Everywhere you look in Baghdad, there are signs of capitalism. The streets are festooned with signs for Samsung and Iraqna, the major local cell-phone provider for the city. Satellite dishes — the possession of which was punishable by the state under Saddam — now hang from houses throughout the city. It is difficult to walk down Rashid Street because of all the large hand carts overloaded with televisions, computers, air conditioners, and microwaves.

The locals are snatching up not only Western goods, but Western culture. As you might expect, this is particularly true among the youth. In addition to listening to Western music, increasingly available thanks to the Armed Forces radio station, they also follow the lives of music celebrities in Arabic magazines, which chronicle events like Britney's Vegas wedding. With the proliferation of televisions and satellites, Arabic music videos — strikingly similar to Western videos — have become popular. And once rock and roll is introduced, sex and drugs must follow — well, maybe not, but the taboo against alcohol is loosening, as many of the local men sneak around in the evening to taste the forbidden elixir away from the condemning eyes of wives and clerics.

But perhaps the biggest influx of Western culture is in the area of fashion. Young women are increasingly abandoning traditional Iraqi garb in favor of more form-fitting clothes. And while the middle-aged woman across from the palace in Adhamiya may scream "Whores!" as the girls pass by in their more revealing Western garb, she does so only as a break from indulging in her own Western pursuit: hocking Pepsi on the street corner. Men are also quickly snatching up clothes emblazoned with English words, only to ask passing Americans to tell them what their clothes say. (Imagine their chagrin when they learn that their shirts' logo is not really English, but rather a Greek word for victory.)

Now [poker pro and former Golden Nugget poker room manager Eric] Drache has a reason to return to downtown.

Not long ago, Tim Poster, one of the new owners of the Golden Nugget, decided to reopen the poker room because 'to leave out poker would be a major competitive disadvantage.'

'Uniformly, all the major guys I respect told me the best guy to bring in to open the room would be Eric Drache,' Poster said. 'He has the history, the experience and the following.'

So after nearly 20 years, I met with the Nugget's new poker consultant in the midst of his efforts to turn part of the pool area across from the Carson Street Cafe into a 20-table poker room.

His challenge is to have it ready to open at 7 p.m. tomorrow.

Why the rush to open? The Golden Nugget wants to take advantage of Thursday's start of the World Series of Poker across the street at Binion's Horseshoe.

The plan: Lure tournament customers to the Golden Nugget during the monthlong World Series.