In it for you. It’s the New Democrats – now a sad shadow of their former selves – who, ironically, came up with the best slogan for the 2019 federal election campaign: in it for you. That’s what just about every election campaign is about, this one included. Which party best
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Alberta Politics: Stephen Harper’s proposed restrictions on bitumen exports caused no uproar – so why the fury at Justin Trudeau?
Late last week, Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer was once again accusing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal Government of wanting to phase out the oilsands, as he put it, and passing laws to put that putative plan into action. Notwithstanding a lack of persuasive evidence, the popularity of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Happy Canada Day! In a troubled world, Canada stands out as a genuine triumph of bureaucracy
Happy Canada Day! One way or another, our Canada always seems to end up on every list of the world’s Top Ten economies. Granted, we are almost inevitably No. 10 of 10, which may leave the intensely competitive dissatisfied. But, realistically, this also means we’re No. 10 of 193, if
Continue readingAlberta Politics: TMX gets the nod from Justin Trudeau’s cabinet – masterstroke or master blunder?
With his cabinet’s second approval of the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion Project yesterday afternoon, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has either proved the Liberal Party of Canada’s old mojo is still intact or blown it all to smithereens. It’s too soon to tell. Alberta Conservatives and their legion of media cheerleaders
Continue readingAlberta Politics: United Conservative Party introduces the Open for Fast Food Act – sorry about the 13% pay cut, kids
Premier Jason Kenney’s newly elected United Conservative Party introduced its second bill yesterday, calling it the Open for Business Act. The NDP immediately dubbed Bill 2 the Pick Your Pockets Bill, seeing as its provisions include a 13-per-cent pay cut to $13 an hour from $15 for students under 18
Continue readingWarren Kinsella: My latest, on the so-called “digital charter”
The Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development blinked. Then he blinked again. He has just been asked if his government’s “Digital Charter” would apply to his own political party. You know, the governing Liberal Party of Canada. He doesn’t answer. The host on CBC’s “Power and Politics” genially tries
Continue readingAlberta Politics: What should we make of the post-election Edmonton Journal editorial urging the UCP to keep the carbon tax?
I suppose we should never attribute to mischief what can be explained by incompetence, but what else are we to make of the Edmonton Journal’s earnest editorial yesterday urging Alberta Premier Jason Kenney not to pull the plug on the carbon tax? “Killing the provincial carbon tax is one political
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Stephen Mandel, as impudent as ever, pleads for public subsidy for his Alberta Party
Hello, Alberta! Stephen Mandel here! My Alberta Party didn’t manage to elect a single MLA last month, but we’re good guys and we got 9.1 per cent of the vote. How about you give us some money? That wasn’t really Stephen Mandel saying that, of course. It was me, your
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Albertans, in their ‘bitumen bubble,’ may have missed the significance of West Coast Green goings on
We Albertans have been living in a bit if a bubble – a bitumen bubble. As a consequence, we may not all have noticed what’s been happening on Canada’s West Coast. So the potential significance of the victory in a federal by-election Monday by Paul Manly of the Green Party
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The game’s afoot in Ottawa as the moment nears for Jason Kenney to implement his ‘revenge platform’
Jason Kenney will be sworn in tomorrow as the 18th premier of Alberta, so we should know very soon if he really meant his oft-repeated pledge to make the repeal of the NDP’s carbon levy the first act of his government or if it was just another campaign whopper. Likewise,
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Irked by news site’s critical reports, Jason Kenney hints at retaliation as PressProgress fires back
Apparently the stenographic efforts of Postmedia’s Alberta newspapers as a virtual wing of the United Conservative Party campaign team were not enough for the victorious Jason Kenney, Alberta’s premier designate. Journalists and publications that provided less obsequious coverage of the campaign leading up to the April 16 election will be
Continue readingWarren Kinsella: How Trudeau elected Kenney
Last month, I was back home in Calgary to teach at the law school. So, I got together with a couple high school buddies – one a lawyer, one an engineer – at Michael’s on Tenth Avenue. (Michael’s has the best pizza in Canada, by the way. Hands down.) We
Continue readingAlberta Politics: What would Green Party of Canada Leader Elizabeth May do in Rachel Notley’s shoes? Not the same thing as Alberta’s premier
What would have Elizabeth May have done in Rachel Notley’s shoes? The leader of the Green Party of Canada says she would have summoned up the memory of Peter Lougheed, founder of Alberta’s 44-year Progressive Conservative Dynasty, but not the way the province’s first NDP premier has. “I think that
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Could Justin Trudeau be coated with Trump-like Teflon? It’s possible, and here’s why …
Is the SNC-Lavalin Affair really the Trudeau crusher Andrew Scheer and his strategic team obviously think it is? No sooner had former justice minister Jody Wilson-Reybould completed her startling testimony last Wednesday before the House of Commons Justice Committee – replete with detailed allegations of political interference in the justice
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Has a UCP candidate voiced what her party really thinks, its leader’s pledge notwithstanding, about two-tier health care?
If you wonder what the United Conservative Party really thinks about how health care ought to be run in Alberta, perhaps you should ask if Miranda Rosin instead of Jason Kenney, he of the Coroplast Pledge. Ms. Rosin is the UCP’s candidate in the new Banff-Kananaskis riding. Mr. Kenney is
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The stars of the NDP firmament are aligning today for someone in Burnaby South – it remains to be seen if it’s Jagmeet Singh
Even if all the New Democrats vote Liberal and all the Liberals vote NDP in the Burnaby South by-election today, the outcome could be a very close one. It’s rude of me to mention this just now, of course, but you have to admit something like this could very well
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Brian Topp, NDP strategist who led Rachel Notley’s 2015 war room, describes what Jagmeet Singh must do this year to win
With a federal election looming this fall, mainstream pundits have already written off the federal New Democratic Party and its leader, Jagmeet Singh, relegating Mr. Singh to history’s discard bin and declaring the party to have already returned to perpetual third-party status. Maybe they shouldn’t, suggests long-time NDP political strategist
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Irreconcilable differences? Gulf between the Alberta and federal NDP is wide, and could grow wider
The rift between Premier Rachel Notley’s Alberta New Democrats and the federal NDP led by Jagmeet Singh over the Trans Mountain Pipeline is wide and deep, but it is not unbridgeable – yet. That could soon change, though, if two likely political scenarios unfold in tandem: an early federal election
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Calculating the winners and losers in yesterday’s Trans Mountain Pipeline debacle
No doubt they were chuckling discreetly at Kinder Morgan headquarters in Houston yesterday as they counted up their additional spare change. They had, after all, just managed to sell off the Trans Mountain Pipeline to the Liberal government led by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, backstopped by Premier Rachel Notley’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: NDP will need to choose carefully as Linda Duncan decides not to seek re-election as Edmonton Strathcona MP
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Not to be negative, but the federal New Democrats might want to hold off scheduling the nomination to choose Linda Duncan’s successor until just after next spring’s provincial election. Then again – given the fraught relationship these days between the federal NDP and the Alberta branch of
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