Does anyone recall the Reform Party of Canada’s campaign starting in the late 1980s to impose on our country a “Triple-E Senate” – that is to say elected, effective, and, above all, “equal”? Pushed by the likes of Calgary-area farmer Bert Brown and would-be philosopher king Preston Manning, this call
Continue readingTag: National Energy Program
Alberta Politics: How propaganda became memory: Pierre Trudeau, Alberta and the National Energy Program
On this day 40 years ago, prime minister Pierre Trudeau’s finance minister and deputy PM, Allan MacEachen, rose in Parliament to introduce a new national budget. Warning that Canada could become increasingly dependent on foreign supplies of oil and subject to the vagaries of the world oil market, Mr. MacEachen
Continue readingAlberta Politics: If you want to know how an Alberta Provincial Police force would behave, read between the lines of yesterday’s announcement
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police may be no paragon of liberalism and progressive enforcement, but they’re apparently too liberal and progressive for the members of the so-called Fair Deal Panel that Alberta Premier Jason Kenney appointed to trot out his quasi-separatist hobbyhorses. Mr. Kenney’s supposedly cash-poor government announced yesterday it
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The state of the art of Conservative victimhood in Alberta: Cue the violins! Here comes the Buffalo Declaration!
Cue the violins! No one does victimhood like an Alberta Conservative contemplating the prospect of another term in Opposition overlooking the Ottawa River. Michelle Rempel Garner, the Blocker Queen of Twitter and Conservative MP for the monochromatic suburban wasteland of Calgary Nose Hill, apparently wants us to think she is
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Andrew Scheer’s big National Energy Corridor idea sure sounds a lot like NEP 2.0
Now that we are in the midst of a closely fought federal election campaign, it’s interesting to see the Conservative Party of Canada is open at least to some of the ideas of prime minister Trudeau. I speak, of course, of prime minister Pierre Trudeau and the National Energy Program
Continue readingThe Senate—No Solution to Regional Alienation
Canada has always been a highly regionalized country—the Maritimes, Quebec, Ontario, the Prairies, B.C., all with varying interests and economies and, with Quebec at least, culture. One particular complaint is that the country is run from the centre, i.e. Quebec and Ontario dominate with the other regions struggling to be
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Knickers in a twist over David Suzuki’s U of A honorary degree
Photo: Environmentalist, scientist, author, and broadcaster David Suzuki (credit: David Climenhaga) The decision by the University of Alberta Senate to present an honorary degree to high profile environmentalist, scientist, author, broadcaster and Order of Canada recipient Dr. David Suzuki has aroused much controversy from conservative partisans, Postmedia columnists, U of A
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Why demanding Ottawa intervene to bend B.C. to Alberta’s will is probably a terrible idea … from Alberta’s point of view
PHOTOS: Perfidious Pierre, villain of the National Energy Program, as the late prime minister is understood by all good Albertans to have been (Photo: Wikimedia Commons). Below: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Alberta Opposition Leader Jason Kenney, and British Columbia Premier John Horgan (Photo: B.C. NDP).
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Rachel Notley and Jason Kenney find common ground, sort of … on dubious pipeline posturing
PHOTOS: Kinder Morgan Inc.’s Trans Mountain Pipeline. (Photo: Handout from Kinder Morgan Canada.) Below: Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, Alberta Opposition Leader Jason Kenney, U of A economist Andrew Leach, and British Columbia Premier John Horgan. I guess we can understand why Jason Kenney acts like Alberta has all the powers of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Alberta’s NDP borrowed more than export-cut threats from Peter Lougheed for yesterday’s Throne Speech
PHOTOS: Premier Rachel Notley speaks with well wishers in the Alberta Legislature Rotunda yesterday after her government’s Speech from the Throne was read by Lieutenant Governor Lois Mitchell. Below: Finance Minister Joe Ceci, Ms. Mitchell and Premier Peter Lougheed, back in the day. (Mitchell and Lougheed photos: Government of Alberta.)
