"It wasn't to completely discredit him. I mean when we came into that discussion that evening, we didn't know what to expect," said Arnell Tailfeathers, a freelance videographer.
"We just thought ... if something happens — we better document it."
Yeah, I'm not buying it. Somebody found that old article in the Manitoban where Flanagan talked child pornography. And someone made sure a question about that article got asked when Flanagan appeared at the University of Lethbridge. And then Mr. Tailfeathers posted the video, and seems to have run a twitter spam campaign the night of Feb. 27th to insure that it got noticed. Of course nobody could know that Flanagan would go off like that, but to claim it was all a spontaneous goof...
I'd prefer to think that the folks at Idle No More, with whom Mr. Tailfeathers is associated, are starting to think beyond road blockades and towards a more creative form of resistance.
5 comments:
Good for them. To beat the enemy, one has to think like them.... Not be them.
In the unedited raw footage it is clear Mr.Tailfeathers is rather rude in his questioning, even asking Flanagan if he was the father of the Ikea Monkey.
It was Levi Little Mustache who asked the question. Presumably he did his research beforehand. Dr. Dawg had blogged about Flanagan's 2009 remarks; maybe others did too.
https://twitter.com/LeviINM
Arnell Tailfeathers recorded it but also recorded other discussion at that talk and has posted 5 video clips:
http://www.youtube.com/user/ArnellTailfeathers
https://twitter.com/ArnellTF
Bear in mind that Flanagan was there, on traditional Kainai territory, to talk about possible legislative changes to the Indian Act. Since such legislation was the originating cause of the rise of Idle No More, naturally Kainai members of INM and others attended.
Most FN people hate Flanagan's guts for pushing racist policies such as assimilation of FNs. No doubt they were out to get him if possible, but I doubt they really expected him to shoot himself in the foot in his mouth over this particular issue.
Harper has written a defense now, but strangely enough does not mention his comments about being on the NAMBLA mailing list:
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/03/04/tom-flanagan-in-his-own-words-ex-harper-strategist-explains-controversial-child-pornography-comments/
Oops, did I write "Harper"? I meant of course to write "Flanagan". No connection between the two, none at all, at all.
Unfortunately, Flanagan's clarification of his relationship to the Ikea Monkey has been forgotten in the reaction to his other revelations.
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