Back in January 2019, observers of the Alberta political scene wondered if the $6,000 administrative penalty levied against the Canadian Taxpayers Federation for failing to register as a third-party advertiser under Alberta’s election financing law would result in a long-overdue recognition of the partisan role the self-described “tax watchdog” clearly
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Accidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Andrew Nikiforuk discusses the 10 inescapable laws of pandemics – and the grim future they portend in light of our pitiful response to the social challenges posed by COVID-19. And Jessica Wildfire writes that the effects of repeated COVID infections on people’s immune
Continue readingAlberta Politics: About those very expensive bottles of children’s ‘Tylenot’ – where’s the CTF when you need it?
Where’s the Canadian Taxpayers Federation when you need it? Help is on the way? Well, not really. But Premier Danielle Smith got a photo opportunity out of it, anyway, in the aroma-torch-lamp section of an Edmonton pharmacy in March (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). Like the cops, they never seem to be
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The curious case of Canada’s ‘tax watchdog,’ which hasn’t barked at the scandalous RStar program
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is missing in action! Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, a former registered lobbyist for the controversial RStar scheme, now in the process of implementing it (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). The CTF calls itself a “citizen’s group dedicated to lower taxes, less waste and accountable government.” Yet with potentially
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Paul Kuodi et al. find some hopeful evidence that vaccinations may help to prevent long COVID symptoms as well as more acute ones. Nili Kaplan-Myrth rightly questions why safety is being treated as a privilege to be withheld from vulnerable people. And
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Research paper argues Canadian Taxpayers Federation pushed ‘anti-Indigenous political rhetoric and policy’ over 21 years
Locating the Canadian Taxpayers Federation clearly in the ecosystem of neoliberal advocacy, a recent paper in the Canadian Review of Sociology analyzes more than 400 documents published by the CTF over 21 years to argue the organization has pushed “anti-Indigenous political rhetoric and policy.” Lead author Kyle Willmott, a professor
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Calgary judge makes short work of bid for injunction to block COVID-19 restrictions
A Calgary superior court judge yesterday made short work of the bid by the so-called Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms to get an emergency injunction blocking public health restrictions on activities likely to exacerbate the spread of COVID-19 during the holiday season. In a hearing that could be watched online,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Fossil fuels may be fading, but Alberta stands ready to supply bad economic ideas to Canada and the world
VICTORIA — We Albertans can be enormously proud, I guess, of our continuing influence on the Dominion. We surely must be the leading exporter of ridiculous, potentially destructive ideas in Canada. B.C. Premier John Horgan (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). Consider Andrew Wilkinson, hapless leader of British Columbia’s Liberals (who are
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On lunatic fringes
Let’s take a moment to acknowledge a rare opportunity to agree with the messaging of the Canadian Taxpayers’ Federation: any plan to hand out more giveaways to the corporate sector can only be reflect policy based on the definition of insanity.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: As predicted, ‘Fair Deal’ Panel reheats the Firewall Manifesto to manufacture consent for policies Albertans don’t want
Consider the report of Alberta’s “Fair Deal” Panel, released yesterday by Premier Jason Kenney with considerable fanfare. It strongly suggests the Harper-Kenney wing of the Canadian Conservative movement is made up of people who purport to be Canadian patriots when they’re in power in Ottawa but are Prairie separatists when
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Why won’t Ottawa do anything to rein in equine identity theft?
Is this Stablegate? The Canadian Taxpayers Federation wants to know why Justin Trudeau and his Liberals aren’t reining in equine identity theft. The Twittersphere exploded yesterday when CTF Federal Director Aaron Wudrick indicated he believes horses may be hoofing it to sign up for the Canada Emergency Response Benefit, fraudulently saddling
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta COVID-19 cases rise to 74; UCP to push budget through; Jason Kenney visits the airport
Faced with the embarrassment of having to rewrite Alberta’s budget to acknowledge economic reality and public health necessity in the midst of a global pandemic or stick with one that fails to meet even that low bar and sets the stage for a attacks on public health care in the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Inside Jason Kenney’s troll factory: the UCP propaganda ecosystem goes after Alberta’s registered nurses
The president of the Alberta Federation of Labour called out the Canadian Taxpayers Federation yesterday for the partisan role it plays supporting of the Kenney Government’s contract demands in negotiations with the union that represents the province’s front-line registered nurses. Calling the CTF “a secretive anti-union lobby group,” Gil McGowan
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Worried about coronavirus? Ideology trumps expertise when Conservatives meddle with health care
If the world is on the cusp of another deadly coronavirus outbreak, this might seem like a peculiar time to be signing up for a high-risk experiment in health care management based on ideology instead of facts. But as far as Canada’s increasingly extremist conservative movement is concerned, of course
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Shut down your ‘anti-Alberta campaigns’ inquiry or the courts will shut it for you, tiny group warns Alberta government
OTTAWA – Well, one thing’s already clear, there’s no way the mighty Kenney Government will shut down its so-called inquiry into “anti-Alberta energy campaigns” on the say so of Progress Alberta, a small Edmonton-based research and activist organization. That said, the day may come when the government’s leaders wish they
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Stephen Harper and Preston Manning, joined at the hip by history and not particularly liking it, make changes
On Wednesday, former prime minister Stephen Harper abruptly quit the Conservative Party of Canada’s fund-raising board, supposedly to give himself time to prevent Jean Charest from becoming leader of Canada’s Conservatives or prime minister of Canada. Yesterday, we learned that Preston Manning would quit his eponymous market-fundamentalist call centre in
Continue readingAlberta Politics: What’s with the United Conservative Party’s emerging fury at nurses, of all people?
What’s with the sudden hate on for nurses by United Conservative Party supporters? It comes from somewhere. Your average UCP internet troll doesn’t just come up with this stuff on his – or occasionally her – own. The traditional Conservative approach to attacking nurses and other predominantly public and female
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Canadian Taxpayers Federation commentary on nurse salaries isn’t research so much as an echo chamber
Has anyone noticed how the propaganda produced by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation seems to be growing more inept of late? Misleading arguments and anti-union bias have long characterized many of the claims made by the Regina-based CTF, which claims to be a non-partisan “citizens’ group,” although its only legal members
Continue readingAlberta Politics: When in doubt, tell the truth: Andy Scheer’s lies lack ambition; more importantly, so do his excuses!
Mark Twain, the renowned American author and one of the great raconteurs of the 19th Century, counselled: “When in doubt, tell the truth. It will confound your enemies and astound your friends.” Excellent advice, it turns out, in this political season. The author’s advice was not just about lies 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
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