The World Famous Dan Shields: 2729...The Prodigal Sun

Oooops.

Freudian newspapery slip.

Y'see he did own the Chicago Sun[-Times].

Conrad Black that is.

And this morning's op-ed in the Toronto Star calls for his return.

Le cut.

Le paste.

If Black wants to return, we should welcome him back; But drop the love-in and focus on what he can contribute to our national identity

Toronto Star

Wed Aug 11 2010

Page: A15

Section: Opinion

Byline: Neil McLaughlin

Canadian columnists and journalists have spilled too much ink on the continuing saga of Conrad Black.

We have been warned about Black's quest for revenge and libel payments in The Globe and Mail.

We have been bombarded by the National Post's love-in; his largely uncritical supporters claim he has been vindicated and has emerged from prison a changed man with head unbowed.

Even the normally critical Rick Salutin explained away the obstruction of justice conviction with reference to Black's "boyish" charm. Powerful intellectuals and academic and business elites are accustomed to grovelling from graduate students and employees, but the cult of personality around Lord Black is unbecoming for serious journalists. Yet Black could once again be one of Canada's most important "public intellectuals."

Two years in jail seems a fair penalty for the contempt for the law he showed when removing boxes from his office at night while under investigation for a serious crime. We will see whether the original fraud charges are upheld by the American court system after their Supreme Court found that the prosecution misused an overly broad and vague "fair services" law initially designed to deal with kickbacks and bribes in the public sector.

Whether or not Black leaves the United States with a felony criminal record, our journalists should drop the Black worship and focus on larger issues related to the status of public debate in Canada. The issues have been polarized by both Black's defenders and his critics. We could do without the excessive and premature language about vindication pushed by Black's supporters. His convictions have not yet been overturned, and his greedy and arrogant behaviour was appalling even if it turns out not to be illegal.

It is no time, however, to engage in vindictive and petty talk about keeping him out of Canada because he gave up Canadian citizenship to take a British title. If Black wants to return to Canada, we should welcome him back. Black has deep roots in our country, has a Canadian wife and daughter, considers it his home and he may even have learned something new about Canada during his recent Florida vacation.

Black would not be the first Canadian to have romanticized both the United States and Great Britain, and then come home to re-establish roots with a desire to contribute to our quest for national identity. Whatever one thinks of Black's politics or his business practices, he is a serious intellectual with much to contribute.

I will not be marching in any
National Post
-organized "Welcome Back Conrad" parade, but once the American courts decide his fate, we should let the man back into the society where he belongs. Conrad Black has the potential to help add intellectual diversity and historical depth to our public debates. His sharp wit, excellent biographies on Duplessis, Roosevelt and Nixon, and his ability to discuss foreign policy, economics and culture make him a public intellectual worth debating.

Former Dominion workers and many Hollinger investors will surely feel we will all be better off if his recent legal troubles force him permanently out of business. The Canadian government should pass laws that criminalize the underhanded "non-compete" contract he used to pad his pockets, and would do well to make sure his taxes are in order. But Black has things to say about political history, ideas and Canadian society.

Black's defence of the unregulated free market is distorted both by ideology and self-interest, but we should respond with better analysis and policy. Black does not deserve a medal, as Jonathan Kay seems to believe, for changing his mind and coming to understand that the American criminal justice system is overly harsh and irrational.

The Canadian socialists and liberals Conrad Black has been attacking for years have long known this. But Black has joined those of us skeptical of Stephen Harper's build-prisons-for-unreported-crimes agenda, and this is a good thing. Black's teaching among his fellow inmates does appear to have taught him about the class and racial inequalities deeply interwoven into American society and this intellectual honesty must be acknowledged even if Black thinks everything is about him. Real public intellectuals, of course, can come to understand the plight of others not simply because of their own situation, and they rely on the strengths of their arguments for influence, not bullying critics with lawsuits or owning the media. But even if Conrad Black still has growing to do, if he were kept out of business and allowed back into the Canadian intellectual scene, it would be a win-win for everyone.

Neil McLaughlin teaches sociology at McMaster University. He writes on the sociology of public intellectuals. ngmclaugh@mcmaster.ca