Posted on 01/26/2006 8:45:41 AM PST by Fedora
Makes you wonder if Harry Reid was behind the initial revelations of Jack Abramoff's lucrative representation of the Indian tribes. He gets a twofer - the tribes' lobbying activities are crippled, which helps his Vegas mob patrons, and he pins a scandal on the Republicans to take the heat off himself. With his connections, it would have been easy to set up a middleman to feed the Washington Post all the dirt on Abramoff and the tribes.
Excellent work! Thank you.
Bump
Link to Part 1 HERE
Reid is about as dirty as they come.
Interesting idea. I hadn't considered that possibility--will look into it--but it does seem clear he's been doing damage control in Abramoff-related matters, at a minimum.
newsmind.org has a very interesting article, "The Senator's Sons, about Reid inserting legislation which rewarded his sons and other relatives. Conflict of interest? Nawwwwwwwh.
By which I mean, "damage control" in the sense of trying to steer the Abramoff inquiry away from his own role and towards the political opposition.
Well done, sir. Thank you.
Ping in response to your question about Reid's son from the other thread--thanks for mentioning that.
Generally very good work with your research. I agree that the Reid family is as crooked as they come.
However, that being said, I don't necessarily agree with your painting Rory Reid, acting on behalf of Lady Luck, in doing anything particularly shady with respect to signing the settlement with FinCEN for the 25 unfiled currency transaction reporting forms. Most casino companies that have run into this problem (i.e. failure to file the forms) typically settle their fines with the Federal government for much less than the full penalty (e.g. MGM MIRAGE back in 2003 and Station Casinos in 2003 or 2004--I can't quite remember off the top of my head). It would only make sense that as legal counsel for Lady Luck, Rory would have been heavily involved the settlement--it's not an uncommon thing for any casino's legal counsel to do. It doesn't mean the casinos that run into this problem are intentionally trying to break the law. Usually it means that someone wasn't properly supervising their Reg. 6A Compliance Specialist whose job it is to ensure that these CTRs are filed correctly. I'm not saying that the casinos don't break the law if they fail to follow it, but I'm just saying that this particular point you are making usually doesn't originate due to an intention to break the law.
Thanks for your comments. Yes, I'm not automatically assuming there was any intent to break the law in that instance, and I tried to word myself accordingly to leave that open (I'm posting this in the hope that someone with better resources than I can investigate some of these topics further and perhaps find information I'm not aware of, and they may well conclude there was no wrongdoing there). That may be consistent with a regular practice. However in this particular case I do wonder if there was a quid pro quo involved due to the peculiarity of this situation where the legal counsel was also the son of a Senator lobbied by the industry and contributed to by the company in question. In either case Rory Reid's relationship to Lady Luck was an important chapter in the history of his relationship to the casino industry so I wanted to cover it.
Fair enough. One can certainly question his involvement, given how shady the family generally is. But one has to also understand that Las Vegas, though considered a relatively large city, is still a very "small town." Everyone knows everyone and there are a lot of close ties between people in the casino industry and every other major profession in Nevada. Believe me when I say that to the outsider, virtually every legal transaction made by the gaming industry would appear to be a conflict of interest because the entire economy of this town (and possibly the rest of the state) is driven by the gaming industry. You won't find this is the case anywhere else in the country--at least not to the same extent.
I also just wanted to make sure that people understand that, for the most part, FinCEN violations are generally pretty common in the casino industry (not just in Nevada) due to the huge amount of cash transactions that flow through them--there are bound to be oversights.
Still, I appreciate all of the research efforts you have made. It certainly does shed light on the need for further insight.
But Harry is a member in good standing, how could this be.
Your point is well-taken and I agree with the need to point things like that out to put things in perspective. Thanks for providing some informed commentary on that.
Incidentally another thing about Lady Luck I'd mention is the fact that it was doing business outside Las Vegas as well, so the economics and politics of other regions where it was doing business are also factors to consider. Lady Luck's venture into Mississippi was part of a broader expansion of the casino industry into that region in the 1990s. This hasn't gotten as much attention as the expansion of the Indian casino business during that period but I find it equally interesting, and I wonder what state and national politics were involved in that.
Well, well, well
Great work. I had read that reid's son or sons was/were dirty, but didn't know any details.
The answer to your question as to how extensive the state and national politics are involved in the granting of casino licenses is--it depends according to the jurisdiction. In Nevada, for instance, it's very little. Anyone who applies for a license, can pass the background check and can prove to the Gaming Control Board theirs would be a viable business, would be able to get the license. However, in certain states, particularly the Midwestern gaming jurisdictions like Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, etc., there are a limited number of gaming licenses available--often this is because the restriction was legislated in order to address the social concerns over even legalizing gaming in the state in the first place. Therefore, there is certainly the greater likelihood of politics playing a role in who gets the license.
In the case of Lady Luck, fortunately the entrance into Mississippi is relatively easy--i.e. the licensing process (and entire internal control structure for that matter) generally follows Nevada's system as it was modeled after it. The only really messy part of MS licensing is that currently a casino must be a "riverboat"--which has generally restricted the number of licensees just by sheer geographical constraints. However, in the wake of the effects of Hurricane Katrina, recently there have been rumblings about even changing that restriction. Still, I personally would tend to believe that in Mississippi, names mean more than anything else. In other words, the government would likely grant a license to a well-established casino company than to just an ordinary little upstart casino.
In these other markets where the licensing is a bit more selective, I guess the best answer as to whether politics play a role is to follow the money.
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