Tropicana of Cancer; Bucking the system

Alex Yemenidjian‘s efforts to reboot the Tropicana Las Vegas are sputtering quite badly these days. First, there’s the much-reported mess that is the Mob Experience, currently on the lam from foreclosure. Then a three-month extension of Gladys Knight‘s A Mic and a Light was foreshortened almost as soon as it had been announced. (The Trop’s showroom is a vortex of failed or truncated acts.) Now the much-ballyhooed alliance with Nikki Beach has gone bust … and not in a silicone-implant sort of way. Nikki-tines were sacked en masse in the Trop’s coup de la plage, marking the abrupt end of a 16-week sojourn. Even on good nights, the Nikki Beach-dedicated parking lot rarely looked better than half-full. No wonder the operation was running at a loss. (One less place for Dennis Rodman to hang out? Aw, darn the bad luck!)

But soft! Nikki Beach is threatening to unleash its legal beagles upon the Trop, seeking to shut down operations at the beach, Club Nikki and Café Nikki. The latter is really good, by the bye, so eat there while yet you may. For a while, Yemenidjian had the Midas touch but a growing inventory of missteps must have folks in Illinois saying thanks that Trop owner Onex Corp. lost out on the Des Plaines casino bidding. Victorious Neil Bluhm not only enjoyed a gangbusters opening but has rival casinos eating his dust. Would somebody on the Strip please sell that man a casino site?

Internet gambling’s future in the U.S. remains inscrutable. Among recent setbacks is the imminent collapse of Washington, D.C.‘s attempt to became a haven for cyber-poker. The enabling legislation may soon be repealed and it’s hard to blame opponents. Problems dogging the abortive launch include a sloppily written contract, obscure domestic investors and a Greece-based operator (Intralot) that is — surprise! — presently under scrutiny. There’s nothing to be done except …

… keep butting one’s head against federal impediments, as lawmakers in New Jersey are doing. Sports betting is seen as a pacemaker for the Garden State’s dying horseracing industry and is the only surefire way of slowing Atlantic City‘s slide. Based on recent polls, Jersey voters would be an easy sell. However, the Justice Department clings to its view that the ancient Federal Wire Act (a relic of the Prohibition Era) prohibits sports wagering in all but a handful of states that enjoyed ‘grandfather’ exemptions several decades later. Gov. Chris Christie (R, right) refuses to confront Washington’s, meaning that lawmakers will have to keep forcing the issue. Without a full-fledged courtroom confrontation in re the Wire Act — undoubtedly climaxing at the Supreme Court — there’s no hope for changing the status quo.