Storming Caesars Palace

Annelise Orleck tells the story of a group of women fighting for welfare rights under the bright lights of Las Vegas. She counters the popular image of the welfare queen by explaining their struggle in great detail - from their inability to procure birth control, have a relationship with a man without getting their rights taken away, and their hardships in obtaining those rights in the first place. This story culminates with the establishment of their own welfare-esque organization: Operation Life, in the heart of the west side. Orleck conducted countless interviews in her research which allows for the actors to really come alive in her story. The reader becomes well acquainted with the struggles of the black family in Las Vegas, learning of the tole that long hours at the test-site took on black marriages (46). Additionally, it is not necessary for Orleck to include the comical picture of Wesley's pants ripping on the Vegas strip, but it fulfills her goal of letting the players drive her narrative and put them on center stage (160). Orleck also notes that events happening in northern cities, like Sugrue's portrayal of Detroit, were not limited to the northern United States. Railroad tracks separated the white side of town from the black side in the Mississippi delta town of Tallulah and a clinic competing with Operation Life was "nearly impossible to get to from the West Side" (7, 216). Certainly a clinic that was inaccessible to the citizens who needed it was not an adequate substitute for Operation Life. And if one pays attention to Sugrue's narrative, its geographic placement was probably not a coincidence.