Rating: 
Summary: Using the Juice
Review: "Sixty years ago, Las Vegas was a gritty, wind-whipped crossroads of faded [houses of ill-repute] . . . and honky-tonks with stuttering neon." "It is a city in the middle of nowhere that is the world's most popular destination." The city is all about "diversion, entertainment, money, sex, escape, deliverance, another chance, a last chance, and another life for a few hours, days, forever." From these threads, the authors portray Las Vegas as the archetype of what America is becoming. Whoever has the money calls the tune, whether it be crooks, hustlers, businessmen or politicians. The person who controls the action "has the juice" and everyone dances to that person's tune. The basic story line is that Las Vegas has never seen money or people it didn't like. From Las Vegas, the authors tie the corruption centered there to the United States government, many foreign governments, Nevada government, and to many other institutions and facets of American life.Although the book covers the last half century of Las Vegas, the book also deals with the roots of the town earlier. The real focus, however, is on the most wide-open gangster years in Las Vegas from the 1940s through the early 1960s. You will learn a lot about Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, Benny Binion, Senator Pat McCarran, and Hank Greenspun who were the major figures involved in the early development of Las Vegas. What may be news to you is how many "above-board" people were involved with gangsters. Most of them will be names you recognize, and some will be attached to people you admire (possibly like the Kennedys, Richard Nixon, or Lyndon Johnson). I suspect that one of the reasons that the book focuses more on the early years is that it takes a while for investigative reporters to locate all of the crooked deals that have gone down. By now, everything up the the Kennedy assassination is probably pretty well exposed. While not so much is said about the 1990s, you are left wondering if perhaps the gangster infuence may not be as great now, or just isn't exposed as much. As someone who follows public companies that do business in Las Vegas, I have certainly noticed that profits from the casinos are more measly than make sense now. Is someone else getting the rest? In the old days in the cash room, it was "three for us, one for the government, and two for Meyer [Lansky]." The book details the role of Las Vegas in laundering crooked money, skimming off profits for mobsters, and suppressing competition for gambling revenues. The mobsters appear to have been buying politicians (on both side of the fence) all along, and gotten their money's worth. As described, this may sound shocking to you. On the other hand, I noticed that there was little in the book that had not already been reported many times before. The book's genius is its ability to connect the dots so that you see the pattern of corruption behind glittering lights on the Strip and in Glitter Gulch. The authors also detail some of the social problems in Las Vegas, including the history of racism, high rate of suicide, rough treatment of workers by casinos, prostitution, drugs, and lack of cultural activities for a city of its size. Interestingly, Las Vegas has been the nation's fastest growing metropolitan area for a long time. It does make you wonder about what may be coming if other areas follow this example. The book's main strength is the writing style of the co-authors. They make old news fresh and interesting. The sentences and their images are vivid and clear, as the quotes in the beginning should show. The book has three main weaknesses. First, the case isn't really made that this pattern of corruption is developing in the same way elsewhere. Perhaps it is, and perhaps it isn't. But having raised the point, I would have liked to know more. Second, there is some unnecessary repetition in the book. Juicy stories seem to be retold just to get the reader excited, rather than to add new information. Third, a lot of the characterizations are based on who hangs out with whom. The degree of connection can never be exactly established, so the case may be understated or overstated. Obviously, if there were more information it would have been revealed. I did have one check on the book that you won't have. I have spoken with one of the people profiled in the book by telephone. During that experience (the details of which I promised to keep confidential), I definitely came away with the feeling that something was wrong with the person I was talking with. The material reported in this book about this person certainly fits in with my impressions of someone who was not strictly on the up-and-up. I think the main question raised by this book is how much the social fabric is at risk with criminals having so much influence in the United States. The answer would seem to be quite a bit. Be sure you know whom you are dealing with before you go ahead.
