Jason Kenney ← Progressive Bloggers // Blogues progressistes

Susan on the Soapbox: The Emotional Mr Kenney

Jun

25

2017

“When it comes to politics, all I can offer is emotion.” — David Sedaris, author of numerous books including “Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls” If we didn’t know any better we’d think David Sedaris was talking about Jason Kenney. Mr Kenney is campaigning hard to become Alberta’s next premier. His stump speeches hit all the ...

Alberta Politics: With three right-wing political parties now possible instead of one, has Jason Kenney’s roll of the dice crapped out?

Jun

25

2017

PHOTOS: Jason Kenney, as he may see himself, gets ready to roll the unite-the-right dice. Actual Alberta conservative politicians may not appear exactly as illustrated. (Photo: Publicity shot for Sky Full of Moon, 1952.) Below: The real Mr. Kenney, plus the real Katherine O’Neill, Greg Clark and Stephen Mandel. Snake eyes? Jason Kenney rolled the ...

daveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: All roads lead to Red Deer and the Alberta Party for homeless politicos

Jun

22

2017

Red Deer and the Alberta Party are frequent destinations for disaffected politicos in search of a new political home. Led by former Progressive Conservative Party president Katherine O’Neill and backed by former cabinet minister Stephen Mandel, disaffected Tories are booking their trip to the central Alberta city this weekend to discuss bringing centrists “together,” presumably under the ...

Alberta Politics: Saskatchewan credit rating downgraded for second time by Standard & Poor’s and all we hear are crickets!

Jun

22

2017

PHOTOS: It’s quiet here on Crickets Avenue. Don’t expect a Wildrose of PC press release to come along any time soon. (Photo: Billy Hathorn, Wikimedia Commons) Below: Standard & Poor’s headquarters in New York City (Photo: Uncredited, Wikimedia Commons); Brad Wall, the real leader of Western Canada, or so they say. (Photo: Daniel Paquet, Wikimedia ...

Alberta Politics: Explaining Derek Fildebrandt’s ambitions: Jason Kenney vows to stifle ‘bozo eruptions’ in the UCP

Jun

21

2017

PHOTOS: Alberta Progressive Conservative Leader Jason Kenney. He vows to find ways to ensure there are no bozo eruptions in the ranks of the United Conservative Party. This will not be easy. Below: Frequent eruptor Derek Fildebrandt, who says he’s considering running for the leadership of the UCP himself; former Alberta deputy premier Thomas Lukaszuk, ...

Alberta Politics: Opposition focuses its fury on Tzeporah Berman, ignores oilsands advisory group’s consensus recommendations … why?

Jun

20

2017

PHOTOS: Environmentalist Tzeporah Berman. Below: Former Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers president Dave Collyer, who worked successfully with Ms. Berman to produce the recommendations of the Alberta Government’s Oil Sands Advisory Group, and Opposition leaders Jason Kenney of the Progressive Conservative Party and Brian Jean of the Wildrose Party, who relentlessly attacked Ms. Berman. Do ...

Susan on the Soapbox: Susan on the Soapbox 2017-06-18 21:57:30

Jun

18

2017

Unsolicited Advice from a Conservative Pundit This week Preston Manning, former leader of the Reform Party, offered some advice to the yet to be formed United Conservative Party (or whatever it’s going to call itself after the Wildrose and the Progressive Conservatives merge). A vision of sorts Since neither Brian Jean nor Jason Kenney ...

Alberta Politics: Environmentalist Tzeporah Berman, who gave as good as she got, leaves Alberta oilsands advisory role

Jun

17

2017

PHOTOS: Former Oil Sands Advisory Group member Tzeporah Berman. Below: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, Progressive Conservative Legislative Caucus Leader Ric McIver, and Environment Minister Shannon Phillips. Tzeporah Berman, the high-profile environmentalist who became a lightning rod for right-wing fury at Alberta’s NDP, is no longer advising Premier Rachel Notley’s Government. A Canadian Press story yesterday ...

