Flimsily Spiteful Vengeance

"Overall, however, the organization failed to gel, and by mid-November it was apparent that we were falling seriously behind. We had no office space, no campaign pamphlet, little money, and no discernible fundraising plan. We we did have was a plan for a launch that would cost $60,000, even though we only had about $40,000 in the bank. Stephen and I realized in mid-November that the organization wasn't working and couldn't be saved. He therefore called all the paid people and told them he would have to terminate their employment, though John Williamson would stay a few more weeks as press secretary and First Past the Post would continue to do our web business. I admired the way Stephen did this; it would have been easier to tell me to fire everyone, but he didn't take the easy path. This willingness to handle the unpleasant side of things has continued to be one of his strengths in his subsequent political career. Even when he has to replace people, they appreciate how he delivers the bad news personally, and they often remain supportive and willing to work in other capacities in the future."
"Stephen's biggest tactical triumph came in autumn 2007, when he pounced on a House of Commons resolution by Gilles Duceppe to recognize Quebec as a nation. Rewording the resolution to read that "the Quebecois form a nation within a united Canada", Harper pulled off a coup by getting all parties, including the out-manoeuvred BQ, to support it. He also departed from platform commitments when he removed the tax exemption for income trusts and when he unveiled a new equalization formula that fell short of his campaign promise to allow provinces to exempt 100 percent of natural resource revenues from the transfer calculation. Under heavy pressure, he went beyond the platform to embrace the view that global warming was caused by greenhouse gas emissions and that the Canadian Government should take action to reduce those emissions, a position he had resisted in the past. He also made a dramatic apology to First Nations over residential schools, something not mentioned in the 2006 platform. I didn't particularly like either the new greenhouse gas policy or the residential schools apology, but they were in line with the incrementalist course I had recommended in the first edition of this book and which Harper openly professed in the second week of the 2008 campaign."
Tom Flanagan, Harper's Team; Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power, second edition, C.2009

"He can be suspicious, secretive, and vindictive, prone to sudden eruptions of white-hot rage over meaningless trivia, at other times falling into week-long depressions in which he is incapable of making decisions."
Tom Flanagan, Persona Non Grata: The Death of Free Speech in the Internet Age, C.2014

So, as long as Professor Flanagan was on the inside, helping the Conservative Party of Canada in its drive to unseat the Liberals to form a government of their own, he could recognize and appreciate the outstanding leadership qualities of the man who would be prime minister, and who achieved that goal. Either Mr. Flanagan is a fairly good judge of character, or he is not. Failing that, Mr. Flanagan is without doubt, a most poisonously vindictive man in his own right.

So horribly offended at the unfairness of being professionally and personally considered outside the realm of acceptable tolerance that his presence became persona non grata when, in an off-guard moment he expressed himself in a public forum as disfavouring jail time for anyone in possession of child pornography on the grounds that they had a right to favour the kind of photos that appealed to them, and they weren't hurting anyone in the process, a line of thought repellent to the prime minister.

So Mr. Flanagan scribbled his notes and set about writing a lengthy riposte to the assault against his character that he had himself initiated, defending himself against all those who had made it clear they had no wish to be connected in any form possible to someone who saw little amiss in people aiding an industry that is horribly destructive to children. His new book soon to see publication had some vituperative leaks beforehand, so those who salivate at the prospect of reading an insider's view of the prime minister's traits would anticipate the opportunity to purchase the book.

"It's odd that after not having worked on the Hill in almost a decade, and in the context of defending his own outrageous comments on child pornography, Mr. Flanagan comes forward with these ridiculous allegations. As the public knows, and as the prime minister's record shows, he's had no difficulties making decisions in good times or bad", pithily responded Mr. Harper's director of communications, Jason MacDonald.

A common interest in politics and in specific the original Reform Party brought Mr. Flanagan and Mr. Harper together; one to become the eventual head of the newly-formed Conservative Party of Canada through a merger of the Canadian Alliance and Progressive Conservative parties, the other to visualize, recommend and perform the backroom strategic manoeuvring that would help Stephen Harper's aspirations become reality. Mr. Flanagan quite obviously recognized the exceptional metier of the man at that time.

With the first, unauthorized book, Harper's Team, that Mr. Flanagan wrote in an obvious ploy at elevating his status as a mover-and-shaker of political vision and verity, it might be said that he had set out to alienate a man who prizes his personal privacy, to begin with. Choosing to write fairly intimate details of his observances when he was privileged with the friendship of the Harper family, it is little wonder that Mr. Harper chose not to be indifferent to this infringement of a friendship's implied trust.

"I would see Stephen sometimes get morose and sad, but it never affected his ability to do his job. Yes, sometimes he would get depressed, but he was always a hard worker and always doing his job. He is so smart and he had a great imagination and can think about all the horrible things that can happen", in all the things can conceivably go wrong, and concerning himself with exerting an effort to ensure that those matters would not surface to mar planned events, explained Gerry Nichols, who had worked with Mr. Harper at the National Citizens Coalition.

The consensus among those who knew and recognize Stephen Harper as a colleague appears to be one of affection and admiration. Obviously those among his collegial acquaintances and friends who had never disappointed the trust that he placed in their friendship. As for decision making and proceeding on the basis of those decisions the Prime Minister does not appear to have made many grave errors due to indecision and bad humour.

He has expressed the opinion of most thinking Canadians on issues from Sri Lanka to Syria, Iran to Russia, Ukraine to Israel as far as international issues are concerned. Most latterly his Ukraine file stand has all-party support, just as his decision on Libya intervention along with NATO had. In foreign policy issues, including Canada's relationship with Israel, this prime minister has proven his mettle.

His handling, along with his long-time, trusted and effectively assured Minister of Finance, with the economic file throughout a period of global financial instability has been outstanding, the envy of Canada's G7 peers. A future surplus will make a package of tax reductions for the population possible. And his feeling, compassionate eulogy for Jim Flaherty paints a full picture of a man of many parts, capable and intelligent, reliable and resilient.

Mr. Flanagan, for all his academic credentials and political associations, once a trusted adviser, chose to  burn his candle at both ends, unfortunately, and then used himself as a burnt offering with his penchant for musing in favour of sexual deviants' "right" to pursue their harmful-to-society proclivities, and his own pursuit of revenge on a man whose sensibilities simply do not match his, while outrunning him on the morality-and-decency scale by a wide, wide margin.

Stephen Harper delivers the eulogy at the state funeral for Jim Flaherty in Toronto on Wednesday, 

April 16, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn