Conrad Black is back at his (temporary) winter home in Palm Beach after being freed on bail pending the outcome of his appeal. His conservative friends in their College of Cardinals-type media conclaves appear to seek his beatification for what he has gone through. If he is found to have been wrongly convicted, as countless numbers are in Canada and the United States every year without a whisper of concern from Mr. Black’s supporters — or the tens of millions at their disposal to make that case, as Mr. Black has — he is entitled to all the redress available for one of the most terrible wrongs the state can perpetrate on a person. But, as Stephen Bainbridge points out, there is still much of the dark earth about him that stands between Mr. Black and his final elevation to sainthood.
Richard Fuld was back before another committee attesting to the fundamental strength of Lehman Brothers, which went under for every conceivable reason, except, of course, the failure of its leaders. Follow-up question: does the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission realize that Lehman had a board of directors who might shed some light on the calamity? Fed chief Ben Bernanke was also back before the Commission, after the Fed admitted, once again, that it misread the depth of the economic downturn in recent months. A change in lyrics was also detected regarding Mr. Bernanke’s explanation as to why Lehman was not saved. The self-serving music remains the same, however. BP’s infamous blow out preventer made its way back to the surface; its corporate image is still submerged somewhere in an ocean of missteps and CEO blunders. HP’s board is back in the news, and not in a good way. It showed that you can spend tens of millions on a CEO and, for that lofty sum, still get a chief executive with a missing ethics gene. The directors’ solution? Spend tens of millions more to get rid of him in the face of the deception which the board claimed was the reason for his ousting. Go figure. Canada saw a new Governor General appointed to represent the Queen as head of state. It came on the sole recommendation of a prime minister whose Conservative Party holds a minority position in parliament. It is a throwback to a time when most Canadians could not read or write and women did not have the vote. Still, few Canadians seemed bothered by the quaint tradition. On the other hand, few parents teach the idea that any girl or boy can grow up to be GG someday.
President Obama is back to a freshly redecorated Oval Office, where he has hatched yet another stimulus package. The new soft beige seating areas will provide a calming effect when yet lower approval ratings are published. As the distancing of the President from the electorate becomes more pronounced, and the loudening canons of Republican victory signal their approach with each day, one can almost hear the mournful reprise of a love no longer to be: “We’ll always have health care.”
However timeless the Pyramids of Giza and the inscrutability of the Great Sphinx remain, they cannot for more than a few weeks distract our attention from the greater monuments of folly and misjudgment that today’s Pharaohs of business and government routinely create.
They will be pleased to know that, along with all of them, we are back, too.