their taste in pictures. I don't look at these pictures." A video of the remarks was posted to YouTube overnight and his remarks proved controversial. Danielle Smith, who was mentored by Flanagan, and served as Wildrose Party leader in 2009, cut her ties with him saying "there is no language strong enough to condemn [his] comments". Andrew McDougall (the Director of Communications for the Prime Minister of Canada) considered them to be "repugnant, ignorant, and appalling." CBC News immediately announced that, "In light of recent remarks made by Tom Flanagan at the University of Lethbridge, CBC News has taken the decision to end our association with him as a commentator on Power and Politics. While we support and encourage free speech across the country and a diverse range of voices, we believe Mr Flanagan's comments to have crossed the line and impacted his credibility as a commentator for us (McGuire February 28, 2013)". Flanagan subsequently apologized for his remarks, stating that his words were "badly chosen". On 5 March 2013 Flanagan, in an interview with The Agenda talk show host Steve Paikin, Flanagan defended his position, and explains that he was cut off and unable to explain fully his position. He also states he was posing a question to provoke thought, as he would have done in his role as a professor. In his book Persona Non Grata, Flanagan explains that his remarks were taken as if he was in favour of child pornography or supportive of child molesters. In fact, he was intending to question whether mandatory jail time for simple possession of child pornography was an appropriate punishment. Affiliations Flanagan is often described as a member of the Calgary School, which includes a group of conservatively inclined professors at the University of Calgary, such as Barry F. Cooper, F.L.(Ted) Morton, Rainer Knopff and history professor David Bercuson who are strongly committed to strategic and direct influence on public affairs with a long-term vision. By 1998, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a public policy research institution based in Washington, DC, had already observed the ascendancy of the role of Calgary-based academics on Canadian public policy, specifically the Calgary School of political science (Rovinsky 1998:10). He is also a senior fellow of the conservative think tank the Fraser Institute. Political influence In a jocular letter written to the Literary Review of Canada (2010–12), Flanagan commented that, "Sylvia