The man just does not stop! After that dynamite alliterative intro he keeps the magic alive in all his public speeches, and I hadn’t even noticed until cruising through YouTube. Of course you know that alliterative verse was popular with the Vikings…you can connect the dots, right? Did you know that the last alliterative verse drama performed in England was written by JRR Tolkien? And it’s not half bad, either.
But, frankly, it’s not this good.
All is not well in Conrad Black‘s heart of darkness.
Possibly Canada’s most literate alleged criminal, Black has just successfully defended himself from an attempt to revoke his bail and stick him in the pokey. He was less successful, however, in his attempt to prevent charges of tax evasion from being added to the sordid mix.
The CBC has the story:
On Aug. 10, a U.S. judge raised Black‘s bond by $1 million in cash to $21 million US, saying the toppled media baron had misrepresented how much he was worth.
The Canadian-born 61-year-old is scheduled to go on trial in March 2007 on racketeering and fraud charges, accused of looting millions of dollars from Hollinger International Inc. when he headed the media empire.
Judge Amy St. Eve of the U.S. District Court in Chicago, who is overseeing Black‘s upcoming trial, agreed with prosecutors that Black had misstated the worth of his assets, but denied their request to revoke his bond and jail the 61-year-old.
In related news, he’s filed a revised “oops, forgot about those millions” statement listing additional money his wife has loaned him since his income stream became uh, became uh, constrained. Relatively speaking.
AccountingWeb (whodathunk there’d be such a thing?) has his number:
A revised affidavit, filed last month, says that his wife loaned him $2.3 million between January and April of this year. “Essentially, it appears that whenever Black needs money, his wife (or at the very least, her corporation) stands ready to provide millions of dollars in cash without so much as a promissory note,” prosecutors said in court papers filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. “The Blacks have a unique financial arrangement into which the government and this court have little or no information.”
Now, Barbara Amiel-Black, known previously as Lady Black 
of Crossharbour and before that simply as Barbara Amiel and, around Toronto newsrooms as a bit of a femme fatale, is a journalist. She’s a columnist. Sure, being Conrad Black‘s wife didn’t hurt her when she was out knocking on doors, asking papers to carry her column (like Chicago, where she was not loved). But it must be admitted that very few journalists, not even Polly Toynbee, are so vastly overpaid that they can loan out $2.3 million at will. Maybe she’s taken some of those rocks she’s so fond of to the pawn shop.
The report cites a wide range of personal expenses the Blacks allegedly charged to the company, including $2,463 for handbags and $3,530 for silverware for the Blacks’ corporate jet. Amiel Black is said to have charged the company for tips she gave a doorman at Bergdorf-Goodman, an expensive Manhattan clothing store. In 2000, Hollinger International paid $42,870 for a “Happy Birthday, Barbara” dinner party at New York’s La Grenouille restaurant. Guests at the $212-a-plate party included Oscar de la Renta and Barbara Walters…
and there’s this:
Timson also recalled the time Barbara was walking along Toronto’s Bloor Street with a friend when a man passed by, smilingly acknowledging Barbara. “Who was that?” the friend asked.
“I’m not sure,” she replied, “but I think it was my first husband.”
I must say, however, that he has lawyered up in quite an impressive manner indeed. It may never be the same attorney twice, but they all seem to be a dab hand with the snappy quote:
Black’s attorney Ed Genson told the Sun-Times: “They ought to start filing their pleadings like lawyers and not short story writers.”
Very nice. When I’m down to my wife’s last $2.3 million, I want Ed Genson in my corner too. Mind you, it must be maddening to work for Black; by the time you’ve gotten back from giving your press conference, he’ll have faxed you a complete, footnoted and annotated list of where you could have improved and the changes he’d like to see for next time.
from Fark. This is just too amusing not to post. If you don’t get the joke, something tells me you’ve got that Y-chromosome mutation.
Q: My husband wants to have a threesome with me and my best friend.
A: Obviously your husband cannot get enough of you! Knowing that there is only one of you he can only settle for the next best thing your best friend. Far from being an issue, this can bring you closer together. Why not get some of your old college roommates involved too? If you are still apprehensive, maybe you should let him be with your friends without you. If you’re still not sure then just perform oral sex on him and cook him a nice meal while you think about it.
Q: My husband continually asks me to perform oral sex on him.
A: Do it. Semen can help you lose weight and gives a great glow to your skin. Interestingly, men know this. His offer to allow you to perform oral sex on him is totally selfless. This shows he loves you. The best thing to do is to thank him by performing it twice a day; then cook him a nice meal.
Q: My husband always has an orgasm then rolls over and goes to sleep without giving me one.
A: I’m not sure I understand the problem. Perhaps you’ve forgotten to cook him a nice meal.
More here.
Rohinton Mistry had the right idea years ago; after being body-searched one too many times, he simply refused ever to fly into or through the United States again.
But it’s not just the US. Let’s go to BoingBoing for the report of panic-striken Brits fingering each other at airports. Although we could go anywhere in the blogosphere, really. This is major, major news.
Two brown men were forced off a plane by a bunch of non-brown British passengers who became convinced that they were behaving suspiciously and were therefore terrorists. Shocking — who’d have thought that putting signs everywhere telling you that you were in danger of terrorists and that terrorists were everywhere and that you should look out for suspicious terrorism behavior would turn normal people into witch-hunting racist mobs?
The extraordinary scenes happened after some of the 150 passengers on a Malaga-Manchester flight overheard two men of Asian appearance apparently talking Arabic. Passengers told cabin crew they feared for their safety and demanded police action. Some stormed off the Monarch Airlines Airbus A320 minutes before it was due to leave the Costa del Sol at 3am. Others waiting for Flight ZB 613 in the departure lounge refused to board it…
Websites used by pilots and cabin crew were yesterday reporting further incidents. In one, two British women with young children on another flight from Spain complained about flying with a bearded Muslim even though he had been security-checked twice before boarding.
Now let’s look a little closer to home. Winnipeg, in fact, where we meet hottie doctor Ahmed Farooq, who was kicked off a flight for praying.
Naturally, the hotel room he where he had to spend the night, plus the flight home the next day, were out-of-pocket expenses that for which the airline takes no responsibility.
A Winnipeg doctor is demanding an official apology and compensation from United Airlines after being kicked off a flight in the U.S. this week, an incident he has characterized as “institutionalized discrimination.” Dr. Ahmed Farooq, a Muslim, was escorted off an airplane in Denver on Tuesday.
According to Farooq, reciting his evening prayers was interpreted by one passenger as an activity that was suspicious…
Farooq said the allegation came from a passenger who appeared drunk and had previously threatened him during the trip.
When flight personnel were alerted, the 27-year-old radiology resident and two colleagues — a man and a woman — were taken off their flight. They had been returning from a conference in San Francisco.
Farooq said that even officials from the Transportation Security Administration soon realized the flight crew had overreacted, but by the time that conclusion had been reached the trio were forced to stay in Denver for the night and catch a flight the next day — at their own expense.
“There’s no recourse,” Farooq said. “There’s no way to really be able to talk to anybody to really be able to reason it out. The police officers who talked to me afterwards and subsequent officials within the first three to five minutes, they were like, ‘You know what? The crew made a mistake. We apologize that they took you off. They overreacted.‘”
Thank god I’m not tanned! But if I may be permitted this remark, I’d just like to say that, having checked out the picture, I wouldn’t mind detaining him…in my apartment!
raincoaster 