OTTAWA Now that the dust is settling from Monday’s announcement General Motors Corp.’s last auto assembly plant in Oshawa, Ont., will soon be closed, the emerging landscape is not promising for Alberta. Leastways, it’s not hopeful from the perspective of an Alberta that has no plan to transition from a
Continue readingAuthor: David Climenhaga
Alberta Politics: Alberta politicians need to tread carefully when they comment on the coming job losses at GM Canada in Oshawa
We don’t yet know why General Motors Corp. has decided to walk away from its last auto-assembly plant in Oshawa, Ont., which CTV reported last night the Detroit-based company will announce it is doing at 10 o’clock this morning. I’m sure there will be plenty of suspects. I have one
Continue readingAlberta Politics: If other Canadians don’t think Alberta should go suck a lemon, they probably soon will
Alberta! Go suck a lemon! I don’t endorse that sentiment, of course. I’m an Albertan, after all. The person who did say something like that, as it happens, didn’t say it about Alberta. It was a long, long time ago, 1976 as a matter of fact, when Catherine Ford said
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Bygumbo, children’s lit by Edmonton author Gwen Molnar and illustrator Barbara Hartmann, leads Audreys fiction bestsellers
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold in Edmonton for the week ended Nov. 11, 2018. The lists are compiled by Audreys Books and provided by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta. EDMONTON FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. Bygumbo (children’s) – Gwen Molnar and Barbara Hartmann
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta’s Bill 27 may not take the politics out of pensions, but it will certainly help
Tabling on Tuesday of Bill 27, Alberta legislation that will wrest control of public service pensions from the sole hands of the minister of finance and hand it to joint boards run by public service employees and employers, should be the denouement of a long and sometimes dramatic story. “This
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Criticism of John Carpay, who compared pride flags to swastikas, called the work of a ‘left wing mob’
According to an increasingly influential segment of the United Conservative Party’s social conservative base, Albertans who have taken to social media to assail an ally of party leader Jason Kenney for the bigotry evident in his comparison of the pride flag to the Nazi swastika are nothing more than “the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Author Andrew Nikiforuk tells a bleak tale of squandered opportunities, wilful blindness on energy policy
By adopting an energy policy founded on low royalties and pipeline development, the NDP government of Premier Rachel Notley squandered an opportunity to implement a program that could have strengthened Alberta’s economy while preparing it to deal with the inevitable decline in fossil fuel demand, author Andrew Nikiforuk told the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Brexit Redux: Looking back at Jason Kenney’s strange comments when the U.K. shot itself in both feet
Back in June 2016, hours after Britons had narrowly voted to leave the European Union, a lot of Albertans scratched their heads at Jason Kenney’s bizarre Brexit commentary on social media. At the time, Mr. Kenney was still drawing a paycheque as the Conservative MP for Calgary Midnapore. He was
Continue readingAlberta Politics: A Grain of Rice by Nhung Tran-Davies tops Audreys Books’ Edmonton Fiction Bestseller list this week
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold in Edmonton for the week ended Nov. 11, 2018. The lists are compiled by Audreys Books and provided by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta. EDMONTON FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. A Grain of Rice (Young Adult) – Nhung
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Big Oil wants a milk break … and supply management’s foes are all over the media – except when they’re not
On Tuesday, the president of Cenovus Energy Inc., one of the Big Five players in the Alberta oilsands, called for temporary production cuts across the Canadian oil sector to push the sinking price of oil back up again. It’s all about supply and demand, as the well-educated readers of this blog
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Religious schools defy David Eggen; John Carpay hangs in; and Jason Kenney isn’t the Decider after all!
NDP Education Minister David Eggen’s warning yesterday he could defund 28 religious private schools if they won’t obey the law and implement diversity policies and UCP Leader Jason Kenney’s refusal to expel a high-profile social conservative party member who compared pride flags with Nazi swastikas seem like separate stories. They
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Calgary’s Olympic bid is dead, but don’t completely rule out a zombie moment
Moments after 10 p.m. last night, the few Albertans nervously paying attention outside Calgary received word voters in Cowtown had clearly said no to the idea of a re-do in 2026 of the city’s fabled 1988 Winter Olympics. I use the term fabled advisedly, as I suspect the vaunted success
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Too many senior managers are leaving the City of St. Albert: It’s time for City Council to explain what’s going on
ST. ALBERT, Alberta What the heck is going on at the City of St. Albert? According to the headline on a small news story inside Saturday’s edition of the St. Albert Gazette, our community’s twice-weekly newspaper, “City restructures upper management.” That’s one way of putting it. From here, though, the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Lake of Fire Update: Stuff is still hitting the fan, and it may not be lava!
Well a certain kind of stuff has certainly hit the fan since it was reported here and elsewhere that John Carpay, the well-known social conservative warrior, had dipped his toe into Alberta’s always-dangerous Lake of Fire. Since the story broke over the long weekend, Mr. Carpay and his old comrade
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Considering Carpay’s Folly: Why can’t Alberta Conservatives stay away from the Lake of Fire?
Why can’t Alberta conservatives learn to stay away from the Lake of Fire? This is a question for the ages. Latest to bathe in the scalding waves of the fiery lake is social conservative litigator and Jason Kenney confidante John Carpay. Mr. Carpay was a principal player in the unsuccessful
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Edmonton Conservative MP Kerry Diotte threatens defamation action against young people who criticized him on Twitter
Edmonton Griesbach MP Kerry Diotte has threatened a young writer and former constituent with a defamation lawsuit for tweeting critical comments about his appearance in photos with Faith Goldy, an unsuccessful candidate for mayor of Toronto who is widely viewed as a white nationalist. Bashir Mohamed, 23, who has written
Continue readingAlberta Politics: ‘Businessman, pundit, and religious activist’ Craig Chandler would be a perfect test for Jason Kenney’s database!
Craig Chandler would be the perfect test case for Opposition Leader Jason Kenney’s new database for identifying and rooting out would-be members, volunteers and candidates whose views are too extreme for the United Conservative Party. If Mr. Chandler doesn’t set all the alarm bells ringing, the database doesn’t work properly.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: While Albertans panicked about state of the oilsands, the Big Five bitumen-extraction corporations made billions
While Albertans have been in flap over the state of the province’s oilsands industry, the Big Five Oilsands extraction corporations have been raking in billions. “Despite the 2014 oil price crash and the ongoing hand-wringing over pipelines and the price differential, the reality is the Big Five oilsands producers have
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Translating Air, poetry by Edmonton’s Kath MacLean, tops Audreys Books Edmonton Fiction Bestseller List
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold in Edmonton for the week ended Nov. 4, 2018. The lists are compiled by Audreys Books and provided by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta. EDMONTON FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. Translating Air – Kath MacLean * 2. A
Continue readingAlberta Politics: For the Changing Moon, poems and songs by Anna Marie Sewell, tops Audreys Edmonton bestsellers fiction list this week
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold in Edmonton for the week ended Oct. 28, 2018. The lists are compiled by Audreys Books and provided by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta. EDMONTON FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. For the Changing Moon (poetry) – Anna Marie
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