worse than we think.
(5) libslie0066
6:24PM Oct 21st 2009
(5) RICH05
12:15AM Oct 22nd 2009
(4) rickskbc2112
3:31AM Oct 22nd 2009
(3) SMITDOG
10:34AM Oct 22nd 2009
(-4) ruben
2:54PM Oct 23rd 2009
Mr. Wynn practices the same policy by robbing the tips from the dealers to pay his supervisors instead of paying them himself. What a hypocrite.
(-1) 
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