Zusatztext The history of Vegas's dark underside . . . has seldom been so abundantly and compellingly told. The Washington Post Book World Riveting. . . Absorbing. . . A saga of underworld subculture that intersects with that of government agents! senators! and presidents and ranges from Cuba to Dallas to Watergate. The Wall Street Journal A must-read. . . . One of the most important non-fiction books published in the U.S. in [a] half century. Los Angeles Times Something on every page hits like a meat ax. In their unsparing! meticulous reporting! Denton and Morris produce a compelling! important dossier. New York Daily News Informationen zum Autor Sally Denton & Roger Morris Klappentext Las Vegas-the name evokes images of divorce and dice, gangsters and glitz. But beneath it all is a sordid history that is much more insidious and far-reaching than ever imagined. The Money and the Power is the most comprehensive look yet at Las Vegas and its breadth of influence. Based on five years of intensive research and interviewing, Sally Denton and Roger Morris reveal the city's historic network of links to Wall Street, international drug traffickers, and the CIA. In doing so, they expose the disturbing connections amongst politicians, businessmen, and the criminals that harness these illegal activities. Through this lucid and gripping indictment of Las Vegas, Morris and Denton uncover a national ethic of exploitation, violence, and greed, and provide a provocative reinterpretation of twentieth-century American history. Now this neon maelstrom of ruthlessness and greed stands to not as an aberrant "sin city," but as a natural outgrowth of the corruption and worship of money that have come to permeate American life.Chapter 1 1.Meyer Lansky The Racketeer as Chairman of the Board He was born Maier Suchowljansky in 1902 at Grodno, in a Poland possessed by Tsarist Russia. As a child he envisioned the United States as a place of angels, "somewhat like heaven," he would say much later. When he was ten, his family fled the pogroms directed at Jews for the land of his dreams. In the Grand Street tenements of the Lower East Side of Manhattan he found not angels but what he called his "overpowering memory"-poverty, and still more savage prejudice. In school, where he excelled, his name was Americanized. Meyer Lansky was a slight child, smaller than his peers. But he soon acquired a reputation as a fierce, courageous fighter. One day, as he walked home with a dish of food for his family, he was stopped by a gang of older Irish toughs whose leader wielded a knife and ordered him to take down his pants to show if he was circumcised. Suddenly, the little boy lunged at his tormentor, shattering the plate into a weapon, then nearly killing the bigger boy with the jagged china, though he was almost beaten to death himself by the rest of the gang before the fight was broken up. Eventually, he would become renowned for his intelligence rather than his physical strength. Yet no one who knew him ever doubted that beneath the calm cunning was a reserve of brutality. He left school after the eighth grade, to find in the streets and back alleys of New York his philosophy, his view of America, ultimately his vocation. He lived in a world dominated by pimps and prostitutes, protection and extortion, alcohol and narcotics, legitimate businesses as fronts, corrupt police, and ultimately, always, the rich and powerful who owned it all but kept their distance. There was gambling everywhere, fed by the lure of easy money in a country where the prospects of so many, despite the promise, remained bleak and uncertain. A gifted mathematician with an intuitive sense of numbers, he was naturally drawn to craps games. He was able to calculate the odds in his head. Lore would have it that he lost only once befor...

8220;The history of Vegas’s dark underside . . . has seldom been so abundantly and compellingly told.” –*The Washington Post Book World

• “Riveting. . . Absorbing. . . A saga of underworld subculture that intersects with that of government agents, senators, and presidents and ranges from Cuba to Dallas to Watergate.”–The Wall Street Journal
• *“A must-read. . . . One of the most important non-fiction books published in the U.S. in [a] half century.” –*Los Angeles Times
• “Something on every page hits like a meat ax. In their unsparing, meticulous reporting, Denton and Morris produce a compelling, important dossier.”–*New York Daily News

Auteur

Sally Denton & Roger Morris

Texte du rabat

Las Vegas-the name evokes images of divorce and dice, gangsters and glitz. But beneath it all is a sordid history that is much more insidious and far-reaching than ever imagined. The Money and the Power is the most comprehensive look yet at Las Vegas and its breadth of influence. Based on five years of intensive research and interviewing, Sally Denton and Roger Morris reveal the city's historic network of links to Wall Street, international drug traffickers, and the CIA. In doing so, they expose the disturbing connections amongst politicians, businessmen, and the criminals that harness these illegal activities. Through this lucid and gripping indictment of Las Vegas, Morris and Denton uncover a national ethic of exploitation, violence, and greed, and provide a provocative reinterpretation of twentieth-century American history. Now this neon maelstrom of ruthlessness and greed stands to not as an aberrant "sin city," but as a natural outgrowth of the corruption and worship of money that have come to permeate American life.

Échantillon de lecture
Chapter 1

1.Meyer Lansky

The Racketeer as Chairman of the Board

He was born Maier Suchowljansky in 1902 at Grodno, in a Poland possessed by Tsarist Russia. As a child he envisioned the United States as a place of angels, "somewhat like heaven," he would say much later. When he was ten, his family fled the pogroms directed at Jews for the land of his dreams. In the Grand Street tenements of the Lower East Side of Manhattan he found not angels but what he called his "overpowering memory"-poverty, and still more savage prejudice.

In school, where he excelled, his name was Americanized. Meyer Lansky was a slight child, smaller than his peers. But he soon acquired a reputation as a fierce, courageous fighter. One day, as he walked home with a dish of food for his family, he was stopped by a gang of older Irish toughs whose leader wielded a knife and ordered him to take down his pants to show if he was circumcised. Suddenly, the little boy lunged at his tormentor, shattering the plate into a weapon, then nearly killing the bigger boy with the jagged china, though he was almost beaten to death himself by the rest of the gang before the fight was broken up. Eventually, he would become renowned for his intelligence rather than his physical strength. Yet no one who knew him ever doubted that beneath the calm cunning was a reserve of brutality.

He left school after the eighth grade, to find in the streets and back alleys of New York his philosophy, his view of America, ultimately his vocation. He lived in a world dominated by pimps and prostitutes, protection and extortion, alcohol and narcotics, legitimate businesses as fronts, corrupt police, and ultimately, always, the rich and powerful who owned it all but kept their distance. There was gambling everywhere, fed by the lure of easy money in a country where the prospects of so many, despite the promise, remained bleak and uncertain.

A gifted mathematician with an intuitive sense of numbers, he was naturally drawn to craps games. He was able to calculate the odds in his head. Lore would have it that he lost only once before he drew an indelible lesson about gambling and life. "There's no such thing as a lucky gambler, there are just the winners and losers. T…