Carl Icahn, the billionaire investor known for his relentless campaigns against CEOs and rivals, has a secret cause that he has pursued for a decade.
In 2012, McDonald s Corp. pledged to stop buying pork for its Bacon McDouble cheeseburgers, McRib sandwiches and the like by 2022 from producers who use small crates to constrain pregnant swine. Left unmentioned was that Mr. Icahn had pushed for the change behind the scenes.
A decade on, Mr. Icahn has concluded the original promise was hogwash. McDonald s now often has its producers move pigs out of the containers only after confirming they re pregnant. Many wait to do so until the sows are four to six weeks into their 16-week pregnancies. Mr. Icahn had expected the use of so-called gestation crates to be banned altogether.
The man who helped send TWA into bankruptcy and partly inspired Gordon Gekko, the ruthless corporate raider in Wall Street, is spending a lot of time advocating for better treatment of pigs, using many of the same tactics.
Ethically, you really can’t eat anything but the super-expensive, free range pork. So look for that at your supermarket. Wild boar you shoot yourself is fine. That’s something I think I could do–it looks relatively easy. Evidently making your bacon involves smoking it. Anyway, be kind to pigs. They’re said to be lovable (though they seem pretty filthy to me). I know Jews don’t eat pork. Maybe God doesn’t want you to eat them either. Try not to think about bacon.
