Alberta Politics: Hysterical Conservatives outdo themselves with ‘coalition’ histrionics, but Parliament is operating exactly as it should

Let it be conceded that the Conservative histrionics over yesterday’s confidence and supply agreement between the Liberals and the New Democrats in Parliament has far outdone the “spectacular national Conservative tantrum” predicted in this space.  Naturally one would have expected a right-wing Opposition party to argue that any deal between

Continue reading

Alberta 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 reading

Calgary Grit: Canada’s Greatest Losers

Last week, Martha Hall Findlay and Karen McCrimmon declared their candidacies for the Liberal leadership race. This week, George Takach has taken the plunge. I’ve posted one blog interview with David Merner, and will have others with David Bertschi and Alex Burton next week. Deborah Coyne, meanwhile, has already released more fresh ideas than we’ve seen from Stephen Harper during his entire tenure as Prime Minister. These are seven very different candidates with seven very different messages, but the one …

Continue reading