Apparently, being kicked out of the Alberta Legislature means never having to say you’re sorry! Judging by the smile on her face yesterday morning as a crowd of more than 800 Registered Nurses furious at the prospect of having their pay cut substantially by Premier Jason Kenney’s hard-right government roared
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Alberta Politics: From the first nail in the Velvet Coffin to the death of Star Metro — the decline of Alberta’s newspapers
The bad news was delivered on social media yesterday by employees of Star Metro newspapers in cities outside Ontario. Whatever was behind the Toronto Star’s decision in April 2018 to hire real journalists and publish free print newspapers in five major cities across Canada, including Calgary and Edmonton, apparently it
Continue readingAlberta Politics: If you’re shocked by the firing of Alberta’s Election Commissioner, you shouldn’t be
If you’re shocked that Jason Kenney’s Government has effectively just fired the guy who’s been investigating the sleazy Kamikaze Campaign that preceded the premier’s choice as leader of the United Conservative Party in 2017, you really haven’t been paying attention. Alberta’s best-known political commentator is so shocked… How shocked is
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Excellent question: If a referendum’s good enough for the CPP, why not for the teachers’ pension fund?
“Jason Kenney says he will use a referendum to determine if Albertans want their Canada Pension Plan shifted to AIMCo,” Jonathan Teghtmeyer, Associate Communications Coordinator of the Alberta Teachers Association, observed before asking a perfectly reasonable question on social media yesterday. So, Mr. Teghtmeyer tweeted, “why won’t he allow teachers
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Uh oh! Those perfidious Swedes have clearly joined the anti-Alberta energy ‘misinformation campaign of defamation’!
Why, those perfidious Swedes! First they sent their sneaky little agent Greta Thunberg in a sailboat to Alberta’s shores to stir up our young people — and that’s no mean feat when you consider that we don’t have any shores here in Alberta! Which, as we keep telling the rest
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Will the UCP’s scheme to restrict reproductive rights play in Ponoka? Maybe not …
Bill 207, which if it was honestly titled would have been called an Act to Restrict Reproductive and Other Rights in Alberta, does not seem to be playing particularly well, even in Ponoka. Jason Kenney’s United Conservative Party stirred up a hornet’s nest with this sneaky bill — disingenuously entitled
Continue readingAlberta Politics: First reading of Bill 207 reveals zero UCP votes for women’s reproductive rights
Here are two important statistics about the United Conservative Party’s Bill 207, the Conscience Rights (Health Care Providers) Protection Act, which was introduced in the Alberta Legislature yesterday … Just a minute, you say, Bill 207 is a private member’s bill, brought forward by Peace River UCP MLA Dan Williams,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The ‘most pro-life Legislature in decades’ gets ready to make its first move to restrict reproductive rights
Does anyone recall when Cameron Wilson, political action director of the “Wilberforce Project,” previously known as Pro-Life Alberta, bragged that “if the UCP wins the upcoming election, then we will have the most pro-life Legislature in decades, and maybe ever”? That was only in February this year, a century or
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Plan to roll back public employees’ pay is no surprise, but the way it’s being rolled out seems surprisingly inept
When Alberta’s finance minister announced the Kenney Government’s plan to roll back unionized public employees’ pay by 2 to 5 per cent yesterday, he blamed Alberta’s debt and deficit, not the huge hole he’d just blown in the province’s budget with $4.5-billion in tax cuts for billionaires and big corporations.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Federal election results show why abandoning ‘social license’ was a dumb idea for Alberta’s oilpatch
Seeking “social license” for Alberta’s fossil fuel industry was said by the NDP government of former premier Rachel Notley to be a way to win approval for more pipeline capacity to Canada’s ocean ports. This was true enough as far as it went, and the idea getting such approval required
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta is Alberta again! The poor little rich kid of Confederation brings down a budget
Happy St. Crispin’s Day, Alberta! Appropriately enough, it’s time for those of us who live here in Wild Rose Country to cry, “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more!” Alberta is Alberta again! Yesterday’s vicious austerity budget proves it. Alberta’s once again the poor little rich kid of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Budget Day reminder: Facts about Alberta public employees don’t support propaganda saying they’re too numerous or paid too much
Alberta’s a high-wage province! Who knew? Maybe the question ought to be … Who didn’t? At any rate, the Kenney Government’s “blue-ribbon” panel on Alberta’s finances, chaired by former Saskatchewan finance minister Janice MacKinnon and instructed not even to look at the revenue side of the province’s so-called public spending
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Massive Edmonton rally greets eco-activist Greta Thunberg; tiny truck counter-protest ignored by all but media
It would have been a remarkable accomplishment for any group to summon a throng the size of the multitude that enthusiastically greeted 16-year-old Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg in Edmonton yesterday afternoon. To do it on three days’ notice in the capital city of Canada’s fossil fuel heartland where everyone
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Edmonton Strathcona voters should vote for NDP’s Heather McPherson, says former Alberta leader Brian Mason
No name was mentioned, but it was pretty clear exactly whom former Alberta New Democratic Party Leader Brian Mason had in mind Wednesday when he posted a social media comment stating he will be voting for the federal NDP candidate in his own riding on Monday. In case that message
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Gretamania strikes Alberta! Be afraid! Be very afraid!
Be afraid. Be very afraid. Gretamania appears to have struck Alberta! Yesterday, 16-year-old Greta Thunberg, who is apparently the environmental movement’s answer to St. Joan of Arc with a planetary mass following to suit, was spotted in Calgary. This wasn’t like your usual Alberta Elvis sighting, either. There was an
Continue readingAlberta Politics: What was Rachel Notley suggesting when she said she’s not committed to voting for Jagmeet Singh’s New Democrats?
Responding to former Alberta NDP premier Rachel Notley’s remark last week that she hasn’t committed to voting for Jagmeet Singh’s New Democrats in her own federal riding, a young Albertan named Reakash Walters tweeted from Ontario: “I have never felt so out of touch from Alberta politics than right at
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Partisan signs in the Alberta Legislature Building’s windows? No rules, no problem!
Who knew? It turns out anyone can stick up anything they like in the windows of the stately and historic Alberta Legislature Building in Edmonton and they won’t be breaking any rules. This even includes Matt Wolf, Jason Kenney’s personal twitter troll, formally known as the Alberta premier’s director of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: ‘How can we help you bust your union?’ Alberta Government launches ‘employee support program’
The Government of Alberta launched its promised “Employee Labour Relations Support Program” yesterday. Apparently they’ll not only tell you how to certify a union, they’ll tell you how to decertify one too! Busting a union used to be easier back in the days of the old Progressive Conservatives, who weren’t
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The UCP takes a powder as 4,000, and maybe a lot more, Climate Action strikers gather at Alberta’s Legislature
I don’t know if the thousands of young Climate Action Strike protesters who gathered on the frigid doorstep of the Alberta Legislature yesterday frighten Premier Jason Kenney and his angry fossil fuel warriors, but they ought to. Yes, the fired-up but well-behaved crowd of truants and their supporters in Alberta’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Appointment of Stephen Mandel to AHS board proves failure’s no barrier to success in Jason Kenney’s Alberta
Who says Premier Jason Kenney can’t unite Albertans? Sometime today, Mr. Kenney will appoint Stephen Mandel to the governing board of Alberta Health Services. Well, the announcement will be made by Health Minister Tyler Shandro. Late yesterday, as the word of the appointment leaked out, moans of despair could be
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