Free Republic

Thirty years ago, disgraced Atlantic City Mayor Michael Matthews stood in front of a federal judge and pleaded guilty to accepting a bribe from an FBI agent posing as a mobster. It was 1984. Atlantic City was a boomtown then, just six years into the casino gambling era that was going to remake the shabby resort town that I was assigned to cover as a reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Every day, I watched as buses from up and down the East Coast dumped thousands of slot machine mavens and roulette table hopefuls at the eight gambling palaces that had...

No matter what you think of Pete Rose, you can't deny what an electric moment it was on September 11th, 1985, when Rose became baseball's all-time major league hit leader -- a record that still stands today. And yet, the debate over whether his cardinal sin -- gambling on baseball -- should keep him out of the Hall of Fame for life remains as fierce as ever, as correspondent Lee Cowan explains in a profile of Rose, to be aired on CBS' "Sunday Morning" October 19... Take our poll! Do you feel Pete Rose should be inducted into the National...

It never ceases to outrage when those who abide unabashedly and unrepentantly in sin claim to be Christians. Like the two churchgoing San Diego couples whom we previously wrote about – Will and Shirley and Nate and Faith – whose idea of a small group was a casino gambling ring. They were featured in the documentary film “Holy Rollers: The True Story of Card Counting Christians.” More recently there was Alexis McGill Johnson, who this past spring became the chairwoman of Planned Parenthood, the nation’s foremost abortionist. Johnson publicly professes herself a Christian but thinks there nothing wrong with killing...

As one Atlantic City casino after another shut down and left thousands of workers jobless, Mayor Don Guardian insisted that the meltdown that claimed four of his city's 12 casinos since January was actually the opportunity of a lifetime for savvy investors. On Wednesday, someone finally agreed. A Canadian asset management company won a bankruptcy court auction for the failed Revel casino hotel and announced plans to re-open it as a casino....

Trump Plaza Hotel & Casino closed its doors early Tuesday, the fourth Atlantic City casino to go belly-up so far this year. When it opened on May 14, 1984, Donald Trump called it the finest building in Atlantic City, and possibly the nation. But since then, The Donald has left town and cut ties to its casinos. And the Plaza, like many Atlantic City casinos, has seen better days.

For those who promote legalized gambling as a means of economic development or revitalization, or as a painless way to pay for public schools, the recent news from Atlantic City, New Jersey, is sobering. Dominated by its famous boardwalk, the beach resort is familiar to Americans from the popular game of Monopoly, the Miss America pageant and the Democratic Convention that nominated Lyndon B. Johnson for president. Almost 40 years ago, when casino gambling was prohibited by every state except Nevada, New Jersey voters succumbed to a slick campaign that promised to remake the fading resort into Las Vegas East....

Republican Gov. Chris Christie's administration issued a directive Monday allowing the state's casinos and racetracks to offer sports betting, a move likely to be challenged in court by sports leagues. The governor said he took his cue from previous federal court rulings that found that nothing in New Jersey law prohibits the casinos and horse racing tracks from offering sports betting, so long as it's not sponsored or licensed by the state. Soon afterward, one racetrack, Monmouth Park in Oceanport, said it was preparing to offer sports bets "in the very, very near future."

Three premier Atlantic City casinos will be closing in the next two weeks with the lost of almost 6,000 jobs. Another casino closed earlier this year, making the total job loss close to 8,000 - one quarter of casino employment in the city.Over the last few years, tax revenue from casinos has fallen precipitously which have led to massive budget problems for the city. The recession is to blame, but Atlantic City's problems go deeper than it being a one industry town. Philly.com: The closing of three casinos, starting with Showboat and Revel this weekend followed by Trump Plaza two...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Chuck Todd, the new host of NBC's Meet The Press, suggested that Americans who do not pay income tax fund public education more than the rich by buying lottery tickets and going to casinos. While interviewing Ben Carson on CSPAN's After Words, which aired on Sunday, Todd said that Americans who don't pay federal income tax go to casinos or buy lottery tickets and are "spending more money funding our schools, whether it's Detroit or other places." Todd said that though "they are not writing a check to the federal government," poorer Americans "are contributing arguably more money to education...

