PHOTOS: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley and Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne at yesterday’s press conference in Toronto. Below: Ms. Notley, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, British Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn and U.S. Democratic Presidential candidat…
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Alberta Politics: Hints of Sun news-management style emerge in plans for Edmonton’s combined Postmedia newsrooms
PHOTOS: “Well, Fred, they used to wrap the grocery flyers in these things. They were called ‘newspapers.’” Below: Gerry Nott, senior Postmedia functionary, and Justin Trudeau, the Canadian prime minister most hated by the Canadian newspaper ind…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Meditations on booms, busts, oil prices, sales taxes, Albertans and their governments
PHOTOS: Alberta in the spring of 2014. Actual Alberta drilling operations may not have appeared exactly as illustrated. Below: Conservative premiers Peter Lougheed and Ralph Klein. If God gives us another oil boom like the one us Albertans are all pray…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Can one newsroom plus one editor add up to two newspapers? That’s Postmedia’s story and they’re stickin’ to it!
PHOTOS: The Edmonton Journal’s building in downtown Edmonton as it appeared today. Below: Margo Goodhand, Paul Godfrey (Toronto Star photo) and Stephanie Coombs. After a day of merger mania accompanied by brutal newsroom cuts at Postmedia’s daily n…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Senior editorial heads roll at Edmonton Journal and more may drop soon
PHOTOS: The Edmonton Journal’s headquarters in downtown Edmonton, one of the Postmedia assets that still retains some value. Below: Departing Journal editor-in-chief Margo Goodhand and managing editor Stephanie Coombs. There’s already blood on the …
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Disturbing echoes of ‘Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Arguments’ heard in Alberta #kudatah talk
PHOTOS: Edmonton’s courthouse, home of the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench, not long after it was built. Below: Associate Chief Justice John Rooke of the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench and Alberta Premier Rachel Notley. Anti-NDP petitioners tacitl…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: It’s not just the #kudatah – it’s the feeling Alberta’s conservatives are all boarding the Crazy Train
PHOTOS: George Clark, Alberta’s answer to Joan of Arc. (Screen grab from Youtube.com.) Below: Wildrose Party Leader Brian Jean, who with his MLAs is tacitly supporting Mr. Clark’s efforts; the origin of the #kudatah meme; Preston Manning, a conserv…
Continue readingIn This Corner: Stuff Still Happens, week 2: Caution, bad news ahead
Hoo-boy, what a bad news week for Alberta, and Canada. Oil continued its slide, falling to below $30 a barrel. The Canadian dollar continued its slide, falling to below 70 cents US. If it weren’t for the fact that Mexico already has the peso, we’d be calling the loonie the peso of North America. Thanks […]
Continue readingAlberta Politics: ‘Kevinismus’ in Canada: Should Kevin O’Leary run to lead the sad-sack federal Conservatives?
PHOTOS: Kevin O’Leary, in a typical pose (CBC photo). Below: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, U.S. Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump and perpetual Alberta conservative leadership candidate Thomas Lukaszuk. Give Kevin O’Leary his due. At …
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Board of Governors appears to openly defy Notley Government as Athabasca University crisis deepens
PHOTOS: Athabasca University’s administrative building, just outside the Town of Athabasca, about 150 kilometres north of Edmonton, as seen from the air. Below: Alberta Advanced Education Minister Lori Sigurdson, interim Athabasca University Presiden…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Juxtapose: Tories had loads of cash for junketing flunkies, none at all for dying addicts
PHOTOS: Alberta Progressive Conservatives enjoy an “international travel mission” during the Golden Age of Tory Travel. Actual PC staffers may not have appeared exactly as illustrated. Below: New Democrats Trevor Horne, the MLA for Spruce Grove-St….
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Delaying Alberta Liberal leadership vote until 2017 a good idea but does it break the party’s bylaws?
The Alberta Liberals have decided to postpone the selection of their next party leader until spring 2017. The party had originally scheduled to hold a leadership vote in April 2016. The only current Liberal MLA, Calgary’s David Swann, has de…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Fearless champion of the corporate overdog snarls at CCPA’s eye-popping New Year CEO salary tally
PHOTOS: Beggars and bazillionaires, not really as far apart as you think, the Fraser Institute insists. Top 100 Canadian corporate executives may not appear exactly as illustrated. Minimum wage workers, though? Not so different. Below: CCPA researcher …
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Short-term jobs and profits notwithstanding, Canada’s interests are not served by Saudi armoured vehicle sale
PHOTOS: A Canadian LAV III similar to the armoured vehicles to be sold by General Dynamics Land Systems (Canada) of London, Ont., to the Saudi National Guard. Below: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Foreign Minister Stéphane Dion, former MI6 head Sir Ri…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: As widely predicted, Calgary-Bow MLA Deborah Drever invited to rejoin New Democratic Party Government’s caucus
PHOTOS: Surrounded and supported by NDP House Leader Brian Mason, Calgary-Varsity MLA Stephanie McLean and Finance Minister Joe Ceci, Calgary-Bow MLA Deborah Drever addresses the media in Calgary yesterday after being welcomed back into the Government …
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Shredding the public interest! Albertans will never know what Tory secrets were purged by the PCs last May
PHOTOS: Privacy Commissioner Jill Clayton and Public Interest Commissioner Peter Hourihan (CBC photo). Below: Results of some of the shredding that took place in the basement of the Alberta Legislature on May 6; Service Alberta Minister Danielle Larive…
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: A Rookie Crew: Eleven Alberta MLAs to watch in 2016
The past few years in Alberta politics have reminded us that politics can be an extraordinarily unpredictable and forecasting the future can be a very tricky business for political pundits. Aside from the obvious choices of Premier Rachel Notley, Finan…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta NDP defies voters by continuing to govern as if it won the election that put it in power: political scientist
PHOTOS: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, running the province as if she had a majority government! What next? Below: University of Calgary political scientist and Calgary Herald columnist Barry Cooper, Broadbent Institute Director Rick Smith and Wildrose…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Progress Alberta, new progressive advocacy group, will make waves … not just with opponents but maybe on own side too
PHOTOS: The Alberta Legislature, suitably decorated for the province’s progressive and proudly diverse population. Below: Progress Alberta Executive Director Duncan Kinney. Progress Alberta, a new group that describes itself as “a multi-issue, inde…
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Albertans are more progressive than you might think. I’m not surprised.
A new report, “The Quiet Majority“, released by a new group called Progress Alberta shows that we Albertans may be more progressive than we believe we are. According to a survey conducted by Abacus Data, when Albertans were asked whethe…
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