A Day With Dr. Flanagan

This is extremely short notice, but if you're a political junkie and you have time to sneak over to the University of Manitoba today, there are not one, but two chances to learn a thing or two from one of the most interesting figures in Canadian politics today - Tom Flanagan.

Dr. Flanagan - perhaps best known as Stephen Harper's former campaign manager and one of the intellectual leaders of the former Reform party, but also a noted and somewhat controversial academic from the University of Calgary - has two speaking engagements today at the U of M. His first, at 12:30 in the University College lounge, deals with the last election campaign. Later, at 2:30 in 306 Tier, he's speaking to political science students. I'm busy earlier, but I'm going to try and check out Talk No. 2.

Given a) this lame attempt to keep Flanagan off campus and b) the frequent characterization of Dr. Flanagan on our local paper's op-ed pages as a Machiavellian schemer bent on wiping out Canadian progressives like the Jedi, why can't I shake the feeling the lecture will resemble this?