Posted on 05/28/2008 5:26:22 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
'Capitalist' dogs casino about link to bad luck -
ATLANTIC CITY - Al Garrett, who has spent more than three years fighting a statue, thinks he has finally hit on a way to win his cold war.
The statue is of Vladimir Ilich Lenin, the communist founder of the Soviet Union. Lenin stands outside the front door of Red Square, the hipper-than-thou, Russian-themed restaurant and bar in The Quarter, the highly capitalistic dining and retail section of Atlantic City's Tropicana Casino and Resort.
And Garrett has objected to the architect of one of history's brutal dictatorships being part of a restaurant's theme statement ever since Lenin's likeness went up early in 2005. Garrett has written letters to the editor. He has made calls to radio talk shows. And he has circulated public petitions demanding that Red Square tear that statue down - or at least move it inside the restaurant, away from where thousands of people walk by it every day.
He doesn't like the idea of Lenin getting a place of honor - or at least high visibility - anywhere in the United States. But it really bugs him that it happened in Atlantic City, just down the White Horse Pike from his Absecon home.
So Garrett, 65, has come up with the ultimate Atlantic City argument as a trump card in his symbolic siege of the statue:
Lenin, he says, is bad luck.
He has been unlucky for the Tropicana, according to Garrett, who points out that the casino has run into several years of troubles since it allowed Lenin to be put on a pedestal. The formerly prosperous casino complex was sold, and after Columbia Sussex Corp. took over in early 2007, the new owners started a round of layoffs that eventually led to much-publicized customer complaints of Trop's rooms being dirty, and plagued by several kinds of bugs and other serious maintenance problems.
New Jersey's Casino Control Commission denied Columbia Sussex a new license last December and ordered the casino sold. Several groups have bid on the property or expressed interest in buying it, but so far, no sale.
"Take that statue out of there and it will change their luck," counsels Garrett, who adds that the way he sees it, the pall of poor mojo extends beyond the people who own the property.
Lenin is also bad luck for the Trop's gamblers, he says, in a bid for public support for his lose-Lenin campaign.
"Write and call the management of the Tropicana," reads a campaign sign that Garrett brings out in public on special occasions, including a recent celebration to mark the opening of the casino's new Havana Rooftop Slots.
The Lenin statue is an "insult ... to our American vets and our troops, and bad luck for you and your customers," Garrett's sign also argues.
So he says Trop's management should be as eager to evict the dictator as he is. Still, a spokeswoman for the casino had nothing to say about Garrett's theory, or his campaign, when a reporter asked for a comment.
But casino security workers told Garrett not to display his sign on Tropicana property when he rolled his wheelchair up next to the Lenin statue the other day. Tropicana security also quickly stopped a photographer for The Press from shooting pictures of Garrett and an ally he has enlisted in his anti-Lenin battle, David Pratt of Atlantic City. (The spokeswoman, Diane Spiers, blamed the photo ban on state rules requiring advance notice to gaming regulators for media pictures shot on casino property.)
Red Square's general manager wasn't so silent about Garrett's lonely cause, though.
"Thanks for the advertising," Joseph Massari told the two statue protesters outside the restaurant.
"The only symbol I'm concerned about is four stars - that's the rating of my restaurant," the executive told a reporter a few minutes later, suggesting that Garrett should find more important causes to worry about.
But Garrett is not deterred. And he expects to win this battle, he says, just as his freedom won out over communism in the Cold War.
"It is uncanny that all these things have happened after they put him up," he said. "You made a bad decision, and you have to live with the consequences."
Or better yet, he hopes, change them.
In Moscow, they have costumed impersonators walking around so tourists can take their pictures. There’s Lenin, Tsar Nikolai, Prince Mikhail and Princess Sophia, even a Putin impersonator (I’m pretty sure it was an impersonator, I don’t think the real Putin would just be strolling around Red Square chatting with tourists)
There is no Stalin impersonator.
The Lenin impersonator is really a very funny guy, he put birdseed on his jacket so the pigeons perch on his shoulders and crap all over his hat and jacket. He told us he is a devout Catholic.
Hitler on the other hand, well he's the epitome of all evil. Pol Pot somehow doesn't get a pass either despite the fact that he basically had the same aims and methods as Stalin.
I really don’t see what the big deal is. So there’s a statue of Lenin out front; don’t overreact to what is essentially nothing but a kooky statement of chic.
You don't have that kind of muscle
How about Soviet kitsch(see post 26)
The gal is one of the quirkiest musicians out there. But she does look great in two of her music videos.
Statues of Lenin out front and if it is like other Red Square themed bars I’ve seen, vintage Stalin propaganda posters inside.
Replace Lenin with Hitler or Robert Byrd in his klan hood and see how well your defense flies.
Did you mean that as a compliment or a criticism towards Regina?
The only drawback to her is that, like most of her peers, she's a lib.
You'd think those who are of Russian Jewish decent would know better.
Anyway, here's a flattering close-up of her:
The latter had to be consumed in-country, eh? ;->
I did not Know Regina was a lib but I guess that should be expected. You would think that being born a Jew in the Soviet Union and living there your first 9 years would make you less of a lib. I wonder how her parents think.
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