Alberta Politics: PC-Wildrose merger agreement leaves many unanswered questions for Wildrosers and the rest of us

Jun

16

2017

PHOTOS: Wildrose Party Leader Brian Jean and Progressive Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney shake on their merger plan in this Wildrose photo. Below: Lacking anything better to illustrate this story with, here are a couple of party logos. If anything’s clear from trying to make sense of the agreement that outlines the scheme to merge ...

daveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Alberta Conservatives now appear less united than they have in years

Jun

14

2017

Progressive Conservative leader Jason Kenney took aim at the New Democratic Party and Alberta’s teachers this week, claiming that both groups are planning to hijack the July 22 vote to fold his party and the Wildrose Party into a new United Conservative Party. Kenney’s claims are unsubstantiated and are likely a distraction from the unity ...

Alberta Politics: Year after year, about now, Alberta conservatives shoot themselves in the same foot

Jun

12

2017

PHOTOS: Then-Wildrose MLAs Kerry Towle, leader Danielle Smith and Jeff Wilson (in Wildrose T-shirts behind the sign) take part in the August 2014 Calgary Pride parade. Below: Wildrose staffer Cory Johnston, current party leader Brian Jean, former leader Smith (Photo: Dave Cournoyer) and Alberta NDP Premier Rachel Notley. Bottom: Calgary blogger Susan Wright. Plus ca ...

Alberta Politics: Tee times and cowboys trump Pride when jittery Alberta conservative politicians join the parade

Jun

8

2017

PHOTOS: Participants in last year’s Edmonton Pride Parade as it made its way through the leafy streets of Rachel Notley’s Edmonton-Strathcona riding. They don’t look very dangerous, do they? Below: The missing men – Wildrose Leader Brian Jean and Progressive Conservative Leader Jason Kenney (Photo: Wildrose Party), plus Oscar Wilde and a participant in the ...

Alberta Politics: Mapping the ‘Kleintastrophe’ – veteran journalist and researcher tracks energy policies of past Alberta PC governments

Jun

8

2017

PHOTOS: Alberta premier Ralph Klein at the start of the Kleintastrophe in 1992. (Screenshot of CBC broadcast.) Below: Calgary journalist and researcher Gillian Steward, former Alberta Liberal leader Kevin Taft, the best premier Alberta never had, and would-be United Conservative Party leadership candidate Doug Schweitzer. As the years Ralph Klein headed Alberta’s government recede into ...

Alberta Politics: Wildrose to members: Want to break a law? No problem! We’ll just get elected and change it

Jun

6

2017

PHOTOS: The Alberta Legislature, about the best your blogger can do on the road to illustrate this illustration-resistant story (Photo: Wikimedia Commons). Below: Wildrose Leader Brian Jean, Progressive Conservative Leader Jason Kenney and Wildrose Treasurer James Cole, every one of them people mentioned in this story of whom photos exist. CALGARY It turns out the ...

Alberta Politics: David Khan elected to lead Alberta Liberals 100 years less a day after party’s last election victory

Jun

4

2017

PHOTOS: New Alberta Liberal Leader David Khan, at left, in a hopelessly self-referential photo with your blogger. (Photo: Dave Cournoyer.) Below: Liberal leadership candidate Kerry Cundal, leadership dropout Nolan Crouse and would-be centre uniter Stephen Mandel. CALGARY Members of the Alberta Liberal Party elected David Khan to what has to be among the toughest political ...

Alberta Politics: If failure to appear at Pride goeth before a fall, what will Jason Kenney do?

