PHOTOS: Alberta Lieutenant Governor Lois Mitchell, clad in a purple official gown, reads the NDP Government’s third Speech from the Throne in the Legislature in Edmonton yesterday afternoon. Below: Party crasher Jason Kenney, Labour Minister Christina Gray (Dave Cournoyer photo) and Opposition Leader Brian Jean. Alberta’s New Democratic Party Government
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Alberta Politics: St. Albert Mayor Nolan Crouse makes it official: he wants to lead Alberta Liberals
PHOTOS: St. Albert Mayor Nolan Crouse, second from left in Liberal red tie, announces his bid to lead the Alberta Liberals, a party that currently has only one member in the Legislature, on the University of Alberta campus near the North Saskatchewan River Valley yesterday. (Photo grabbed from Global TV
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Looking ahead to the Throne Speech and Spring Session
Similar to last week’s third quarter fiscal update delivered by finance minister Joe Ceci, this week’s Speech from the Throne will mostly focus on political messaging and managing public expectations. Along with the pomp and circumstance that will drape the Legislature as Lieutenant Governor Lois Mitchell reads the throne speech on March 2, 2017,
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: The Three Alberta’s: Quick thoughts on the latest Mainstreet/Postmedia poll
Some quick thoughts on the Mainstreet/Postmedia poll released yesterday. The poll showed the Wildrose Party at 38 percent province-wide support, with the Progressive Conservatives sitting at 29 percent and the New Democratic Party with 23 percent. The Liberals and Alberta Party sat at 5 percent each. But the regional breakdown is
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Will the PC Party finally disqualify Jason Kenney?
“He’s not running to be the leader of the Progressive Conservative party. He’s running to destroy the party so that he can then form a new party that he’s going to run and become leader of,” Progressive Conservative Party member Jeffrey Rath told CBC Calgary. The Priddis-based lawyer has filed a complaint
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Brian Jean makes it clear, any new Alberta conservative party will be the Wildrose Party
PHOTOS: Hate to burst your balloons, Tories, but Brian Jean says any new new united right-wing party will be the Wildrose Party, and nothing else. (Wildrose.ca photo.) Below: Wildrose Finance Critic Derek Fildebrandt, front-running Progressive Conservative leadership candidate Jason Kenney and a group of smokers … actual young Alberta tobacco
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta public employees, subject to constant Wildrose and media vilification, win national award for effective service
PHOTOS: An image of the May 2016 Fort McMurray fire taken by Alberta Government photographer Chris Schwarz. Below: The Wildrose Party sees government workers like forest fire fighters (GoA photo) and Licensed Practical Nurses (AUPE photo) as “union bosses.” Just guessing, but you probably won’t read much news coverage about
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Wildrose reaction to proposed raise for front-line health workers illustrates the party’s rightward shift
PHOTOS: Rob Anderson, on the right, the Wildrose Party’s finance critic under Danielle Smith, at a rally supporting public sector workers in 2012. With him are AUPE President Guy Smith, left, and Alberta Liberal Leader David Swann, centre. Below: The Wildrose Party’s intemperate current finance critic, Derek Fildebrandt, Ms. Smith,
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Three Reasons Why Jason Kenney is Scarier Than Donald Trump
Twitter exploded last night. Thousands of demonstrators jammed American airports to protest Trump’s Executive Order banning Muslims from certain countries from entering the US. Refugees traveling with valid documentation, permanent residents with green cards, temporary workers on visas, and dual citizens were detained, some were deported. ACLU lawyers fanned across
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Progressive Conservative leadership campaign rattles uncomfortably toward a seemingly inevitable Jason Kenney victory
PHOTOS: Surprise! I don’t have a unite-the-right plan after all, but I’ll quit if you’ll let me run to lead the new party. Wildrose Leader Brian Jean, presumably, was thinking something along those lines when he made his announcement yesterday (Photo from Wildorse.ca). Below: PC leadership race participants Richard Starke,