Some of the newest incarnations of fantasy football look a lot more like gambling than intricate, outsmart-your-opponent strategy games. Since 2011, the billion-dollar fantasy market has been infused with dozens of daily and weekly games. Those games allow players to win huge prizes quickly, sometimes in one week, sometimes in just one night. With players betting thousands or even tens of thousands a night, legal experts believe it's time to review the section of the 2006 federal law that was written specifically to protect fantasy sports from being banned the way online poker was. "There's importance in clarifying the law,"...

Gambling might join the list of Baltimore City's problems after Horseshoe Casino opens Aug. 26. As the city touts 1,700 new jobs, millions in education funding and an expected economic boost, new billboards advertise hotlines for gambling addiction, a dark side to Horseshoe’s shiny exterior. A moral gamble? With a median household income of $35,000, Park Heights is among Baltimore City’s poorest ZIP codes. In 2012, however, it led state lottery ticket sales, with a total of $34 million, according to a Capital News Service analysis. Father Zaborowski compares gambling spending to alcohol and drug addiction, which plague the neighborhood,...

By this point, you have made up your own mind, as so many of us have. You are from one of two camps. One is the "hasn't Pete suffered enough? The other is the "Pete got exactly what he deserved" I occupy the former.

They’ve turned to politicians, bureaucrats, businessmen and union reps to try to save their jobs at three Atlantic City casinos scheduled to close soon. Now, hundreds of soon-to-be unemployed dealers, cocktail servers and hotel workers are turning to what many say could be their last, best chance. “We’re praying for God to open new doors to them,” said Rev Eric McCoy, president of the Atlantic City Fellowship of Churches. Clergy members and the main casino workers union organized a rally and prayer service Wednesday night for the nearly 8,000 workers who will be jobless when Revel, the Showboat and Trump...

The winning streak has run cold for Atlantic City, N.J. Earlier this week, the upscale Revel Casino Hotel announced it will close, bringing the total number of casinos in the city expected to close by the end of the year to four. Thousands of workers are confronting unemployment. The state has long guaranteed Atlantic City a monopoly on gambling within New Jersey's borders, but gambling revenues there have been declining due to increased competition from new casinos in neighboring states and the lingering effects of the financial crisis. The monthly report from the state Division of Gaming Enforcement issued Wednesday...

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-12/atlantic-city-faces-downward-spiral-with-revel-s-demise.html

Before Maryland’s largest casino opened less than two miles away, convenience store manager Chirag Patel was hoping to sell more lottery tickets than he was already moving. “We were doing very good business with scratch-off games,” he said. “I was trying to get another terminal” from the Maryland lottery commission. Then the massive Maryland Live opened near his Dash In gas station, and in the two years since, he estimated, his lottery ticket sales have gone down by 25 percent. And so has his commission, which used to be about $3,000 a month. Maryland lottery commission officials can commiserate. On...

Kelsey Zachow bought the ticket on Friday the 13th last month, but didn't even know she had the winning slip until 11 days later. The mom of a 7-month-old, Zachow will take home $27 million in the lump sum payment after taxes, and plans to quit her jobs.

Sure, Las Vegas is known for its casinos. But just because Sin City has the highest concentration, that doesn’t mean it has a monopoly on gambling. If Vegas isn’t your thing but you still want to hit the slots and be entertained, then seek an alternative at one of these non-Vegas casinos that are getting the most Yahoo searches.

ATLANTIC CITY - The list of casinos closing or expected to close here just keeps growing. Trump Plaza Hotel & Casino will likely shut its doors for good in mid-September. Trump Entertainment Resorts told The Associated Press that it expects the casino to close its doors Sept. 16. No final decision has been made, the company said, but it “expects that it will terminate the operations of Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino on or shortly after September 16, 2014.”

Pete Rose has a vision. Someday his career hits record will be tied, and he will respond with one final turn at bat. He will roll a single up the middle and crawl to first base for No. 4,257, reclaiming his title as Hit King. Rose related this fanciful dream on the phone the other day, at the end of a lively conversation. The problem with the story, obviously, is that he is 73 years old and has been barred from baseball since 1989. But there has to be a better ending out there, somehow. Life is good for Rose....