Yesterday’s United Conservative Party claim that Alberta is the beneficiary of a record-breaking drive to recruit nurses from abroad seems divorced from reality. A UCP social media ad attributing a misleading claim to the Globe and Mail (Image: Facebook/Jason Copping). In a UCP news release echoed repeatedly on social media
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Alberta Politics: Even more stuff Danielle Smith says: Privatize major public hospitals? Sure! Alberta’s premier has a plan
A video clip of Danielle Smith outlining how Alberta could privatize major public hospitals like the Peter Lougheed Centre, the Rockyview General Hospital, and South Health Campus appeared on social media last week. The massive South Health Campus public hospital facility in Calgary – targeted by Alberta’s premier for privatization?
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Unhinged: Danielle Smith says vaccinated Albertans are just like the German voters who elected Hitler
In an unhinged commentary recorded by Danielle Smith on Nov. 10, 2021, the day before Remembrance Day, Alberta’s future premier compared Albertans who got vaccinated against COVID-19 with Germans who voted for Hitler. NDP Opposition Leader and former Alberta premier Rachel Notley called Ms. Smith’s comments “horrifying” (Photo: David J.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Wildfire state of emergency introduces new calculus to Alberta election campaign
Declaration of a provincial state of emergency just 23 days before the spring election introduces a new level of complexity to Alberta’s electoral math. Alberta Opposition Leader Rachel Notley (Photo: Alberta NDP). Alberta is now dealing with electoral calculus, as it were, not just mere arithmetic. With dry conditions, hot
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Two cheers for King Charles!
Today’s the day! Prince Charles in short pants, already apprenticing for the job (Photo: Creator unknown, Library and Archives Canada). Charles III, the former Prince Charles, finally gets the job he could have had in 2001 if the British monarchy had the same mandatory retirement age as the Canadian Senate,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: UCP’s ‘Alberta is Calling signing bonus’ is mostly fluff, little substance, and likely to stir resentment
The United Conservative Party’s big “economic diversification” announcement yesterday, delivered by Premier Danielle Smith in what looked like a tire-repair shop, sounded like an uninspiring revival of former premier Jason Kenney’s “Alberta is Calling” subway advertising campaign in Toronto last fall. Jason Kenney during his lame “Alberta is Calling” News
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Radical street preacher Artur Pawlowski found guilty of 2 charges; still gets to challenge Jason Kenney’s Critical Infrastructure Defence Act
Possible unpopular opinion: Far-right street preacher Artur Pawlowski will have done us all a favour if he manages to get all or part of Jason Kenney’s odious Critical Infrastructure Defence Act tossed out by a court on constitutional grounds. Radical street pastor Artur Pawlowski, found guilty of two changes yesterday,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: As campaign begins, Art Pawlowski and Rob Anders talk political alliance; Paul Hinman gets new party; Drew Barnes exits, stage right
Apparently looking for something to do while he awaits the verdict in his criminal trial later today, “street preacher” Artur Pawlowski has teamed up with the former holder of the title of Canada’s Worst MP to try to form a new Alberta political party. Former Wildrose Alliance leader Paul Hinman
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Happy May Day! Alberta poised for election call today
Today is May 1, the International Day of the Worker and presumably only by coincidence the day on which Alberta Premier Danielle Smith plans to visit Alberta Lieutenant-Governor Salma Lakhani to ask her to call a general election for May 29. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). Recent polling
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Criticized for the company she keeps, premier insists she doesn’t know who her friends are
Criticized for the company she keeps, Danielle Smith countered by insisting she doesn’t know who her friends are. Alberta’s premier hobnobs last Wednesday in Calgary with convoy leader James Bauder, his wife Sandra Collins Bauder, and convoyer Harold Jonker (Photo: Facebook/James Bauder). When Alberta’s premier caught flack for posing at
Continue readingAlberta Politics: $#!+ Danielle Smith says, and does: Alberta Premier touts far-right ‘bastions of freedom’ in U.S.; poses with convoy insurrectionists
It’s been more than 25 days since April Fool’s Day and we’re still learning almost daily about $#!+ Danielle Smith says … and does. This is Alberta, where it often feels as if every day is April 1, and by some kind of strange cosmic convergence, it’s Ground Hog Day
Continue readingAlberta Politics: In another unsurprising Danielle Smith flip-flop, Calgary to get $330 million in provincial cash for new Flames arena
Among other things, Danielle Smith’s announcement yesterday afternoon of big provincial bucks for a new downtown arena for the Calgary Flames represents yet another flip-flop for Alberta’s premier. Billionaire Calgary Flames Part owner N. Murray Edwards (Photo: Facebook video screenshot). Alberta taxpayers will sink $330 million or more into the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: How to blow up a pipeline hearing: AER boss just won’t say when regulator told Alberta government about toxic leak
Anyone who watched the head of the Alberta Energy Regulator refusing to answer questions yesterday during the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development’s hearings into Imperial Oil’s Kearl site tailings pond spill in May 2022 has to wonder what the actual purpose of the provincial agency is. Alberta Energy
Continue readingAlberta Politics: NDP would repeal Sovereignty Act, restore balance to workplace law, Christina Gray tells AFL convention
CALGARY – An NDP Government will repeal the Sovereignty Act and other controversial UCP laws while creating better jobs in a more affordable Alberta, Opposition Labour Critic Christina Gray told delegates to the Alberta Federation of Labour’s biennial convention today. Delegates to the AFL convention heard from NDP leader Rachel
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith flips another flop – takes credit for federal child-care program she recently reviled
CALGARY – Alberta Premier Danielle Smith took to social media on Tuesday to take credit for the federal Liberal Government’s $10-a-day daycare plan, which Alberta only reluctantly signed onto and to which the province contributes nothing. Federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who has pledged not to fund $10-a-day child care
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Tales from the Crypt: UCP unearths Stephen Harper whose bloodless video ‘endorsement’ falls somewhere short of inspiring
How do you make a political endorsement without making a political endorsement? Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, who was not mentioned in Mr. Harper’s “endorsement” of her political party, which he also didn’t name (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). Canada’s former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper has offered us a lesson! Yesterday, Alberta’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: NDP’s Rachel Notley targets radical Take Back Alberta group taking over the United Conservative Party
It’s hard to imagine David Parker, founder and de facto leader of the Take Back Alberta political action committee, was very happy to hear Opposition Leader Rachel Notley signal clearly last week that the NDP considers his group a legitimate target in the election campaign already unofficially under way. Take
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Message to Alberta’s media: Danielle Smith has neither the authority nor the power to restrict you to one question – ignore her decree!
It’s in Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s nature never to admit she’s wrong, so it was no surprise after her announcement Friday that she wouldn’t allow reporters at a government news conference to ask more than one question prompted a storm of criticism, she doubled down yesterday. Some politicians, like Alberta
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The victim of her own repeated blunders, Danielle Smith decrees a limit on reporters’ questions
It looks like Alberta’s going to need a Sam Donaldson in this election campaign. Former ABC White House Correspondent Sam Donaldson in 1995 (Photo: John Matthew Smith via Wikipedia). You know, someone with a voice big enough to be heard over the noise of Alberta’s premier and her United Conservative
Continue readingAlberta Politics: ‘National Citizen’s Inquiry’ into COVID-19 objects to TikTok ban; meanwhile, Alberta’s official version of the same thing is doing something
The so-called “National Citizens Inquiry” established last fall by Preston Manning complained on Easter Sunday that TikTok has joined YouTube in suspending its account, presumably for spreading misinformation about COVID-19. Mr. Manning in Ottawa in 2013 when he was still talking about the need “Green Conservatism” and warning his fellow
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