Jun

4

2017

PHOTOS: Progressive Conservative Leader Jason Kenney, back in 2010 when he was a Calgary MP, taking part in the Calgary Stampede Parade. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons.) Will he show up for the Edmonton Pride Parade next Saturday as well? Below: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, flanked by Education Minister David Eggen and Economic Development and Trade Minister ...

daveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Looking past pipelines, the NDP-Green agreement looks pretty good for BC

Jun

2

2017

“Mark my words, that pipeline will be built, the decisions have been made.” – Alberta Premier Rachel Notley Alberta politicians, media and pundits are unsurprisingly focused on what the governing agreement between British Columbia New Democratic Party leader John Horgan and Green Party leader Andrew Weaver will mean for the future of the Kinder Morgan ...

Alberta Politics: Genial and in control, Alberta premier fields questions about B.C. politics with aplomb at hospital announcement

May

31

2017

PHOTOS: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley and Health Minister and Deputy Premier Sarah Hoffman announce a new hospital on Edmonton’s south side. Alberta Health services CEO Verna Yiu is visible on the right. Below: Infrastructure Minister Brian Mason, controversial B.C. environmentalist Tzeporah Berman and some of the crowd at the hospital announcement. We may have been ...

Alberta Politics: How but as a leadership campaign brochure are we to interpret Derek Fildebrandt’s paean to ‘Max’ Bernier?

May

30

2017

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 the first-ministerial brass ring in ...

Alberta Politics: Media readers deserve the whole story about the sources reporters quote in public policy stories

May

26

2017

PHOTOS: The question isn’t just whether Alberta’s students are getting the information they need, but whether media is giving the rest of us all the facts we require when we read news stories about education policy. Below: Former Edmonton Public Schools curriculum director Stuart Wachowicz, a frequent source used in columns by Edmonton Journal writer ...

Alberta Politics: ‘Foreign influence’ had nothing to do with Tory Joan Crockatt’s Calgary Centre election defeat in 2015

May

24

2017

PHOTOS: Joan Crockatt, during her brief spell as Conservative Member of Parliament for Calgary Centre. Below: Liberal Veterans Affairs Minister Kent Hehr, who beat Ms. Crockatt in 2015; environmentalist Chris Turner who ran against her for the Greens in 2012 and did very well; and environmentalist Harvey Locke, who ran against her for the Liberals ...

daveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: No, reforming Alberta’s Labour Laws will not kill democracy.

May

23

2017

It won’t come as a surprise to many political watchers in Alberta that the most vocal critics of the NDP government’s yet to be announced reforms to Alberta’s outdated labour laws have strong ties to the province’s Conservative establishment. “Keep Alberta Working” is a campaign of the “Alberta Growth Initiative,” which is a coalition of the Alberta Hotel ...

Alberta Politics: Don’t look for dramatic change to Alberta labour laws in revisions NDP will likely introduce this week

May

22

2017

PHOTOS: Alberta Labour Minister Christina Gray (Photo: Chris Schwarz, Government of Alberta). Below: Labour Lawyer Andrew Sims and Alberta Premier Rachel Notley (Photo: Dave Cournoyer, Wikimedia Commons.) Alberta’s New Democratic Party Government is expected to introduce changes to the province’s main labour relations laws this week, quite possibly on Wednesday. Naturally enough, right-wing politicians and ...

Susan on the Soapbox: Meet the “United” Conservative Party

May

21

2017

Say what you will about the Wildrose, they were always grassroots party…that is until Jason Kenney blew them out of the water. Last week Jason Kenney and Brian Jean unveiled the terms under which the Wildrose and Progressive Conservatives will roll up into the United Conservative Party (UCP). The Agreement in Principle on the Establishment ...

Alberta Politics: Tories, Wildrosers agree to call new entity United Conservative Party … without ever speaking the initials aloud

May

19

2017

PHOTOS: Wildrose Leader Brian Jean and Progressive Conservative Leader Jason Kenney pose uncomfortably in this Wildrose Party photo. Below: A CBC shot by Terry Reith may have captured the real mood better. Below that: Twitterist Edwin Mundt’s take on the You See Pee. Question: What happens when Alberta Can’t Wait? Answer: UCP! Seriously, United Conservative ...