"Lord Black" Topic

Seems Lord Black is going down for up to 35 years,
link

Apparently he was an avid Napoleonic wargamer, anyone come across him? They showed a brief clip of him with some 25mm figs re-enacting waterloo or something on the news…

Link didn't work for me.

Normally wargamers are portrayed as gormless geeks who live a troglodytic, celebate existence.

Now we have a whole new negative stereotype to work with.

If any of you even try to buy the Daily Telegraph I'll never speak to you again!

Yes! Guilty, guilty, guilty!!

Can I buy the Times?

Will he be selling his collection? Doubt he'll need them for quite some time.

I believe Tubby (our media nickname for Lord Crossharbour) collected 54mm Britains, along with another Canadian mulit-millionaire name Hal Jackman.

Both were born to privilege (such as it is) in Ontario.

Black has long be reputed to be a great Bonapartist, but I don't know if he and Jackman actually wargamed as we might, or rather postured and posed for cameras.

Anyway, as the fellow who coined Black's nickname in Canada, I would say he was a great and generous proprietor, both in Canada and Britain (not sure about the US or Israel publications). I haven't read the text of today's decision, but don't believe his corporate crimes were any different than the majority of US company executives…and in fact the real ones are coddled compared to the ballpark sentence released today.

However, the only reason he moved his corporate headquarters years ago was to strike at a socialist Ontario government (lead by another privileged Canadian masquarading as a socialist); if he didn't do this in a fit of pique, he never would have been ensnared by the changed US corporate accountability laws.

Hoisted on ones own petard, for those who like siege games.

An informed view from the Great White North

Cheers,
GH

Glad to hear he's going to serve time.

Well his napoleonic complex will be well served now, and he was found guilty on 'black friday'

I wasn't even aware the guy was any sort of gamer.

He's not even Canadian anymore, having dumped Canada in favour of his "Lordship" title – it's fitting that "crossharbour" doesn't really exist as it seems fabrication and deceit were a way of life for Black. He should already be in jail for comtempt.

I am always amazed at how people in charge of such vast wealth they have legally, feel the need to take yet more rather than be happy with what they have.

And then they wonder why they go to jail…

Maybe they should exile him on an island off the Carolina coast instead, going with the whole Napoleon theme…

- he was a great and generous proprietor-

????? Are we talking about the same Conrad Black? The one I'm talking about had nothing but contempt for the less fortunate and I heard him say so quite often.

about the proprietor side of him…

I'm just speaking from experience during the brief period of time he owned most of the top Canadian papers and a few magazine…and the Telegraph and I believe Spectator in London.

Pay and freelancer pay was very good, compared to the rates the new owners will cough up grudgingly.

Now again, that was for his prestige papers; the locals and weeklies and pennysavers he had huge numbers of were servile, petty little operations.

Black also had contempt for most journalists, and frequently went out of his way to express it. But he did pay us fairly…so go figure.

Plus, though he sued – or so it seemed – almost every Canadian paper and journalist for libel at some point, he never served a writ on the satirical Frank magazine, nor some writers such as myself. I remember in one documentary he asked, almost whistfully, 'Do they still call me Tubby?'

Really, the man was full of almost impossible contradictions, which made him interesting for a Canadian.

An boorish elitist, at times almost a confidence trickster and looter of others money (pension funds)…yet he a cartoon or prisoner of such failings.

Go figure.

And for a wargamer, probably a better dinner companion than Key Lay, Jeff Skilling and Bernie Evers.