Rating:
Summary: Mirage in the sands
Review: For the younger generation of American and tourists of the world, Las Vegas is a city of glitz and extravagance; however, underneath all the light, noise and the make believe world of casino there lies a deeper truth. "The Money and the Power" by the husband and wife team of Sally Denton and Roger Morris tells the story of the true Las Vegas that sprung up in the sands of southern Nevada after WWII. The book tells the story of the important figures that shaped, started, bribed, killed, strong armed their way to start an empire that became the city of the 21st century. The book encompassed such figures that we might have seen in movies that tried to portrait the lives, but this book does it much better and more colorful. People like Lansky, Bugsy, Wynn, Binion, Kennedy, Reagan, Clinton, the Mormon Church, Union members, etc. This book is a must read ("I can't put it down", "up all night reading it", "Kept me on the edge of my seat", "So-and-So at their best", "Buy a copy now!", "Must have in your library", etc) not only for people who are fascinated by the city and its glitz. But also for the people who are interested in the history of southwestern United State, the Teamsters, politicians, and of course, the Mobsters (Syndicate) that started all this with the downtown casinos and progressed to the strip with its mega-billion dollar hotel/casino. Thumbs up!
Rating: 
Summary: Liberal America-Hating Bombast
Review: I could kick myself for having purchased this book. This book represents irresponsible history writing at it's very worst. I recall reading reviews when it was first issued in Hard cover and only vaguely remembered them. I WISH I HAD. The incessant ranting about how awful Las Vegas is and it's allegedgely pernicious corrupting of America was just too much to take. Morris and Denton take their liberal hyperpole to new depths. In addition their tenuous links of wrongdoing by political leaders in cahoots with the criminal underworld don't hold up under close inspection. His attempt to link Pat McCarrans chairmanship of a Senate committee in the 40's to America's ultimately failed involvement in Viet Nam would be laughable if it weren't written with such conviction. This is only one example of many attempts to link Las Vegas issues and people with unfortunate historical outcomes. I could not finish this TRASH!!!! Whatever you do DON'T BUY THIS BOOK!!!!!!!!!unless you are a graduate of the Oliver Stone deluded conspiracy American hating school of hyperbolic bombast.
Rating:
Summary: Unbelievable and completely believable account of Las Vegas
Review: I've been going to Las Vegas with my folks since 1955. The place has always facinated me. Why would so many go to this America Mecca? How were the politicians, beauracrats, mafia, drug lords, entertainers all comingling in the oasis? I've never considered myself particularly naive politically, but after having read this book, and the accounts of all the seedy characters that have made Las Vegas and Nevada what it is today completely blew me away. I now realize that the glitz and glitter of Las Vegas is and always has been just a carnival act in the midway, hiding a much more elaborate and dynamic show which not only controls the city, but our government as well. No kidding - when we stayed at the Sands Hotel in the 50's, you could walk to the back of the parking lot and see nothing but desert all the way to forever. The city was built for many reasons, but greed and power seemed to rise above all else.
As it says in the book, Lansky new that their were only 2 kinds of gamblers, winners and losers. The winners always owned the games. Great book. If you love Las Vegas, if you love the adrenaline that flows though your body as you approach the #1 city of the 21st century, and if you wonder why you feel so emotionally and economically drained when you leave Las Vegas, this book will fill you in. It can get a little slow, but the information is well worth the read. I especially enjoyed the information on Steve Wynn. Truly fascinating.
Rating: 
Summary: OK, but not 5 stars
Review: Sorry, I see the reviews here for this book which is why I ordered it, and it certainly does NOT read like a thriller. I labored through about 300 of the 400 pages. The authors are little overboard on the whole conspiracy issue, Kennedy, Lansky, Hoffa, Hughes, Wynn, Nixon, Bugsy, etc. An argument can be made that any major metropolis; NY, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, is the center of an international crime network, how they try to link Las Vegas to some of them is too much. Las Vegas is not the heart of all things evil. There is a great deal of chronological detail in the beginning and then many time skips and jumpbacks, very annoying. Good points; details on many back stories on the "founders" of Las Vegas, deals, side deals and stuff you didn't know. If you look what was there in 1950 compared to what it there today it is astounding. 100,000 hotel rooms in the middle of the desert, billion dollar structures dedicated to our fascination of beating the house. Without our desire to gamble the city could never have reached its growth and popularity. The authors detail the influential power of gaming, but casinos have as much clout as any other trillion dollar industry.
Rating:
Summary: Stay Away!!!!
