Travel leaders, lawmakers rally behind ‘blacklisted’ cities

Business isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about Las Vegas, Nevada, or Orlando, Florida, but these two entertainment capitals are also the top business meeting and convention destinations in the United States. One of the nation’s largest employers has discouraged its employees from booking meetings and conventions in the cities where Mickey Mouse lives and Wayne Newton sings. In an e-mail between a Federal Bureau of Investigation employee and a Las Vegas hotel, the FBI employee explained why the agency would not hold an upcoming business meeting in the city

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Fortunes Fade for Macau’s Casino Kings

For most of the past five years, the Chinese gambling mecca of Macau seemed a sure bet. After the local government ended a decades-old gaming monopoly in 2002, some of the biggest casino and hotel operators in the world rushed in with new projects, eager to tap into the hoards of wealthy Chinese who increasingly flocked to the “Asian Las Vegas.” The first American company to enter the market was Las Vegas Sands, which opened the Sands Macau casino in 2004 — and earned back its $285 million investment in only a year. U.S

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Showgirls to hang up headdresses as famed show closes

You know it’s a recession when leggy Las Vegas showgirls can’t sell enough tickets to stay in business. That’s what’s happening to “Les Folies Bergere,” a revue modeled after its famous namesake in Paris, that has run in Vegas for nearly 50 years. The curtain will go down on the act for the last time on March 28, according to the Tropicana Las Vegas, where the show runs on the Strip

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