Las Vegas open thread

Las Vegas is a fascinating place. I was last here almost twenty years ago, before the big building boom. It’s amazing to drive down the strip and see the huge new theme hotels/casinos. They’re a bizarre mixture of the incredibly imaginative and the tawdry. I try to focus on the former and ignore the latter.

The kids’ reactions have been interesting too. My daughter finds the energy and commercialism exciting. My son, while as avaricious as she is, is appalled by the spectacle. His puritanical ten year old soul is especially put off by the way sex is for sale at all times, in all places. Also, because he’s a thrifty soul, he agrees with my take on gambling, which is that it’s foolish to play a money game weighed so heavily in the dealer’s favor.

Since I started the above, we also went to Hoocer Dam, a great engineering marvel. Despite the name, everyone associates it with FDR, which is unfair. It was conceived, designed, authorized and funded on Hoover’s watch — a reminder that the Roosevelt media and historians pretty effectively destroyed Hoover’s often great legacy.