Review: The book has some excellence. It is also extremely breathless in its pace, the way a lot of muckraking books are, and it suffers from an unfortunate habit of inserting the most mundane phrases in quotes and following them (or preceding them) with attributions like "with what one casino manager called" or "as a team of writers would see them" or "as one journalist reported." Entire paragraphs without attribution (except maybe in the endnotes) that beg for it -- and then in almost every paragraph, one of these pointlessly recurring attributions. It makes for an annoying reading experience. Either cut back on the pointless attributions, create your own descriptions for what you are attributing, or don't attribute at all.
Rating:
Summary: The Root of All Evil
Review: The Money and the Power begins as an intriguingly detailed history of Las Vegas, digging deep into mobster mythology to present a "true" history in a field steeped in mythos. The underlying theme is that the peculiar set of circumstances that allowed legalized gambling in Nevada have allowed the corruption the entire (presumably previously uncorrupt?) country. This is an interesting argument, and at first the authors do a good job of marshalling impressive battalions of detail into a compelling narrative. Soon, however, the prose turns oddly purple, and each chapter end seem culled from gothic melodrama. Readers of James Ellroy will recognize the basic scenario from his American Tabloid/Cold Six Thousand series, but it plays better as hard-boiled fiction than curiously naive history. One can agree with many of the authors' historical points without concuring with their increasingly strident and unsupported conclusions. When the corporations finally take the casinos over from the mob, we're told they are in fact no different from their murderous predecessors. The proof: they routine lobby congress for legislation favorable to legalized gambling, and because the casino business is very profitable, they routinely get what they want. This dastardly turn of events has surely never happened in this country before... The first half of this book can be recommended as an impressively researched and well-written chronicle of Vegas' early days. But the later portions, long on hysteria and short on clear analysis, are tough going.
Rating:
Summary: Don't buy this book! Money corrupts!
Review: There - I summed it up for you. Don't waste your time or money on this overwrought, tedious tome. Everyone knows Vegas is the most bald-faced money grubbing society that ever sprouted and grew like a gorgeous weed over it's desert home. Yes, it's spores spread far and wide on the wind all the way to Washington. We live in a capitalist society, corrupted by that which we worship, the almighty dollar. Yes, Vegas is an American Mecca - but the authors should have stopped there, and quit while they were ahead. Even the most innocent tourist understands the allure of Sin City, and why it is mirror to our soul - greed. Why a major terrorist attack hasn't occurred there is beyond me. For all their efforts, the authors sabotage their own case with details that achingly splinter and never resolve. I never did find out why Bobbie Kennedy attacked Organized Crime if his family had such close ties to it. Whatever - don't bother with this book - unless you are fascinated by writers who blather on and on in well articulated sentences and ten dollar words that say nothing at all. The better bet is to go to Vegas and put your money in a slot machine - at least you'll have a ghost of a chance on enjoying your gamble. The Money and the Power is a loser.
Rating:
Summary: Stay Away!!!!
Review: This book is nothing more than the authors' rants against U.S. politics, and its alleged ties to the criminal underworld. The book is laughable in the extremes the authors go take to link almost every U.S. President since JFK to the criminal underworld. The worst part is that most of the so-called evidence for these links is from "anonymnous" or "un-named" sources. Do yourself a favor, and read something else.
Rating:
Summary: History of Vegas. Reads like a college class.
Review: This is a complete history of Vegas from the slant of the author. While there is plenty of information, that's part of the problem. Sometimes there is just too much information. With research this voluminous, the authors had to make some decisions about what areas to cover. Generally, they focused on bankers, journalists, politicians and gangsters. An inordinate amount of time was spent tying the gangsters to the CIA and plots to kill Castro. But is that really part of Las Vegas history or national politics? You should also be forewarned that the number of pages allocated over the past 20 years appeared to be much lower than coverage from '45 to '70. Overall, I became somewhat bored although I did learn quite a bit. The FBI agent Yablonsky trying to work in an environment where many times he was considered an enemy was particularly interesting. Also, the journalist who wrote about Steve Wynn but not is effectively muzzled by Wynn's legal action shows where the true power is in Vegas. Sometimes too much information detracts and for me that was the case here. I enjoyed the book "Casino" more which focused just on the gangsters move to Vegas as well as their eventual demise.
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