On Wednesday, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith threw down the gauntlet, accusing the CBC of defamation and demanding that the corporation retract and apologize for its Jan. 19 report someone on her staff sent emails to the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service challenging how it was handling cases stemming from last year’s
Continue readingTag: Danielle Smith
Alberta Politics: Danielle Smith comes out swinging; Justin Trudeau responds with the rope-a-dope strategy
Danielle Smith comes out swinging. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). Justin Trudeau’s Liberals do the rope-a-dope. Remember, though, in addition to being prime minister, Mr. Trudeau is an actual boxer, and the son of a judoka to boot. So he understands the rope-a-dope strategy, about which there is
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: Danielle Smith’s Magical Email Investigation
So, last week very serious allegations of the Premier's office attempting to intervene in the prosecutions resulting from the Coutts blockade last year. By Saturday, the Premier's office was going to "investigate" by reviewing the GOA e-mail servers. On Monday, the Premier issued a "we found nothing" statement. There are
Continue readingThe Daveberta Podcast: Episode 84: The Daveberta Podcast is back! Now on the Daveberta Substack.
The Daveberta Podcast is back after a brief 11-month semi-permanent hiatus! Enjoy the podcast and find future episodes exclusively at the podcast’s new home on the Daveberta Substack.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith accuses CBC of defaming her, her staff, Crown prosecutors, and the whole public service
Premier Danielle Smith published a statement yesterday accusing the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and journalists in its employ of publishing “a defamatory article” with the intent “to smear the reputations of the Premier, her office staff, Alberta Crown prosecutors and the Alberta Public Service.” Mount Royal University political scientist Duane Bratt
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Public service swiftly checks Premier’s Office emails, unsurprisingly finds nothing
It’s a dirty little secret of Canadian government that plenty of public business is nowadays conducted outside legitimate channels to avoid public accountability. Email, WhatsApp, ProtonMail and Signal are the 21st Century equivalents of a pot full of pink geraniums on your apartment balcony to signal a meeting in a
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: “Too Many Gotchas”
“Nothing to see here, move along.” – Movie trope Last week the CBC published a story saying that a staffer in Danielle Smith’s office sent a series of emails to Crown prosecutors challenging their assessment and direction on criminal cases arising from the Coutts border blockades and protests. You remember
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Posted in obvious haste to distract UCP foes and appease party’s base, Manning panel survey asks only 1 question!
Other than geriatric former Reform Party leader Preston Manning, 80, Premier Danielle Smith’s “Public Health Emergencies Governance Review Panel” hasn’t even been appointed, or if it has the public hasn’t been informed. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). And even this assumes Mr. Manning is not in fact the
Continue readingNorthern Reflections: Will She Leave?
Rumors are circulating about Danielle Smith’s future. David Cleminhaga writes: There’s a whiff of smoke in the air, as if a cow has kicked over a lantern in a stable somewhere, and flames are just starting to spread. On Saturday, the Breakdown, an Alberta political podcast, tweeted “Heard from multiple
Continue readingAlberta Politics: It’s hard to believe Danielle Smith didn’t know her staff was emailing prosecutors about Coutts border blockade charges
How many more clarifications will be required to explain the latest news report about Premier Danielle “Calamity” Smith’s interest in what Alberta’s Crown prosecutors have been working on? Who was the Premier’s Office staffer who emailed the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service last fall? (Image: WorldCollectorsNet.com). Quite a few, by the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Kelsey Piper writes about the U.S.’ memory-holing of the successes of a vaccine program which resulted in exceptionally quick development and distribution of effective COVID vaccines (and should have set a precedent for future pandemic planning). – Dustin Cook and Mike Hager
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Apocalypse Now? Or apocalypse later? Are we looking at the last days of the UCP, or just another self-inflicted speed bump?
“And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.” So says the Gospel of Matthew. Former PC deputy premier Thomas Lukaszuk (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). I speak metaphorically, of
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Political Interference in the Administration of Justice (Again!)
“What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.”—Proverb, originated 1562 Did you catch all that? Premier Smith has been all over the airwaves saying that regardless of what it looks like she wasn’t trying to interfere with the administration of justice. On Thursday Jan 12 in a discussion
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Texas businessman, world traveller, decides not to seek re-election in rural Alberta riding
A United Conservative Party backbencher caught up in the Alohagate pandemic travel scandal in the first hours of 2021 and seldom seen in his own riding has acknowledged reality and announced his political career is done like dinner. Danielle Larivee, the NDP nominee in the Lesser Slave Lake riding, which
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Ah, Imprecision! Carry On, Prosecutors! Danielle Smith takes it all back in clarification
As predicted in this space yesterday, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has now clarified her statement of the day before about contacting Crown prosecutors “on a regular basis” to ask if they thought COVID-related public health prosecutions were in the public interest and if they had a chance of resulting in
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Stuff Danielle Smith says: Alberta premier in hot water again, this time for suggesting she interfered with administration of justice
You just never know what Danielle Smith is going to say next. Opposition NDP Justice Critic Irfan Sabir (Photo : David J. Climenhaga). The trouble is, neither does she. Consider yesterday’s jaw-dropper, the latest in what is getting to be a fairly long list of statements requiring clarifications – clarifications that
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith to Alberta at first newer of 2023: ‘We haven’t made a decision to invoke the Sovereignty Act on anything’
Judging from Premier Danielle Smith’s first formal news conference of 2023 in Calgary yesterday, no one needs to worry too much about her using the deceptively named Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act any time soon. Parks Minister Todd Loewen, who’s been sending ludicrous letters to Liberals (Photo: Government
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Free Money? No Thank You!
Many years ago the (then) Progressive Conservative government offered energy companies bags of money if they undertook projects the government thought were necessary. The CEO I worked for told us to create such a project (even though it would be of little value to the company) and apply for the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta NDP’s $7.1-million fund-raising total in 2022 speaks to deep dissatisfaction among many voters with Premier Danielle Smith and the UCP
It is remarkable by any measure that the Alberta New Democratic Party raised $7.1 million in 2022, not to mention that $3.2 million of that sum was donated during the fourth quarter, and more than a quarter million dollars on the last night of the year. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Resignations leave residents of two corners of southwest Calgary with neither an MP nor an MLA
Happy New Year! The small block of Calgary’s North Glenmore neighbourhood, south of Glenmore Trail, that’s in both the federal Calgary Heritage Riding and the provincial Calgary-Elbow riding (Map: Government of Alberta). Welcome to 2023! Oh, and say goodbye to Calgary Heritage Member of Parliament Bob Benzen, who announced last
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