âeoeHow is Eddie Greenspan doing?” asked Paula Todd one night on her CTV show, The Verdict. Not, “How is Conrad Black doing?” You could get the idea the big trial was about Eddie as much, maybe more, than his client.

“It took six weeks, but I’ve fully adjusted,” he told an interviewer. That’s nice, dear âe” as kids now say to their elders, but is this really about your life in progress, or Conrad Black’s? We were told he “redeemed” himself on the final day of his cross of prosecution witness David Radler, after flubbing the Radler cross-examination by being hyper-aggressive and letting down his fans.

Well, good for Eddie, I suppose, but the, er, defendant, who’s paying the shot … ? Reporters involve him in exchanges on how he’s enjoying it and is he looking forward to his closing.

Personally, I prefer lawyers who respond, “It’s not about me,” if there are any. I also don’t get the references to the fabled Clarence Darrow, which he makes and others do about him. The civil rights that Eddie Greenspan has defended tend to be those of police charged with abusing their position, or a former premier charged with sexual abuse. The powerful deserve defence, but it’s not exactly Darrow country. Nor do I get the allusions to his legendary status up here. He’s no Denny Crane âe” the legend who never lost. Eddie has lost very high-profile cases.

I have no idea if Conrad Black will be found guilty. It’s hard to tell, since reporters tend to see through the eyes of “other professionals,” like lawyers, rather than grunts on the jury. But if he is, maybe it’s Eddie Greenspan who should go to jail.

Boycott the boycotts. I don’t much like boycotts. I think it’s almost always better to talk to people and deal with them than to shut off contact. (The problem with Neville Chamberlain at Munich wasn’t that he talked to Hitler; it’s that he caved. If he’d talked and said there’d be no backing down, the Second World War might have been avoided.)

I felt that way in the days of apartheid and boycotts of South Africa, and disagreed then with many friends. This applies to proposed academic boycotts of Israel, which are only at discussion stage in Britain, although they’ve already produced much outrage and dismay. But I’m also against the boycott that the U.S., Israel, Canada and the EU conducted against the elected Hamas government.

Canada has just “restored” relations with the “new, Hamas-free Palestinian Authority.” Foreign Minister Peter MacKay adds: “of course contingent on no inclusion of Hamas.” They have boycotted the PA since Hamas won. Now, they are going to “re-engage” and “lift a ban on direct financial aid to the new government.”

When you’re a government, you get to call it something other than a boycott (disengagement, financial ban). But that’s what it was: sinister and offensive. Hamas won democratically and was the choice of the Palestinian electorate. No one denies that. It’s an insult to an entire people and to democratic values to refuse to even talk to them, cut off aid and taxes, and blatantly ship in arms to their enemies âe” i.e., Fatah âe” to destroy them. You encourage bloodshed and discourage democracy. And free speech is every bit as involved as it is in boycotting a university.

Thumbs yuck. Is there a way to abolish the thumbs-up gesture used by politicians who don’t know what else to do when faced with a camera, like Finance Minister Jim Flaherty this week beside the NASCAR entry the Tories bought ad space on? The most awkward politicians tend to it: Bob Rae, Stephen Harper. Why is it the all-purpose move? As a wheels-up gesture by pilots when they couldn’t be heard over engines, it made sense. It’s inane when you’re coming out of Question Period.

It’s trying too hard to look … exactly what? Did you know recent research says that in ancient Rome, the thumbs-up was given to gladiators to show they were allowed to kill their opponents, not let them live?

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Rick Salutin

Rick Salutin is a Canadian novelist, playwright and critic. He is a strong advocate of left wing causes and writes a regular column in the Toronto Star.