The Green Felt Jungle

"The opening line is: “Las Vegas is a city in statistics only. In every other respect it’s a jungle.” The green felt refers to the covering of the gaming tables. The book documents the corruption in the city during the 1950s and the connection between the Mob and many hotel-casinos. As the opening sentence suggests, it’s kind of pulpy. But it’s also good old-fashioned investigative journalism. Back in the day, muckraking was pretty dangerous. Few were really willing to take on the Mob – that could lead to some bad situations, even death. We don’t even see this kind of writing in Las Vegas very often any more. Now we have a corporate mob that cause publications to fear losing advertising, which seems to be as frightening to them as a threat to break legs. So looking at this book now, it really stands out as good old-fashioned investigative journalism that we don’t see enough of nowadays, particularly in Las Vegas. Plus there’s some personality and vibrancy to the writing which I appreciate. Benny Binion and Bugsy Siegel were like founding fathers for the city. A lot of criminal types were able to come here and not just conduct business but also have a public persona and become active members in the communities. One of the myths about the city is that the Mob still runs the place. Locals kind of laugh at that. Most of us know that in the 1960s and 70s Howard Hughes started buying up these casinos and buying out the Mob. That led the way to corporations taking over casinos. So most locals know that the old mob is gone and that the corporate mob has taken over. You’ll even hear long-time locals lament the fact that organised crime is no longer in charge of the town. A common refrain is things were better when the Mob ran things – meaning crime was isolated to the mobsters knocking each other off in cities outside Las Vegas. People like Sheldon Adelson and Steve Wynn seem very influential in the city, politically. But one complaint locals make, not specifically about Wynn and Adelson necessarily but just about these corporations in general, is that they set up shop here and make billions of dollars but not enough money is put back into the community. So behind a billion-dollar resort you’ll have a playground that is falling apart or a school that’s underachieving. That’s one of the frustrations many locals have."