Sunday, July 31, 2011

Did Steve Wynn Just Make a Call to Harry Reid, Save the Union, and Limit the Upside to My Vix Calls?

Here's the WSJ headline, an hour ago:

Compromise Debt Deal in Sight
Mr. Wynn is a big-time Democrat, supporter of Joe Biden and owner of Harry Reid.*
($20,000 to beat Sharron Angle in the last cycle's primary)
You probably saw the news ten days ago.
From the LA Times' Top of the Ticket blog:

Democrat Steve Wynn on Obama: 'Until he's gone, everybody's going to be sitting on their thumbs'
Going out on juniper limb here, but it doesn't seem like Las Vegas mogul Steve Wynn will be one of the major bundlers of campaign fundraising cash for President Obama's reelection this year, next year or any year.


Wynn, the head of Wynn Resorts, was on a conference call this week with investment analysts, talking about the nation's business climate and the outlook for hotel and gaming in Las Vegas and Macau, when the subject of Washington came up.


Holy Smokes! You'd have thought someone hit the million-dollar jackpot on the nickel machines!
Wynn, a billionaire who calls himself a Harry Reid-supporting Democrat, went off on an epic rant. According to the wondrous website Seeking Alpha, which has the entire call transcript, Wynn blasted....

...Washington pols in general and Barack Obama in particular for destroying the U.S. business climate despite all of his talk about creating jobs. One key Wynn passage:
I'm telling you that the business community in this country is frightened to death of the weird political philosophy of the President of the United States. And until he's gone, everybody's going to be sitting on their thumbs.
Wynn said he could very quickly create 10,000 new jobs himself and with the multiplier effect help create another 20,000 hires in Las Vegas....
I'm just wondering if Mr. Wynn had a friendly chat with Mr. Reid:
Harry, nice little Senate seat you have here, it'd be a shame if anything happened to it...
*From PR NewsChannel:Your Politics News: Steve Wynn, casinos keep giving to Harry Reid
August 31, 2010 / LAS VEGAS, Nev. / As part of its public requests for information that ties Sen. Harry Reid to questionable political players, Your Politics News submitted Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) paperwork for records to discover why the majority leader shows unbridled allegiance to his state's gaming industry.   



Casino mogul Steve Wynn, who developed and built resorts including the Mirage, Treasure Island, and Bellagio, has contributed to Reid's election campaigns for the last 25 years.  Wynn first gave to Reid in 1984 when the Democrat served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, campaign records show. 


In 2000 Wynn sold Mirage Resorts to MGM Grand Inc.  The sale created MGM Mirage, Reid's biggest political donor with $153,900 in contributions since the beginning of the 2010 election cycle.  Last year Bloomberg News reported that Wynn expressed an interest in buying back some troubled MGM Mirage casinos.  And in Sept. 2009, Wynn made his largest single contribution to Harry Reid -- $20,000.   
"Harry Reid wants to win, and that means he needs Wynn," said Graham Coyne, a media and political consultant based in Carson City. "His history with the gaming commission proves his dedication to bankrolling campaigns with casino cash.  And much of Nevada remains jobless all the while...