Bad Bet on the Bayou by Tyler Bridges
An outrageous tale of fast cash, pretty women, dirty politics and extravagant greed in the Bayou State
Louisiana is our most exotic state. It is religious and roguish, a place populated by Cajuns, Creoles, Rednecks, and Bible-thumpers. It is a state that loves good food, good music, and good times. Laissez les bons temps rouler -- let the good times roll -- is the unofficial motto. Louisiana is also excessively corrupt.
In the 1990s, it plunged headlong into legalized gambling, authorizing more games of chance than any other state. Leading the charge was Governor Edwin Edwards, who for years had flaunted his fondness for cold cash and high-stakes gambling, and who had used his razor-sharp mind and catlike reflexes to stay one step ahead of the law. Gambling, Edwin Edwards, and Louisiana's political culture would prove to be a combustible mix.
Bad Bet on the Bayou tells the story of what happened when the most corrupt industry came to our most corrupt state. It is a sweeping morality tale about commerce, politics, and what happens when the law catches up to our most basic human desires and frailties.
Tyler Bridges is a New Orleans-based writer who covers Louisiana politics for the Baton Rouge/New Orleans Advocate. He has been a member of two Pulitzer Prize-winning teams. He also works as a freelance journalist for magazines such as Politico Magazine. Long Shot: A Soldier, a Senate, a Serious Sin, and an Epic Louisiana Election (Lisburn Press, 2016); Bad Bet about the Bayou: The Growth of Gambling in Louisiana and the Fall of Governor Edwin Edwards (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2002); and The Rising of David Duke (University Press of Mississippi, 1994) are his three books on Louisiana politics. He was a Harvard Nieman Fellow from 2011 to 2012, received Columbia University's Maria Moors Cabot Award in 2010 for his 10 years of international reporting in South America, and was a Harvard Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy Fall 2017 Fellow. Tyler is a Stanford graduate and a Palo Alto native.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780374528546 |
| ISBN 10 | 0374528543 |
| Title | Bad Bet on the Bayou |
| Author | Tyler Bridges |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Farrar, Strauss & Giroux-3pl |
| Year published | 2002-05-15 |
| Number of pages | 432 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |