Buffet readers will recall that I have been reporting on the strange case of the feud between Lavo, the new restaurant and club from the creators of the Venetian's wildly successful Tao, and the corporation of Sheldon Adelson that owns host property, Las Vegas Sands. On the surface this is a landlord vs. tenant dispute with Adelson wanting to revoke the lease because the club was not quick enough to open. In March, Adelson even had the locks changed to keep the creators of Lavo out of the space.

But what makes this feud so unexpected and inexplicable is the incredible business Tao has enjoyed at Adelson's Venetian.The fact is that Tao  is one of the most successful and buzz-generating nightclubs in Vegas as well as, according to the owners' claim, the highest grossing restaurant in the country. This summer Tao Beach successfully expanded the brand into the newly competitive world of day clubbing

Lavo has thus far prevailed enough in litigation to soft open. As the Buffet has documented before, Adelson can be tenacious in litigation. So when I got the press release announcing Lavo's opening, I immediately e-mailed to find out if the court fight between landlord and tenant was over.  I was promptly told by Lavo's representative: "The case is over. There is no further legal action on either side." I was also assured, by Lavo, that now that the restaurant and club was definitely opening, Palazzo was being very supportive of the property.

That certainly did not jive  with my view of Adelson.  In July I made the first of a series of attempts to confirm with the Sands people that they were now being supportive of Lavo and had given up on legal action to remove the club. I never received a response. There turns out to be a good reason for that. Things are not as group-hug as the Lavo team had led me to believe between them and their landlord.

In fact,  according to the Sun today, it turns out the legal maneuvering is not at an end and never really ceased. The Sun reports that settlement talks between the sides that started just a few weeks ago offered no breakthroughs before falling apart. The Sun adds, "Adelson is refusing to give a...$3 million loan they (the owners of Lavo) contend was agreed upon  in their 2006 contract to put finishing touches on Lavo. So, Ferrario (Lavo's attorney) is adding that claim to the litigation."

So for now Lavo is open with the new club's grand opening still set for Sept. 13. Yet, although Lavo may be reluctant to admit it, this much-anticipated club, which marks a serious expansion by Tao to  join Light Group and Pure Management Group, among elite creators of multiple Vegas restaurants and nightclubs on the Strip, still has to contend with a wild card in the form of landlord Sheldon Adelson. But why is Adelson taking such a hard line against the winning team at his Venetian Tao? Now that is one of the major mysteries of Vegas.

(Photo by Sarah Gerke)

Sheldon Adelson must be a Rolling Stone's fan. He still can't get no satisfaction.

It seems being the third richest man in the United States has not sated Adelson's ambition or appetites. Oliver Staley interviewed the 73-year-old Adelson for Bloomberg at The Venetian on Tuesday about his desire to be the richest person in the country:

"I've already figured out when I am going to be No. 2 and No. 1."

No 2. is Warren Buffett and No. 1, of course, is Bill Gates. Adelson does not say if there are others running in this race. Buffett and especially his partner in charity, Gates, seem to be more focused right now on giving their money away; that sure makes it easier for Adelson to reach the top of the list.

Oh, in the interview, Adelson too mentions vague charitable plans to fight unspecified diseases at some future point. "I see this as my humanitarian legacy. We're prepared to pay billions."

How quirky that Adelson says "pay" billions instead of "give" billions; kind of makes it sound like a humanitarian legacy is something hanging in a store window with a price tag on it. Other little quirks Adelson offers in the interview are his similes for the discussion of his Macau casino operation.

"In my entrepreneurial language, it's a no-brainer. It's like bringing a blanket to someone on an ice floe, or bringing water to someone in the desert.''

These are Adelson's examples of entrepreneurship and not charity? Anyway, that is his view of what his Venetian Macau gambling operation will bring to tourists from Korea and Japan.

Of course, in my view, in charity, motivation is less important than action, the actual giving of money. In that regard, the only thing missing from Adelson's announced plan are those pesky details about when he will give these billions that will go to humanity to fight unnamed diseases and in what way he will give it. Charity is often done in private, yes, but understand if you are the third-wealthiest person in the country, people get really curious.

(Photo: Kim Cheung / AP)

Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans includes many names familiar to locals like Kirk Kerkorian, Bill Boyd and Steve Wynn. But it is Wynn's less-than-friendly competitor Sheldon Adelson (who controls the Venetian) who easily answers the question: who is the richest person in Las Vegas? Adelson appears just after Bill Gates and Warren Buffett on the list, and at No. 3, Adelson is the only local in the top 10. Wynn, for example, is not even close at No. 107.

Despite all his success here (dating back to the Comdex convention he founded in the '80s and sold at a premium in the '90s) Adelson, a City College of New York dropout, continues to see himself as a barbarian at Las Vegas' gate. Adelson tells Forbes, "I loved being the outsider. I didn't care what those guys said." That means, among other things, the Venetian is the only non-union property on the Strip.

Interestingly, Adelson's fortune has increased enormously not so much because of his faith in Vegas, but because of his early investment in Macau, according to Forbes. Even the magazine is blown away by Adelson's riches:

"He’s been getting rich faster than, as far as we can tell, anyone in history. Over the past two years Adelson has made $23.6 million a day — just under $1 million a hour. At that pace he’ll eclipse Bill Gates as the richest man in the country sometime in 2012."

Up on Forbes's web site is a ranking of the "Celebrity 100" calculating the earnings of the creative, athletic, beautiful and famous. After an absence from this list, the bitch is back, as Caesars headliner Elton John is the only Vegas local in the top ten (sitting pretty at #9) below Madonna but above Tom Cruise.

John's estimated pay last year: $44 Million. That may seem like all your dreams come true, but  $44 million is really just change between the couch cushions if you are a billionaire and Nevada has four of those, according to the Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans. Three will come as no surprise to locals. Number 235 is William Samuel Boyd whose Boyd Gaming last year swallowed Coast Casinos. Number 164 is Steve Wynn whose monstrously large vision is fairly credited with creating contemporary Las Vegas. And, at number 15, Wynn's rival Sheldon Adelson, the son of a cab driver, who owns the Venetian. The final Nevada billionaire may be less familiar to locals as he has managed to keep a remarkably low profile considering how good this town is at flushing out the ultra rich to come play with us. Pierre M Omidyar is number 18 (and, at 38, decades younger than every other billionaire here), and is the founder of E-Bay. Omidyar and I both live in Henderson; so, I'll keep a look out for him at the grocery store.