John Baird embarks on "stuff-my-pockets" phase of career

After two decades as a high-profile political operator, John Baird has bid adieux to public service.

He's moving on. Last week we learned he had signed on as an "International Strategic Advisor" to Barrick Gold, a "job" that pays well into the six numbers for the chore of attending one or two meetings a year.

When I told Peter Munk 15 years ago that I was willing to be a strategic advisor for a mere $75k a year, he laughed me out of his office.

I even gave him a bit of free strategic advice; a free sample as it were. Put Pascua Lama on ice, I said. It's gonna be a black hole, a money pit.

Get the fuck outta here, he says to me.

Woulda saved him billions to heed my advice.

Back to Baird. Last week Barrick Gold. This week Canadian Pacific. Yup, Bullshittin' Baird is now a director of the new and improved CPR, which also pays well into the six numbers for a couple meetings a year.

He'll feel right at home there. After all, when you listen to Hunter Harrison's bullshit 'n bluster, it's almost like you're listening to a more senile version of Baird.

And you can't blame Baird for looking out for his pocket book. After twenty-plus years of public service, his parliamentary pension is a paltry $65,000 per. Mind you, he must have something coming from Ontario, where he spent some time learning his chops at the feet of Mean Mike Harris, but still, he's gonna have hardly enough to pay for a decent bachelor pad on Bank Street.

But lets not fret. We're up to three or four meetings a year in return for half a million in the bank, and by my math I figure he can still squeeze a couple dozen more directorships into his schedule. A directorship with one of Sheldon Adelson's operations is a no-brainer; a thank-you for the yeoman's work he did promoting Likud and slandering Iran.

Plus, while he's never going to be an A-lister on the public speakers circuit, you can see him making a tidy 25-50k per engagement, mainly due to his extravagantly high profile as Minister of Foreign Affairs, a profile largely earned by being the most inept FM in Canada's history.

Oddly enough, at Barrick he'll be joined by the ultimate carpet-bagger, the Newtster, who managed to coax his net worth from twenty-nine dollars when he entered public service, to multiple millions today.

In the great US political system you don't have to retire before lining your pockets!

In praise of an honourable capitalist

Yes, I truly believe they can be found. Unfortunately it's the sleaze-bag "activist investors" and self-dealing hedgies who get most of the accolades.

But Robert Schad is one of the good guys. Schad was one of that generation of post WW II European immigrants who spent his life building up a company from nothing. The company he built, Husky Injection Molding, was known far and wide as a leader in corporate social responsibility.

In 2008 Schad sold the company for some 800 million to one of the above, who made it more efficient by stripping many of the benefits that Schad had provided his former employees, and then sold it on to another group of hedge funds for two billion.

Long before he sold out Schad had started a joint venture with a First Nation  community in Ontario. The current owners of Husky have since forced the closure of that operation for reasons that seem to have more to do with spite than anything legitimate. Reading the story of Mr. Schad's contribution to that native community underlines just what a mensch he is.

Mr. Schad is also the guy who gets credit for ending Ontario's spring bear hunt, which I once did a satirical take on. I've recently heard another version of the same story, in which far from being pals with Premier Harris, Schad supposedly told him that if he didn't cancel the hunt he was going to donate a million dollars to the Liberal party.

Regardless of which version is true, that cancellation is one of the few blots on an otherwise saintly resume.

Or not, depending on how you feel about bear hunting.

Ted Nugent and the cancellation of the Ontario spring bear hunting season

Since the Michigan Madman keeps popping up in the news I'd like to refer back to when he was making headlines in the Toronto Star.

For many years Terrible Ted used to bring his extended family across the Saint Clair River every spring for a spot of bear hunting. Ted was a rich and reasonably famous dude and his hunting party spent tons of money in the rural Ontario economy.

Then, back in '99, Premier Mike Harris, out of the blue, cancelled the spring bear hunt.

Now, on the face of it, you'd think Mike and Ted would have quite a bit in common. Mike was one of those hard right guys who would feel right at home at a Tea Party tea party. A slash and burn union-busting redneck all the way.

So the cancellation of the spring bear hunt was a bit of a shock. People took a second look at Mean Mike. If he cared enough about those cuddly bear cubs who lost their mommies to the spring hunt, he really couldn't be such a bad guy, could he?

Of course the more liberal reaches of the media couldn't help but soften their approach to Harris after that. That most liberal of liberal Canadian newspapers, the Toronto Star, invoked the Nuge in its attempt to whitewash Harris.

You see, of all the critics of the cancellation, the Motor City Maniac was the most vocal, and that's just the foil that the Star needed to discredit all the other critics.

Like, if a self-proclaimed "greasy gun-loving guitar player" from Michigan is against this, it's obviously a good idea. Case closed.

They didn't dwell too much on the back story. A big Harris financial backer by the name of Robert Schad had a soft spot for cuddly bear cubs. Over brandies one night he says to Mean Mike, "hey pal, I'm thinking of another six-figure contribution to your re-election fund, but how would you feel about doing me a little favor? I've just been so worried about all those homeless motherless bear cubs we see every spring because of that darned spring bear hunt..."

And the rest is history.

The rest of the history includes more reports of nuisance bears every year all over rural Ontario, to the point that they're becoming a threat to campers and cottagers, but that's another story.

Sooner or later the spring hunt will be back and so will Ted and his high-spending posse.