PHOTOS: Derek Fildebrandt buying extra fuel for his big red Ford pickup truck on New Year’s Eve 2016 to illustrate how much more gasoline was going to cost after the NDP’s carbon tax took effect the next morning. (Photo from the politician’s Facebook page.) Prices immediately went down. It turns
Continue readingTag: Canadian Taxpayers Federation
daveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Derek Fildebrandt has a very, very bad week.
Photo: In happier times, as Derek Fildebrandt campaigned alongside Wildrose leader Brian Jean in Strathmore-Brooks on the first day of the 2015 election. (Photo from Brian Jean’s Facebook Page). Over the course of eight days, Strathmore-Brooks MLA Derek Fildebrandt went from being a potential leadership candidate to stepping down from the United
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Derek Fildebrandt’s mini-Skypalace: proof Tory entitlement is still a thing in Alberta
PHOTOS: A scene from Derek Fildebrandt’s mini-Skypalace, the taxpayer subsidized Fildepartment in downtown Edmonton, grabbed from his Airbnb listing. Note the binoculars to the right of the window, presumably used for spotting examples of taxpayer dollars being wasted in the high-rises beyond. Below: The Fildebed, the Fildecloset, the Fildepot and
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: 2012 Derek Fildebrandt to 2017 Derek Fildebrandt: No Tax Dollars for Airbnb
Photos: 2012 Derek Fildebrandt (above), 2017 Derek Fildebrandt (below). For Immediate Release CALGARY – Standing in front of a giant inflatable pork chop, 2012 Derek Fildebrandt denounced 2017 Derek Fildebrandt for renting his government-subsidized downtown Edmonton apartment on Airbnb. “People with enough money to support themselves and rent out government-subsidized
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Derek Fildebrandt caught renting government-subsidized apartment on Airbnb
United Conservative MLA Derek Fildebrandt has been renting his government-subsidized downtown Edmonton apartment on Airbnb, according to a report by one of Postmedia’s Edmonton newspapers. MLAs who live outside of the Edmonton area are eligible to receive a housing allowance to use toward a residence in the capital city, but
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Derek Fildebrandt, UCP ‘liberty’ advocate, calls for return to ugly 1940s labour relations, labour studies professor says
PHOTOS: The late Jim Prentice, during his successful 2014 campaign to lead the Progressive Conservative Party, with supporters in Edmonton. Below: Anti-union “liberty conservative” Derek Fildebrandt, NDP Premier Rachel Notley, and Athabasca University Labour Studies Professor Bob Barnetson. It was probably his “math is hard” moment in a televised debate
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Nobody can wreck an economy faster than an elected New Democrat, and that’s a Certified Kenney Fact!
PHOTOS: Jason Kenney, candidate to lead the United Conservative Party of Alberta, perhaps thinking up another Certified Kenney Fact. Below: B.C. NDP Premier John Horgan, former Saskatchewan premiers Roy Romanow, a New Democrat, and Grant Devine (CBC photo), a Conservative, and federal Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale, a Liberal. According
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Canadian Taxpayers Federation’s position on Khadr case exposes the group’s partisan inclinations
PHOTOS: Omar Khadr, left, with his Edmonton lawyer, Dennis Edney, at right. Mr. Edney’s wife, Patricia Edney, is in the middle. (Photo: CBC) Below: Mr. Khadr at age 14, not long before his capture by U.S. forces in Afghanistan in July 2002, and Aaron Wudrick, Federal Director of the Canadian
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Big Tobacco will be pleased as Derek Fildebrandt’s ‘liberty’ video assails restrictions on flavoured cigarettes
PHOTOS: Young smokers, circa 1910. Below: A screenshot of Wildrose Finance Critic Derek Fildebrandt’s social media video, Mr. Fildebrandt himself, former Wildrose Party leader Danielle Smith, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose marijuana-legalization strategy Mr. Fildebrandt appears to endorse. Wildrose Finance Critic Derek Fildebrandt is continuing his party’s tradition of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: How but as a leadership campaign brochure are we to interpret Derek Fildebrandt’s paean to ‘Max’ Bernier?
