There are two things you need to remember about that new poll from Think HQ Public Affairs that suggests the number of Alberta voters who still approve of Premier Jason Kenney’s job performance has now sunk below 30 per cent. First, it’s a survey of a sample of Albertans, not
Continue readingTag: Jason Kenney
Alberta Politics: After six years of exemplary service as Alberta Health Services CEO, Kenney Government sacks Verna Yiu
Verna Yiu led Alberta Health Services through the darkest hours of the pandemic with grace and a steady hand. The 20-year-plus veteran of public health care administration is the kind of leader whose name invariably appears in print in close proximity to the word “respected.” So why wouldn’t the Kenney
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Poisoning Democracy: Jason Nixon’s Outburst
“Unfortunately, our politicians are not only contaminating the minds of the public but poisoning our democracy at the same time.” Gary Mason, Globe & Mail columnist commenting on the two Conservative MPs who accused Prime Minister Trudeau of running a jackboot dictatorship. A quick check of Hansard this week demonstrates
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Kenney provides unintended comic relief at the pumps; changes are coming to AlbertaPolitics.ca
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney’s bungled effort to pump a little gas yesterday to make a point about his government’s gas-tax cut illustrates why it’s always a good idea to warn your audience if you’re about to try something new. So I’m taking this opportunity to advise readers of AlbertaPoltics.ca that
Continue readingAlberta Politics: After nearly a year gathering dust on a shelf, Kenney Government proclaims politician recall law and its sister act
After letting it sit un-proclaimed in legislative limbo for nearly a year, the Kenney Government has finally gotten around to taking the necessary steps to bring its politician-recall legislation into force. In a press release yesterday, the United Conservative Party Government announced the Recall Act and its sister act, the
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Controversy over sophomoric meme, admission police interviewed premier, distract from lame Axis of Inflation news conference
The adults definitely don’t seem to be in charge any more over in Alberta Premier Jason Kenney’s office. It didn’t take very long after the slap heard ’round the world during last night’s televised Academy Awards presentation before a sophomoric meme about the dramatic moment appeared on Premier Kenney’s social
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: Kenney’s Leadership Review: The Bedlam Continues
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold” – The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats It’s been a long time coming, but it will be over eventually, not on Apr 9 and not necessarily on May 18, but eventually. And no amount of maneuvering with mass membership drives or last-minute
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Pundits pivot to theory UCP orchestrated leak to media of recording of Jason Kenney’s ‘lunatics’ speech to political staffers
Much of the Alberta commentariat pivoted Friday to the theory Premier Jason Kenney himself was behind the leak of a recording of his speech to political staffers in which he accused the right wing of his United Conservative Party of bigotry and lunacy. “I did not think that Kenney orchestrated
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – David Wallace-Wells examines the massive global toll of excess deaths from COVID-19 (likely far exceeding even the already-alarming official counts). Nele Brusselaers et al. examine how Sweden’s choice to ignore science in favour of wishcasting and a strategy of deliberate infection resulted in
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Desperate times call for desperate measures: Kenney labels the UCP’s rightward fringe ‘lunatics,’ ‘kooky people’
In a secret pep talk to his troops Tuesday, revealed yesterday by the CBC, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney said he’s only sticking around as leader of the United Conservative Party to keep the “lunatics” from “trying to take over the asylum.” In May 2020, Mr. Kenney’s social media flying monkeys
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Calling UCP leadership review rule change illegal, unethical, and ‘a travesty,’ Jason Kenney’s rival Brian Jean vows legal response
Alberta’s United Conservative Party hasn’t even held the vote yet in its review of Premier Jason Kenney’s leadership and his chief rival is threatening legal action. Yesterday the party board, dominated by Mr. Kenney’s supporters, changed the rules for the April 9 leadership review vote to make it easier for
Continue readingAlberta Politics: United Conservative Party factions – Jason Kenney’s Mods and Brian Jean’s Rockers – square off over premier’s future
Are rival gangs of UCP Mods and Rockers* heading for Red Deer spoiling for a fight? If you thought the recent opposing demonstrations by outlaw truckers, most of whom don’t seem to own trucks, and local residents in Calgary’s Beltline neighbourhood were rough, imagine how ugly it could get if
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Stolen data: Respected pollster refuses to publish private poll to suit Kenney Government; UCP leaks it anyway
Janet Brown is an independent Alberta pollster with a solid track record for accurate polling, so when a couple of media reports appeared this week saying one of her recent polls showed the United Conservative Party leading the New Democratic Party, political observers paid attention. For one thing, other recent
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Brian Jean, Jason Kenney’s rival, wins Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche by-election in a walk for UCP; turnout was disgracefully low
No surprise, it was Brian Jean in a walk. The well-heeled local lad, former Conservative Member of Parliament and former leader of the Wildrose Party of Alberta didn’t even have to break into a sweat to capture an overwhelming majority of the votes for the United Conservative Party in yesterday’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: At a fraught moment for Jason Kenney, just before a crucial by-election, new poll shows NDP with solid provincial lead
On the eve of today’s Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche by-election and less than a month before the review of Premier Jason Kenney’s leadership by United Conservative Party members, a new poll shows the NDP Opposition strongly leading the UCP in decided-voter support. If the findings of the online survey of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Steven Woolf examines the inescapable connection between political choices and avoidable COVID-19 deaths between U.S. states. And Christopher Blackwell discusses how the pandemic may never end in prisons where authorities are even less interested in ensuring the health of the people whose lives
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Kit Yates discusses how the lifting of COVID-19 public health protections in the UK has predictably precipitated another wave of infections. Natalie Grover writes about the two-year-long battle to get decision-makers to accept that COVID-19 is transmitted through the air. And Catherine
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Jason Kenney’s talk radio debut might have generated some excitement in 1927 – but 2022? Not so much …
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney took to the airwaves yesterday with the first episode of his weekly Corus Entertainment call-in radio program, Your Province, Your Premier. If you have a hankering to hear our increasingly unpopular premier doing his irritating Perfesser Kenney schtick live on the airwaves, though, my advice is
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Jason Kenney offers a grab-bag of defences, some unusual, against five environmental groups’ defamation lawsuit
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney has filed his statement of defence in response to a defamation lawsuit by five environmental organizations, offering a grab-bag of defences for the comments that sparked the dispute. Among them, Mr. Kenney argues that by not specifically naming the groups he attacked in his social media
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Poll says almost everyone’s sick of Jason Kenney as he disqualifies UCP nomination candidates and more drama looms
Hard on the heels of new a poll indicating a majority of United Conservative Party voters want Jason Kenney gone, the premier was busy defending his decision to disqualify a couple of candidates tipped to beat pro-Kenney MLAs in a party nomination votes. Meanwhile, the Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche by-election
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