Isn't something pretty laughable being overlooked in the recent uproar about banning gangsta rap from casinos?

Clark County Sheriff Bill Young's recently excavated letter to gaming controllers from last summer, asking "the gaming industry to not book gangster rap here," has the ACLU and Las Vegas-based hip-hop icon Morey Alexander all riled up.

But when the casino heads caught wind of the request, they must have been rolling on the floor saying, "Please don't throw us in that briar patch."

Forget about the hard-core gangsta guys. They don't exactly rival the Rolling Stones as a concert draw, and in fact have a hard time putting together tours.

But regulators would find it a challenge to out-ban the self-censorship of casinos in the larger realm of hip-hop and urban music.

"It's never been a medium the casinos were seeking out. If anything, they steered away from it," says H.C. Rowe, who booked concerts at Mandalay Bay until a recent move to the Palms.

"Hip-hop acts don't have a gaming profile attached to them," says Daren Libonati, executive director of the Thomas & Mack Center.

Libonati says a $1 million bid wasn't enough to snag either the recent Aerosmith concert or Saturday's Bon Jovi date away from the MGM Grand Garden arena. But no one tried to outbid him for the "Anger Management" tour with Eminem and 50 Cent.

Any attempt by legislators to play music critic -- trying to draw a line for what's acceptable -- would be laughable at best, racist at worst. Case in point, the trouble that started all this last May.

It would be a stretch to call pop rapper and Reebok pitchman Nelly a "gangsta." His audience at the Aladdin included young children. Yet mayhem broke on the Strip -- outdoors, it should be noted -- after the show, and three people were shot.

A similar proposal to ban gangster glorification from university venues might be taken more seriously, since the Thomas & Mack has become the default venue for any show that doesn't translate into baby-boomer dollars for a casino.

But that arena also has a long history of self-regulation, all the way back to the hair metal days: not letting Warrant display naughty T-shirts in 1991, not inviting M?tley Cr?e back for a while after "explicit language" in 1985.

Now, M?tley Cr?e has been considered for a residency at the Aladdin. "As our heavy metal bands grow older, for some reason they become classic rockers," Libonati says.

More relevant today, Libonati says his discussions with Young have been productive, focusing more on patrolling the area beyond the arena than the content onstage.

Mike Weatherford's entertainment column appears Thursdays and Sundays. Contact him at 383-0288 or e-mail him at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com.