A Friend In A High Place

is clearly on the vindication side. William Lord Rees-Mogg, a former editor of the Times of London, has been a friend of Conrad Black for approximately thirty years. In defense of his old friend, Lord Rees-Mogg discloses that parties, of the sort that are mentioned in Count 10 of the indictment (point 8 of it - the birthday party,) are customarily treated as business expenses in the media industry. He also mentions the point that Conrad Black, even as an independent, was a competitive threat in the newspaper industry, and "Hollinger" was little more than a holding company without Mr. Black's presence and energies. As mentioned in this earlier post, Mark Steyn made a similar point, one buttressed by the chart of what used to be Hollinger Int'l, from about December 2003 (Nov. 17, specifically.) [This chart lets you adjust it to that timeframe.] Hopes rose along with the price of the stock in 2004, which went downhill, except for secondary upturns, ever since. If you had bought it on the next business day after Conrad Black had resigned, you'd have lost about 2/3 of your money as of now. [CORRECTION NOTICE: This calculation ignores a $5.50/share special dividend declared in Feb. 2005, while Gordon Paris was the CEO. A total-return calculation results in a much gentler decline.]

Lord Rees-Mogg closes his defense with the conclusion that Conrad Black, if guilty of anything, is "guilty" of being too much of a risk-taker, a habit which, if deplorable at times, is far from illegal and is often a needed one in a thriving economy.

[UPDATE: Conrad Black has responded in a letter to the Times, which denies that he is a new Gatsby. Excerpt: "'I accept the sentiment but not the analogy. William seems to imagine that while I may well be acquitted, my world has somewhat imploded, like Gatsby’s. I don’t think so.'" He made another point, which prompted a clarification from Lord Rees-Mogg.

[This is London has also picked up on Conrad Black's distancing of himself from Lord Rees-Mogg's analogy, as has Romina Maurino. Her report contains a quick precis of the fate of Jay Gatsby in it.

[The blog "DealBreaker.com" has a brief entry on this event.]

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Another defender of Mr. Black can be found right here on Blogspot. bussorah of "Strange Justice" believes that Mr. Black is a victim of overzealous prosecutors and a general climate of disgust with "gluttonous" top executives. As the title of the entry specifies, bussorah is of the opinion that "CONRAD BLACK [is] TO BE A VICTIM OF SUBORNED TESTIMONY."