Is Loveman insane?

There are two bids on the table for Colony Capital‘s grind-joint Atlantic Club Hotel and one of them is from — wait for it — Caesars Entertainment. Now you’re saying to yourself, “Hey, David, isn’t Caesars in the process of selling the Claridge Hotel?” Why it sure is, so why it suddenly wants more rooms after recently wanting fewer defies ready explanation. As for gaming positions, Caesars plans to remove them. Why Caesars is suddenly hot for this charity case? A bid from Tropicana Entertainment is also supposedly reposing in the bankruptcy court’s “in” box, by the way.

The real losers in this are the casino’s employees, all of whom will be without jobs as of an especially lucky Jan. 13. If they’re fortunate, they’ll get rehired, but Caesars could always disperse its workforce through five hotels instead of four. And thanks a lot, Colony Capital CEO Tom Barrack, for taking the former Atlantic City Hilton, and thoroughly crashing and burning it. When it comes to casinos, you might be the biggest screw-up in industry history.

Irony alert: It was then-Harrah’s Entertainment that sold the A.C. Hilton to Colony Capital, part of a mandatory divestiture of assets when Harrah’s took over Park Place Entertainment, almost a decade ago.

The final indignity is the price: Less than $15 million, the smallest tab ever paid for an Atlantic City casino.