PHOTOS: Derek Fildebrandt, the Alberta Wildrose Party’s finance critic and, possibly, third unofficial candidate to enter the non-race to lead the still-nonexistent United Conservative Party. Below: Maxime Bernier (Photo: CBC), who is apparently Mr. Fildebrandt’s ideological hero, and British Columbia NDP Leader John Horgan, who seems very close to grasping
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Here we go again: Opacity not transparency characterizes Alberta’s right-wing merger talks
PHOTOS: Wildrose Opposition Leader Brian Jean and Progressive Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney uncomfortably shake hands in this obviously staged photo in what appears to be Mr. Jean’s office. (Wildrose Party photo.) Below: Tanis Fiss, chair of the insider committee working behind closed doors to unite the two parties (from
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Guest Post: The time has come for a sober conversation about Jason Kenney … and his implied platform
ILLUSTRATIONS: Jason Kenney, the victor in the PC leadership campaign now trying to create a narrative of invincibility about his ambition to lead Alberta. Below: Author Barret Weber. Charts shown are based on the Royal Bank of Canada fiscal tables, updated as of March 22, 2017, that show Alberta’s debt
Continue readingAlberta Politics: When the celebrated Mr. K. performs his feat on Saturday … what will Brian Jean do?
PHOTOS: Wildrose Leader Brian Jean. Below: Progressive Conservative leader-presumptive Jason Kenney, former PC leadership candidate turned NDP MLA Sandra Jansen, NDP Finance Minister Joe Ceci and a very large sewer rat, political affiliation unknown. Could Wildrose Party Leader Brian Jean beat Progressive Conservative leader-presumptive Jason Kenney for the leadership of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Opposition parties strangely quiet as Alberta Finance Minister stops the ABC Sector gravy train
PHOTOS: Alberta Finance Minister Joe Ceci considers a reporter’s question during Friday’s news conference (screenshot). Below: Alberta Workers Compensation Board CEO Guy Kerr and Alberta Energy Regulator CEO Jim Ellis. Being a conservative in opposition apparently turns what your Mama taught you on its head: If you can’t say anything
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Advocates of more choice in education unite to condemn public school board chair’s call for more choice in education
PHOTOS: Edmonton Public School Board Chair Michael Janz, at the podium and on the job. Below: Canadian Taxpayers Federation Communications Vice-President Scott Henning, Parents for Choice in Education Director Donna Trimble, and the Edmonton Christian High School, which is run under the auspices of the EPSB. Conservative politicians, their vocal
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: Why Canadians are lucky Rona Ambrose was hanging around the Caribbean with a billionaire
PHOTOS: The scene abroad N. Murray Edwards’ yacht imagined. Actual Canadian bitumen billionaires and their onboard guests may not appear exactly as illustrated. Below: The real N. Murray Edwards, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau aboard a helicopter, although not the Aga Khan’s, Opposition Leader Rona Ambrose in a yacht harbor, and
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Jason Kenney – just visiting Alberta? – piously congratulates Michael Ignatieff for Order of Canada
PHOTOS: A screen shot from the Conservative Party of Canada’s vile “Just Visiting” ads, which were designed to undermine then Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff in the spring of 2009. They worked. Below: Dr. Ignatieff, who on Friday was awarded an Order of Canada, and Jason Kenney, candidate for the leadership
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Wildrose Shuffles Critics, Fildebrandt no longer Public Accounts Committee Chairman
Outspoken Wildrose Party MLA Derek Fildebrandt, who finds himself frequently at odds with leader Brian Jean, remains in his high-profile role as Official Opposition Finance & Treasury critic after a shuffle of critic portfolios in the Wildrose caucus this week. But according to… Continue Reading →
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Smoke-Free Alberta asks: Why hasn’t all of the Smoking Reduction Act been enacted?
PHOTOS: Water pipes and flavoured tobacco … Why has Alberta legislation outlawing them not been enacted? There are no secret political messages in this picture, by the way. Below: Alberta Health Minister Sarah Hoffman, NDP MLA Sandra Jansen, and Edmonton Journal Editor Mark Iype. A letter Monday from the Campaign
Continue reading