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Today’s Edition of The Fight on the Right
Starke vs. Kenney: the lightweight match Starting the day off, Richard Starke, the soft-spoken veternarian from Lloydminster entered the ring with his “Common Sense Plan” to save the Progressive Conservative Party from Jason Kenney’s hostile takeover plans to merge it right-wing Wildrose… Continue Reading →
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Others sure to suffer as Sudden Apocalyptic Deficit Syndrome strikes affluent, older, white males from Saskatchewan
PHOTOS: The economic landscape nowadays in Saskatchewan. Below: Economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman (Twitter), Canadian economists Jim Stanford (Twitter) and Toby Sanger, and, of course, Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall. Saskatchewan appears to be suffering from a serious economic malady. Nobel Prize-winning economist and journalist Paul Krugman calls
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Seriously? Tories about to dump candidate Jason Kenney, columnist predicts …
PHOTOS: Members of the Progressive Conservative Party executive get ready to send Jason Kenney down the old skid road. … Actual Tory executive members may not appear exactly as described in some publications. Below: Calgary Herald political columnist Don Braid and PC leadership candidate Jason Kenney. “Faced with the end
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta Liberals launch leadership race as Tory contest takes an acrimonious turn
PHOTOS: The Alberta Liberal Party executive. From left to right: Vice-President Fundraising John Roggeveen, Secretary Alyssa Moore, Treasurer Greg Springate, President Karen Sevcik, MLA David Swann, VP David Khan, VP Policy David Gamble and VP Constituencies Dan MacLennan. Below: Potential candidates Nolan Crouse, Mr. Khan and Nirmala Naidoo. OTTAWA Optimistically
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: “Phasing Out” the Oilsands
At a recent town hall meeting Mr Trudeau reiterated his position on climate change. He said: “You can’t make a choice between what’s good for the environment and what’s good for the economy. We can’t shut down the oilsands tomorrow. We need to phase them out. We need to manage
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Guest Post: Five things you need to know about Alberta’s latest Electoral Boundaries Commission
PHOTOS: A rural scene grabbed from the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission’s website. Can you spot a rural voter? Remember, the driver of the car may actually be from Calgary. Below: Post author John Ashton and Electoral Boundary Commission members Laurie Livingstone, Jean Munn, Bruce McLeod and Gwen Day. By John
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Lid’s still on the unite-the-right soup the Wildrose Party’s leader is cooking up, but there are hints about the recipe
PHOTOS: Wildrose Party Leader Brian Jean gets ready to explain his plan to unite Alberta’s right under his leadership as a giant bull crashes through the wall behind him. The circumstances portrayed in this photo, found on the wildrose.ca website, may not have been exactly as just described. Below: Justin
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Even some farm leaders admit the Alberta NDP’s notorious Bill 6 is an improvement
PHOTOS: Agriculture Minister Oneil Carlier as he walked through an anti-NDP demonstration in front of the Alberta Legislature shortly before the passage of Bill 6 in December 2015. Below: NDP Labour Minister Christina Gray, Alberta Federation of Agriculture President Lynn Jacobson and Wildrose Agriculture Critic Dave Schneider. The New Democratic
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: The 2017 List
Last year Ms Soapbox made a list of New Year’s resolutions for Rachel Notley. Happily, Ms Notley delivered on the list, with the exception of resolution #4 (Ms Soapbox failed to anticipate the arrival of Jason Kenney on the political scene). Rather than rewrite the whole thing Mr Soapbox decided
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Happy New Year! AlbertaPolitics.ca’s Top Ten political predictions for 2017
PHOTOS: Your blogger, in hat, contemplates the difference between the renamed Conservative Party of Alberta and the renamed Conservative Party of Alberta. That’s not a typo. See Prediction No. 9 below for an explanation. Actual Alberta political commentators may not appear exactly as illustrated in this screenshot. Below (with predictions):
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