oh, but to wait a little longer

Surfing. I enjoy surfing. As long as it is surfing the web. I spend a great deal of time (much more than I ought to) surfing around the web. I think I inherited this skill and time consuming hobby from my father who has surfed around the web since it began. He was at the forefront of web surfing, maybe one of the first to spend a great deal of time surfing away. He has always been web savy, always understood how it works, and always wondered at how its changed.

I tend to surf for the same type of things on a daily basis. I have my Google New page set up to aid in this mindless surfing for news stories. Yesterday, I was rewarded with all the responses to Mrs. Black's wailing about being betrayed by friends. The FT (Financial Times) seemed to agree with me. Or at least how I thought I had written my rant on her story. I think my favorite part when when he seeming spoke to Mrs. Black, saying on her snip about the appeal hearing that did nothing for proclaiming that Conrad is innocent:

Lady Black, it was an appeal court. Of course Judge Posner kept on interrupting to discover points of law when faced by a defense attorney rhetorically claiming that Lord Black had been a victim of a miscarriage of justice.

If you don’t that know this is how US appeal court and Supreme Court judges behave in order to get to the point, you don’t get out much.

Oh, how I laughed at that. It is so true. Plus, I always enjoy tongue in cheek writing like that. Another point the author makes here is how she's moaning that all their high power friends left their sides in their hour of need. Sure....you asked for it. As, John Gapper puts it:

She appears to be particularly hurt that their friends (and Hollinger directors) such as Henry Kissinger and Marie-Josée Kravis did not stick by them when things got ugly.

Well, if you choose your friends according to how important they are and treat people of lesser wealth or social status with contempt, as the Blacks were notorious for doing, then you should not be surprised when your “friends” do not stick with you through thick and thin.

This is true. During the trial, a "birthday party" for Mrs. Black was put on the block. It was mostly paid by Hollinger, but was billed as a "surprise birthday party." The defense went on to ramble about how this wasn't a personal party because none of their friends were invited. Oh? Really? As time wore on and talk of the birthday party worn on, I realized something: The Black have no personal friends. Every single thing they do, event they attend, event they throw is a NETWORKING FAIR. That is the whole purpose of their lives: networking, something I loathe from every fiber of my being. I understand its point, but in our world today where it is how you get anywhere, you hardly ever get anywhere on merit. One of the witnesses for the trial was a former editor...I do not remember his name, but he wrote a bunch of books or something later and got these nice jobs because...because he knew Conrad Black. He tried time and time again to tell us he did it all by himself, but that is just a lie he tells himself. He is where he is because Conrad told him to be there (like on the witness stand).

Another article worthy of mention is the Guardian blog, Greenslade. The article, titled Ameil plays Cleopatra in casting Conrad Black as Dreyfus. When I read the orginal bit of "fiction" by Mrs. Black (also known as Mrs. Ameil Black, or just Ameil sometimes...woman has too many names), I had some of the same thoughts. However, never seeing American Gigalo, the movie she referenced, I had no clue what she was talking about. However, the reference to Cleoplatra he makes, I do understand. Ameil Black is the queen of denial. The author Roy Greenslade closing paragraph really hit home:

He [Conrad] and Radler - who, at least had the grace to admit it - rooked investors while deceiving fellow directors and shareholders for their own personal gain. That is the beginning and end of it. Her attempt to portray Black as a naive innocent deserving of our sympathy because businessmen can't get a fair trial in the United States is risible.

If businessmen did no wrong, they get a fair trail. Isn't that how the system works? Did I miss something? Oh, wait, no I did not. I was there, I know I missed nothing that would proclaim the reality Amiel Black toots is reality. I missed the bigger picture, the bigger scheme that truly went on due to the system of objections and "that's not important!" However, as one ages and learns, there is always a bigger picture behind what is on trial. You hardly ever get the whole truth and nothing but the truth. You do get facts and lots of facts. You get lots of paper and more paper. And you get the picture that something sketchy went on and end of story.