Continue readingAlberta Politics: In a pragmatic move, Premier Rachel Notley appoints former Tory minister from Calgary to infrastructure portfolio
PHOTOS: Newly appointed NDP Infrastructure Minister Sandra Jansen speaks during yesterday’s swearing-in ceremony at Government House in Edmonton. With her are new Parliamentary Secretaries Jessica Littlewood and Annie McKitrick, left and right, and Premier Rachel Notley (Photo: Government of Alberta). Below: Pierre Trudeau and Peter Lougheed, looking pretty friendly for
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: New book tells the story of the rise and fall of (Pierre) Trudeaumania in Alberta
There is perhaps no greater myth in Alberta politics than that the National Energy Program, which all Albertans are told to believe brought untold devastation to the oil sector and salted the earth for the federal Liberals in this province for decades to come. Looking beyond the myth, most Albertans
Continue readingAlberta Politics: TransCanada pulls the plug on Energy East: the fallout in Alberta will be measurable
PHOTOS: Protesters opposed to the Energy East Pipeline project in Montreal last summer (Photo: Radio Canada). Below: United Conservative Party leadership contender Brian Jean, Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, Canadian prime ministers Trudeau, Pierre and Justin, and sometime UCP leadership candidate Jeff Callaway. It’s been quite obvious
Continue readingAlberta Politics: It’s weird to see Alberta’s Wildrose Party paying tribute to (Pierre) Trudeau’s National Energy Program … but what the heck!
PHOTOS: Prime minister Pierre Trudeau, at right, and Alberta Premier Peter Lougheed looking friendly enough in this file shot taken back in the 1980s. Below: Wildrose Economic Development Critic Prasad Panda and former Manitoba (shhhhhh … NDP) premier Gary Doer. VICTORIA, B.C. While we await the results of today’s British
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Pigs will fly before the fantasy that Ottawa’s carbon tax ‘invades provincial jurisdiction’ will ever persuade a court
PHOTOS: Who says Jason Kenney is full of baloney? These guys do! And they’re the Fathers of Confederation! Below: PC leadership candidate Mr. Kenney; federal Liberal Veterans Affairs Minister Kent Hehr, MP for Calgary Centre; and Brian Jean, leader of the Wildrose Opposition in the Alberta Legislature (Wildrose.ca photo). Ottawa’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Rachel Notley’s demand for a pipeline quid pro quo demonstrates the steely side of Alberta’s premier
PHOTOS: Alberta NDP Premier Rachel Notley. Below: Peter Lougheed, Alberta’s first Progressive Conservative premier, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his father, the late prime minister Pierre Trudeau. GRANDE PRAIRIE, Alberta Rachel Notley’s decision yesterday to make support for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s plan put a national price on carbon conditional
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Deconstructing political discourse in Alberta: Doublethink is alive and well in recessionary Wild Rose Country
PHOTOS: Parson Manning spreads the Gospel of Market Fundamentalism in his days as leader of the Reform Party of Alberta. The actual neoliberal preacher-men of Confederation may not appear exactly as illustrated. Photo grabbed from Elmer Gantry, the mov…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Don Getty, premier who battled economic downturn much like today’s, among the last of Alberta’s Red Tory leaders
PHOTOS: Don Getty and Peter Lougheed, going places politically back in the day. Below: Mr. Getty again, and Mr. Lougheed , as professional football players with the Edmonton Eskimos in the 1950s, the former in an Eskimos photo, the latter in a shot sna…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: C’mon … admit it, Wildrosers! Denis Coderre’s zinger burned because it landed a little too close for comfort
PHOTOS: Welcome to Bedrock City, AB. Actual rural Wildrose ridings in Southern Alberta may not appear exactly as illustrated. Below: Alberta Opposition Leader Brian Jean (CBC photo), Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre, former Canadian Alliance leader Stockwe…
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Scary news for Halloween: Never mind Harper Derangement Syndrome; Notley Derangement Syndrome is a real thing!
PHOTOS: Deficit rode a pale horse … as seen by some Albertans in the skies over Edmonton. Below: Rachel Notley, and Pierre and Justin Trudeau, who are all thought by sufferers of various forms of conservative delusional personality disorder to have economic superpowers. Below them: Two guys who for some
Continue reading