(Ed. Note: This appeared Saturday in a British publication, The Independent, and was passed on to us by a friend. With the interest in casinos in Kansas, we thought it might be interesting to The Effort readers)

The good-time capital of the US has hit a losing streak. Guy Adams reports on an epidemic of bankruptcies, foreclosures and mass lay-offs

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Since the day Las Vegas was created in the shimmering Nevada desert, visitors have been drawn by one simple promise: "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas". The motto adorns the city's road signs, and has inspired everything from its souvenir T-shirts to the local tourist board's seductive advertising campaigns.

These days, that motto is imbued with a worrying sense of irony. Because America's most outrageous city is facing a growing multitude of problems, and they all boil down to a single, unavoidable point: right now, far too little happens in Vegas, because not enough people are actually staying there.

The onset of global slowdown, high petrol prices, and a nation-wide housing slump is spelling disaster for a town that owes every aspect of its wealth - from that gaudy replica of the Eiffel Tower to those scale models of Venetian canals and the Pyramids of Egypt - to its ability to inspire free-spending hedonism.

With Americans cutting back on luxuries, and the price of transport rocketing, the so-called "Vegas vacation" is facing the axe. This week, as the nation celebrated Independence Day, major hotels were taking stock of a fall in all-important room occupancy rates from their usually impressive 95 per cent levels to nearer 80 per cent.

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By Radley Balko, Reason Magazine

I hate to pee in the pool, here, but I'm having a hard time getting too excited about (Wednesday’s) decision.

Justice Antonin Scalia's opinion avoids any decision on incorporating the Second Amendment to the states, and his history suggests a strong reluctance to incorporate individual rights. Scalia's opinion does interpret the Second Amendment as an individual right, but only for self-protection, and only in the home. The concept of the Second Amendment as a bulwark against an overly oppressive government seems dead.

Scalia also goes out of his way to note that the "individual right" the Court found today doesn't undo onerous regulations on the sale of guns, leaves untouched bans on "unusual or dangerous" weapons, and doesn't overturn existing bans on concealed carry.

So what's the real practical effect of today's ruling? Seems to me, it's limited to the following:

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Obsessive internet use is a public health problem which is so serious it should be officially recognised as a clinical disorder, according to a leading psychiatrist.

Sufferers spend unhealthy amounts of time playing online games, viewing pornography or emailing.

They suffer four symptoms: They forget to eat and sleep; they need more advanced technology or more hours online as they develop 'resistance' to the pleasure given by their current system; if they are deprived of their computer, they experience genuine withdrawal symptoms; And in common with other addictions, the victims also begin to have more arguments, to suffer fatigue, to get lower marks in tests and to feel isolated from society.

By David Harsanyi
Staff Columnist, The Denver Post

Have you seen the television spots produced by oil companies? If so, you might be under the impression they were in the business of selling sunflowers and good vibes rather than energy.

In general, oil executives have done a horrid job of defending their industry, opening themselves up to fact-deprived populist attacks that ignore the complexities of the energy mess.

This week's sham of a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing saw Big Oil executives from ExxonMobil, Chevron and three other companies take the stand. With quivering voices, they explained basic economic principles to Senate demagogues who, incidentally, bear far more responsibility for high prices than the execs themselves.

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