{"id":18339,"date":"2016-06-03T12:43:40","date_gmt":"2016-06-03T20:43:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=18339"},"modified":"2016-06-03T12:43:40","modified_gmt":"2016-06-03T20:43:40","slug":"caesars-seeks-taxpayer-bailout-sands-lawsuit-suddenly-vanishes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/caesars-seeks-taxpayer-bailout-sands-lawsuit-suddenly-vanishes\/","title":{"rendered":"Caesars seeks taxpayer bailout; Sands lawsuit suddenly vanishes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You&#8217;ve got to hand it to <strong>Caesars Entertainment<\/strong>: It is truly shameless. The company went to the <strong>Internal Revenue Service<\/strong> seeking a &#8220;a tax-free separation&#8221; for REIT-to-be <strong>Caesars Entertainment Operating Co<\/strong>., claiming that if it had to pay taxes that would <img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-18340\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Frank_LoBiondo.jpg\" alt=\"Frank_LoBiondo\" width=\"220\" height=\"269\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Frank_LoBiondo.jpg 220w, https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Frank_LoBiondo-123x150.jpg 123w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 220px) 100vw, 220px\" \/>sap the value of the bankruptcy reorganization. Oh boo-hoo. Fortunately, 15 members of Congress, including Rep. <strong>Frank LoBiondo<\/strong> (R, <em>right<\/em>) <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-caesars-bankruptcy-congress-idUSKCN0YN5MG\" target=\"_blank\">took notice and sent a letter<\/a> to Secretary of the Treasury <strong>Jacob Lew<\/strong>.\u00a0&#8220;The REIT would effectively shelter a considerable portion of the casinos&#8217; profits, thus functioning as a taxpayer-funded subsidy to one of the largest casino companies in the U.S. and its private equity owners,&#8221; they wrote, adding that the REIT structure could be employed to dodge antitrust laws.<\/p>\n<p>Caesars has done some deplorable\u00a0things in the past but extending its mitt to John Q. Public for a bailout is surely its most brazen move yet.<\/p>\n<p>* Lawmakers in <strong>Pennsylvania<\/strong> could re-vote on <strong>Internet<\/strong> gambling in the Keystone State next <!--more-->week. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pokernewsdaily.com\/pennsylvania-online-gambling-bills-to-be-reconsidered-next-week-28509\/\" target=\"_blank\">A bit of parliamentary confusion<\/a> caused &#8216;Net betting to be voted down in the House when confusion arose over the authorship of two amendments. One would permit the wide-open legalization of slot routes. The other, considered more likely to succeed, would restrict them to OTBs and airport lounges. Let&#8217;s hope Pennsylvania solons vote Internet gambling into law, to continue turning the tide against those like <strong>Sheldon Adelson<\/strong> who would deprive Americans of it.<\/p>\n<p>* In the anticlimax of the year, <strong>Sands China<\/strong> has settled with former CEO <strong>Steven Jacobs<\/strong>, who had been suing the company for wrongful termination. Even though Jacobs <img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-8326\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Sheldon-A-212x300.jpg\" alt=\"Sheldon A\" width=\"212\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Sheldon-A-212x300.jpg 212w, https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Sheldon-A-106x150.jpg 106w, https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Sheldon-A.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 212px) 100vw, 212px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/lasvegassun.com\/news\/2016\/may\/31\/adelson-settles-lawsuit-with-ex-head-of-china-casi\/\" target=\"_blank\">is dismissing all claims against Sands<\/a>, both at the state and federal level, it has to be regarded as a win for the executive, who had been extensively vilified by <strong>Las Vegas Sands<\/strong> CEO Sheldon Adelson. The latter is a scorched-earth litigatant who normally fights to the bitter end &#8212; see <a href=\"http:\/\/www.samoaobserver.ws\/en\/15_03_2016\/us\/3692\/Nevada-court-orders-new-trial-in-$100M-Las-Vegas-Sands-case.htm\" target=\"_blank\">his interminable lawsuit<\/a> with rainmaker <strong>Richard Suen<\/strong>. It&#8217;s just a matter of conjecture but Sands&#8217; attorneys must have calculated that the damage to Sands&#8217; public image from a trial outweighed the value of grinding Jacobs into a fine powder. Jury selection was to have begun later this month. Incidentally, now that Adelson&#8217;s <em>Las Vegas Review-Journal<\/em> no longer does so, the <em>Las Vegas Sun<\/em> has taken up the responsibility of publishing photos of Adelson&#8217;s ridiculous toupee.<\/p>\n<p>* Three counties in <strong>Arkansas<\/strong> could have casinos, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.4029tv.com\/news\/effort-to-bring-casino-to-washington-county-moves-forward\/39850346\" target=\"_blank\">now that a ballot initiative has been approved<\/a> by the state&#8217;s Attorney General. The proposed constitutional amendment would tax the casinos at 20% and locate them in <strong>Washington County<\/strong>, <strong>Boone County<\/strong> and <strong>Miller County<\/strong>. Now the race is on to collect enough signatures to qualify for ballot inclusion.<\/p>\n<p>* <strong>New York State<\/strong>&#8216;s Legislature appears on track to legalize daily fantasy sports in the Empire State. Internet poker, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.uspoker.com\/blog\/ny-online-poker-and-fantasy-sports\/14321\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"broken_link\">not so much<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You&#8217;ve got to hand it to Caesars Entertainment: It is truly shameless. The company went to the Internal Revenue Service seeking a &#8220;a tax-free separation&#8221; for REIT-to-be Caesars Entertainment Operating Co., claiming that if it had to pay taxes that &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/caesars-seeks-taxpayer-bailout-sands-lawsuit-suddenly-vanishes\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[179,26,7,37,101,95,33,12,31],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18339"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18339"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18339\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18341,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18339\/revisions\/18341"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}