It is remarkable by any measure that the Alberta New Democratic Party raised $7.1 million in 2022, not to mention that $3.2 million of that sum was donated during the fourth quarter, and more than a quarter million dollars on the last night of the year. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith
Continue readingTag: Rachel Notley
Susan on the Soapbox: A Tale of Two Strategies (okay, one strategy and one gong show)
Congratulations to all of you for surviving the Smith government’s first session in the Legislature. It started on Nov 29 and ended on Dec 15 and it felt like an eternity. Smith has been premier for two months. she sat in the Legislature for 15 days and already she’s created
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: What Just Happened?
“…the folks who literally spent seven days telling us that what was written in their bill was not written in their bill [will] determine what is…unconstitutional on the part of the federal government…” Rachel Notley, Hansard, Dec 7, p 235 What happened over the last 7 days in Alberta politics
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Limiting debate, UCP rams through ‘Sovereignty Act in the wee hours of yesterday morning
Danielle Smith’s obedient United Conservative Party Caucus rammed through the premier’s so-called Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act in the wee hours of yesterday morning. Opposition Leader Rachel Notley called for the Sovereignty Act to be referred immediately to the Alberta Court of Appeal (Photo: Legislative Assembly of Alberta).
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Rachel Notley’s portrait to be unveiled on Thursday in the Legislature Building – there are policy issues
Let’s take a break from the Sovereignty Act today and talk about something really important: Alberta premiers’ portraits. An Alberta premier could do worse than emulate Barack Obama’s official presidential portrait, by Kehinde Wiley, and many have. (Snapped by the author in the National Portrait Gallery, Washington D.C.). In Alberta
Continue readingSusan on the Soapbox: A Letter to my Conservative-voting Neighbour: A Guest Post by Lloyd Lovatt
Lately Ms Soapbox has been thinking about how to talk to her conservative friends without falling even further down the rabbit hole of polarization. Then a friend sent me this letter which acknowledges the sadness a Lougheed conservative must feel at the loss of their party and suggests we reach
Continue readingAlberta Politics: As by-election test nears for UCP Premier Danielle Smith, new poll shows NDP in majority territory
“We are going to beat the NDP in rural Alberta, we are going to beat the NDP in Edmonton, and we are going to beat the NDP in Calgary,” shouts Alberta Premier Danielle Smith in a little video ad for voters in next Tuesday’s Brooks-Medicine Hat by-election that popped up
Continue readingAlberta Politics: A tale of two speeches: Rachel Notley and Danielle Smith mark informal start of campaign leading to 2023 election
Members of Alberta’s only two political parties with MLAs in the Legislature met in convention yesterday – the governing United Conservatives in Edmonton and Opposition New Democrats in Calgary – where they heard strikingly different speeches from their leaders. Premier Daniel Smith addresses the United Conservative Party annual general meeting
Continue readingAlberta Politics: A big apology by Danielle Smith and a bad poll for the UCP make it look like her government’s already on the ropes
Coming on the heels of two official statements since she was sworn in as Alberta’s premier that attempted to explain or clarify contentious comments, Danielle Smith’s straight-up apology yesterday for controversial opinions about Ukraine published in April in a livestream chat leave the impression her week-old government is already on
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith v. Rachel Notley: One remarkable political comeback sets the stage for another
When Danielle Smith is sworn in today as Alberta’s still-unelected United Conservative Party premier, there can be no doubt she has executed a remarkable comeback. NDP Opposition Leader and former premier Rachel Notley (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). But has one remarkable comeback set the stage for another? Way back, in
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Danielle Smith has neither the temperament nor the right ideology to lead a united conservative party for long
Danielle Smith, expected to win the United Conservative Party leadership race on Thursday, has neither the temperament nor the right ideology to lead a united party for long. Former Premier and NDP Opposition Leader Rachel Notley (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). Her ideological views are too far from the mainstream not
Continue readingAlberta Politics: NDP Leader Rachel Notley vows to reverse UCP policies that reduced worker overtime and the youth minimum wage
Opposition Leader Rachel Notley vowed yesterday to reverse two United Conservative Party policies that reduced overtime payments for many working Albertans and lowered minimum wages for young people if the NDP forms government after the next election. Labour Minister Kaycee Madu, whose 186-word message on the government website marked Labour
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Rachel Notley rolls dice, risks joining UCP leadership candidates to attack Danielle Smith for cancer remark
New Democratic Party Opposition Leader Rachel Notley joined the trailing United Conservative Party leadership candidates yesterday in piling onto UCP frontrunner Danielle Smith for her remarks in a recent social media video that appeared to blame cancer victims for their condition. UCP leadership candidate Danielle Smith in her controversial July
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Another poll shows Daniel Smith leading UCP leadership race – and Rachel Notley’s NDP ahead province-wide
Another day, another Alberta political poll, this time from Leger. UCP leadership candidate Danielle Smith in a video she made doing damage control for her controversial remarks about cancer (Photo: Danielle Smith/Twitter). This one, like last week’s Mainstreet Research poll, shows Rachel Notley’s New Democrats in the lead, although not
Continue readingAlberta Politics: The real question facing Albertans: Which woman should be premier – Rachel Notley, Rebecca Schulz, or Danielle Smith?
The woman who replaces Jason Kenney as premier and leads the United Conservative Party Government into the next Alberta provincial election needs to be mindful of the fact she won’t have a mandate to implement radical change before the next general election. Jason Kenney, in costume as usual, as he
Continue readingAlberta Politics: MLA Thomas Dang acknowledges reality, drops effort to rejoin NDP, says he won’t run again in Edmonton-South
Edmonton-South MLA Thomas Dang was doing no more than recognizing the reality that his political career is finished when he had a spokesperson send media a statement yesterday saying he will not be seeking re-election in the next general election. Mr. Dang more recently, in 2019 (Photo: David J. Climenhaga).
Continue readingAlberta Politics: With Alberta enjoying an unexpected oil boom, Rachel Notley vows an NDP government won’t piss it all away
With Alberta enjoying another rather unexpected oil boom, Rachel Notley has promised that an NDP government won’t piss it all away. Soon-to-depart Alberta premier Jason Kenney was all dressed up for the next oil boom, and now no one wants him around (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr). That’s exactly what she said.
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Launching UCP leadership bid, Brian Jean promises life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, Alberta style
Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul MLA Dave Hanson (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). That sure sounded like what former Wildrose Party leader and UCP co-founder Brian Jean was promising Albertans last night as he launched the formal part of his campaign to take back leadership of
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Awkward family portraits: Travis Toews and his supporters try to give an impression of unity and inevitability
Talk about your awkward family portrait! Brian Jean, the last time he announced he was running to lead the UCP, in 2017 (Photo: Brian Jean/Flickr). Former finance minister Travis Toews, the United Conservative Party establishment’s choice to replace Jason Kenney as Alberta’s premier, lined up with 14 of the party’s
Continue readingAlberta Politics: In speech, Rachel Notley vows to put health care on ballot in 2023, reinstate harm-reduction programs, end UCP privatization plans
NDP Opposition Leader Rachel Notley ripped into the health care policies of the United Conservative Party Government in a campaign-style speech at the annual general meeting of the Health Sciences Association of Alberta yesterday afternoon in Edmonton. Ms. Notley on the big screens at the Edmonton Convention Centre (Photo: David
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