United Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney and UCP MLAs Prasad Panda and Devin Dreeshen took off for India yesterday. The main problem with the UCP passage to India is that, no matter how Mr. Kenney describes it, the six-day visit is really nothing more than a nice fall vacation in
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Alberta Politics: Thank you, Doug Ford, for making it clear our Constitution isn’t worth the paper it’s written on!
By making use of the Canadian Constitution’s Notwithstanding Clause to wreak petty vengeance on his old adversaries at Toronto City Hall, Ontario Premier Doug Ford has actually done Canadians a favour. After 36 years of delusional complacency, we have now had confirmed what anyone who was really paying attention knew
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Kids’ book by Edmonton singer-songwriter Ben Sures tops Audreys fiction bestseller list
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold in Edmonton for the week ended Sept. 9, 2018. The lists are compiled by Audreys Books and provided by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta. EDMONTON FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. The Boy Who Walked Backwards – Ben Sures
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Doug Ford achieves the impossible: he’s gotten Canadians interested in constitutional reform!
Office-holding Conservative politicians and operatives of their well-funded Astro-Turf and think tank support network across Canada have now virtually to a man and woman jumped aboard Ontario Conservative Premier Doug Ford’s runaway constitutional train, defending his use of Charter of Rights and Freedoms’ override clause to gerrymander electoral districts in
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The Dougtatorship notwithstanding, what have you got to fear, Mr. Scheer?
What have you got to fear, Andrew Scheer? Is there a single office-holding Conservative in this country who is willing to stand up for the fundamental rights of Canadians as they are assaulted by Ontario Premier Doug Ford and his unrestrained Dougtatorship? What an opportunity this could have been for
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The era of Notwithstanding Clause restraint is over … get used to it!
The era of Notwithstanding Clause restraint is over. Get used to it. To borrow someone else’s felicitous metaphor, Section 33 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was always an unexploded bomb lurking in the rubble of our country’s constitutional history like a decaying munition under the modern-day pavements
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Notwithstanding common sense, no one should be surprised by Doug Ford’s use of Section 33 to shore up his lousy law
No one should be astonished Ontario Premier Doug Ford plans to use the Canadian Constitution’s Notwithstanding Clause to wiggle out of a judge’s scathing ruling declaring his hurried and sloppy legislation to cut Toronto City Council from 47 to 25 members to be unconstitutional. Mr. Ford and a lot of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Irreconcilable differences? Gulf between the Alberta and federal NDP is wide, and could grow wider
The rift between Premier Rachel Notley’s Alberta New Democrats and the federal NDP led by Jagmeet Singh over the Trans Mountain Pipeline is wide and deep, but it is not unbridgeable – yet. That could soon change, though, if two likely political scenarios unfold in tandem: an early federal election
Continue readingAlberta Politics: How far is the United Conservative Party prepared to go to be tolerant of intolerance? Quite far, apparently
MLA Richard Gotfried defeated candidate Cindy Ross last night for the United Conservative Party nomination in the Calgary-Fish Creek Riding. Mr. Gotfried, narrowly elected as a Progressive Conservative candidate in a tight three-way race in the May 2015 Alberta election, has detractors within the UCP. Still, his victory has to
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The Dutch Wife by St. Albert-raised Ellen Keith leads 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 Sept. 2, 2018. The lists are compiled by Audreys Books and provided by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta. EDMONTON FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. The Dutch Wife – Ellen Keith 2. This
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Say hello to the hurtin’ Albertans, Mr. Trudeau: If the premier ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy!
Welcome to Alberta where, as the prime minister of Canada no doubt discovered yesterday afternoon, if the premier ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy! And, right now, the premier ain’t happy! Old Alberta New Democrats have been familiar with this hurtin’ refrain for some time. Don’t jump to the conclusion that
Continue readingAlberta Politics: MP’s Tweet sets off teapot tempest as Trump’s tabloid crony David Pecker exits Postmedia board
It’s interesting that the presence of David Pecker on the board of Postmedia Network Inc. only became a topic of public debate after he left the largest publisher of daily and community newspapers in English Canada last week. The fact the evocatively named CEO of American Media Inc. was known to
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Happy Labour Day! Despite constant propaganda, the number of workers who wish they had a union is growing
Happy Labour Day! Overall union membership may be shrinking, but the number of workers who wish they had a union and would vote to join one if they could appears to on the rise. This tells an interesting story about the state of affairs in North America as the last
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Who said we wanted rule of law? Hysteria over court’s TMX ruling engulfs Alberta politics and media
Funny, isn’t it? Less than six months ago, tout le monde political Alberta was demanding harsh application of “the rule of law.” This was nearly universally interpreted to mean that no legal challenge or protest against the construction of the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion Project could or would be tolerated.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Donald Trump’s claims about the Canadian trade bargaining team have, for once, a ring of truth!
Yes, Donald Trump is a liar and a braggart, but the American President’s boast yesterday morning that cowed Canadian trade negotiators have all but folded and any new trade deal they sign will be totally on U.S. terms has a ring of truth. Given his track record, it’s certainly not
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Calculating the winners and losers in yesterday’s Trans Mountain Pipeline debacle
No doubt they were chuckling discreetly at Kinder Morgan headquarters in Houston yesterday as they counted up their additional spare change. They had, after all, just managed to sell off the Trans Mountain Pipeline to the Liberal government led by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, backstopped by Premier Rachel Notley’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Advice on dealing with the Trump Administration for Chrystia Freeland: don’t give away the store
WASHINGTON, D.C. – I see Chrystia Freeland, Canada’s foreign affairs minister, is also in town tonight, so if I happen to see meet her strolling on the National Mall or enjoying a beer at Kramer’s Books, I’ll say hi for you-all. I’ll also have some advice for her, worth what
Continue readingAlberta Politics: NDP will need to choose carefully as Linda Duncan decides not to seek re-election as Edmonton Strathcona MP
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Not to be negative, but the federal New Democrats might want to hold off scheduling the nomination to choose Linda Duncan’s successor until just after next spring’s provincial election. Then again – given the fraught relationship these days between the federal NDP and the Alberta branch of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The Day We Burned Ole DC Down? It was today, actually … 204 years ago
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Day We Burned Ole DC Down? It was today, actually. But if this was big news 204 years ago, when the fire was actually lit by the Royal Marines and sundry British Army regiments – revenge for the Americans burning down York, now part of Toronto,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Notice to readers: AlbertaPolitics.ca is closed … sort of
Notice to readers: I expect to be on the road for a few days and so AlbertaPolitics.ca is officially closed for vacation. Which, as regular readers of this blog will understand, doesn’t necessarily mean there will be no posts whatsoever. There may well be a few – mood and WiFi
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