Thread: The American Dream - Viva Las Vegas Style

The American Dream - Viva Las Vegas Style

by SARTRE
January 2, 2011

With every New Year’s resolution, optimism and even the expectation that the future will get better has long been a staple within the popular culture. By nature, people want to believe in a better society. The American Dream means different things to diverse people, but it always had a vision for great achievements and daring exploits. America was great because she dared to forge an independent and freedom loving country.

Las Vegas is the kind of region that evokes strong and varied reactions. Many people see Vegas as freedom and a state of mind, while others curse it as a Sodom and Gomorrah, den of iniquity. Yet when you strip away the glitz, glamour and gambling, you get down to the real guts of the metropolis – MONEY.

The casinos may have a license to coin chips that translate into cash, but the overarching experience of the facade generates a broad base economy that has little respect for the fiat paper notes that pass for legal tender. The saying "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas" really applies to the money you bring when you visit. Lately this huge cash cow machine moos not because it is content, but because the feed supply doesn’t meet the obligations and indebtedness of this dreamscape.

Examine the enormous project called City Center. The Wall Street Journal reports:

"The $8.7 billion project, with its hotels, condominiums, casino and giant mall designed by Daniel Libeskind, is the largest privately funded construction project in the U.S. It was supposed to usher in a new era of sophistication and urban living in the gaming capital. But it almost collapsed before it opened, and because of its huge scale, its fortunes and those of Las Vegas are closely linked.

Over the summer, executives of Dubai World and MGM Resorts International, which jointly own the project, studied and rejected closing two of the site's three hotels and the Viva Elvis Cirque du Soleil show, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

The documents show that the partners have also outlined a plan to seek relief on the terms of the complex's $1.8 billion loan, which requires the joint venture to earn far more cash than currently seems feasible. If they can't renegotiate the terms, City Center could be in default on the loan as early as mid-2011".

Could this be the next "Too Big to Fail" rescue candidate for a midnight stealth earmark coming from the lavish Senator Harry Reid? Politics aside, why was this project ever built? The clear answer suggests that Excess as a Way of Life is the basis for monumental scale developments.
Take a word from the environmental "true believers" SUSTAINABLE. Is the economics sound for a project that constructs such opulence? Certainly, Las Vegas is not the only area that labors under the illusion that the flow of riches will never end. Someone forgot to tell the developers that building on sand dunes have an added cost.

The LV Review Journal cites "Las Vegas lost 13,400 construction jobs, a 23 percent decrease, the Washington, D.C.-based contractors association reported. Overall, the city has lost an estimated 55,000 construction jobs since the recession began -- roughly half of its construction work force -- leading to one of the nation's highest unemployment rates at 14.3 percent in November".

Is Las Vegas Collapsing?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIf70VN5 ... r_embedded

October 08, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/03/us/03 ... _nagourney

CNBC quotes: “Washington is unpredictable these days,â€

I work for a ticket and tour company here in Vegas....It is amazing how people still flood here....and they still buy tickets to the shows....A lot are buying upper balcony seats (cheaper)....but they are still coming and still going to the shows..... what recession???????????