Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Casino Royale Refried.....It's Just The Way Things Are Done

AllTheCynicism
ThatFitsVille



This time it's Les Leyne of the VT-C who weighs in.

Mr. Leyne gives us nothing new, but his piece is a reasonably serviceable re-cap of most of what we know already

Unfortunately, like Vaughn Palmer before him, Mr. Leyne pulls back when he concludes that this is just the way that things are done, which is a shame he figures, but what the heck can you do about it.....

What the heck, indeed.

****

But here's the thing....

Why didn't Mr. Leyne, in addition to listing Mr. T. Richard Turner's various connections to both the Gordon Campbell government and Paragon Gaming Inc., actually have a look at the timeline as well.

Specifically, why did he not have a hard look at, and think about, the dots that need connecting regarding the fact that Mr. Turner was the Chair of the BC Lottery Commission until late 2005 and then, whammo, a few months later he's an investor and director in Paragon and then, double-whammo, Paragon buys the essentially bankrupt Edgewater a few weeks later, followed by the triple-whammo of a numbered company joining the whole gang a short time later to seal the deal.

Why does this stuff matter?

Because the Edgwater casino license is the chip that will be flipped to facilitate the building of Paragon's, and Mr. Turner's, and the Numbered Company's, Casino Industrial Complex on the edge of BC Place's new retractable roof.

A roof that we, and not Paragon, nor Mr. Turner, nor the fine folks hiding behind their Number, are paying for.

OK?


______
One thing we do have to give Mr. Leyne credit for is the fact that he made it clear it was Sean Holman that brought this thing to light with his digging.

.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

So who is 'hiding' behind the numbered company? This kind of 'deal' is just not acceptable in situations involving public assets.

RossK said...

Excellent question Anon-Above.

Important to remember, however, that, at the time, the Edgewater was not a public asset....instead it was a just a longshot that came in and paid off big to the not-so holy trinity mentioned in the post.

.

kootcoot said...

Ah, to go back to the "good old days" when this stuff involved a $20,000 deck and a couple of Sopranos extras filmed leaving a card club in North Burnaby!