The brief summary of yesterday’s policy votes at the CPC 2023 convention was published by CBC. Go there first, and read it – but I really think they missed more than a few things, so this is going to be a bit more of a deep dive into the policies
Continue readingTag: social conservatives
The Cracked Crystal Ball II: You Don’t Think It’s Really Fascism?
If it’s not from Germany, it’s just sparkling authoritarianism, right? More seriously, way back when I first started this blog (in 2004), I wrote a piece about whether or not we were in an emerging Dark Age. That was 2 years before Canada elected a CPC government for the first
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: Twisting the Night Away …
I won’t waste much time directly addressing the attempted coup that took place in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday this past week. Others have already covered it in considerable depth, and the fallout will no doubt take months or more to sort out. However, Maclean’s decided to publish something today
Continue readingAlberta Politics: University top brass salaries capped; David Suzuki to get honourary degree from U of A! Stand by for fireworks!
PHOTOS: High-profile B.C. environmentalist, scientist, author and broadcaster David Suzuki. Below: Alberta Advanced Education Minister Marlin Schmidt, University of Alberta President David Turpin (Photo: The Gauntlet), and United Conservative Party Opposition Leader Jason Kenney. The Alberta government has put a much-needed cap on the salaries of top university administrators, providing
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Corporate media have reached consensus about Andrew Scheer: He’s Stephen Harper with a human face!
PHOTOS: Andrew Scheer, demonstrating his vaunted smile. (Photo: Rabble.ca.) This fills corporate media with hope. It shouldn’t. In Canada, with or without a smile, social conservatism is ballot-box poison. Below: former prime minister Stephen Harper, who really doesn’t have a very nice smile at all. Below him, former PM Joe
Continue readingdaveberta.ca – Alberta Politics: Alberta’s Conservatives are obsessed with Gay-Straight Alliances
Following Progressive Conservative Party leader Jason Kenney’s comments to the Calgary Postmedia editorial board fifteen days ago when he came out in favour of allowing schools to inform parents when students join a student-initiated Gay-Straight Alliance club, Alberta’s conservative politicians have tied themselves in knots over the issue. Gay-Straight Alliances are student-initiated clubs meant
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: So … You Think Silence Is An Answer?
There are a number of Jason Kenney’s supporters running around with the mistaken belief that because Kenney refuses to answer questions about his Social Conservative (SoCon) beliefs is somehow an endorsement that he will be benign on those issues should he ever become Alberta’s Premier. Like the CPC policy change
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Wilting Roses: Wildrose ‘coup’ bid pushes party toward social conservative fringe, former leader Danielle Smith says
PHOTOS: Danielle Smith leads Wildrose Party members in the 2014 Calgary Pride Parade, with then-MLAs Kerry Towle is on her right and Jeff Wilson on her left. She was punished for this defiance by the party’s social conservative wing. Below: Ms. Smith…
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: Brian Jean: WildRose’s Second Lake Of Fire?
“I think they’ll even claim our ethnic candidates are
racist. I wouldn’t be surprised.”
The interview is over but a couple minutes later Jean phones back. He wants to add something.
He says the PC run the same kind of playbook as the federal Liberals tried on Stephen Harper. Remember, Jean served in the Harper government, as did Prentice.
“They tried to demonize him. They said we had a secret and hidden agenda. They claimed we were theocrats and racists and bigots and there were going to be soldiers on the streets of Canadian cities.”
“The PCs do this because they have taken over the space of the Liberal Party of Canada in Alberta. The PCs have taken that ground.”
For the record, Jean says he “has no interest whatsoever” in pushing social agenda issues. Gay-straight alliances will stay with Wildrose.
I suspect most Albertans know very little about Mr. Jean, except that his son passed away recently. I certainly hadn’t heard of him before myself.
The Cracked Crystal Ball II: Brian Jean: WildRose’s Second Lake Of Fire?
Newly minted WildRose party leader Brian Jean is running around the province trying to drum up votes like every other politician in Alberta these days. His latest “fear” seems to be that the PCs are going to start sliming his party. “I think they’ll even claim our ethnic candidates areracist.
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Bill 10 gong show’s bungled effort to pander to PC Party’s worst elements proves Jim Prentice is no political superman
Alberta Premier Jim Prentice, as he appeared to almost everyone until yesterday, except there are no ships here in Alberta, which is why we need all those pipelines. Below: Education Minister Gordon Dirks; humiliated PC MLA Sandra Jansen, official sponsor of Bill 10; and Liberal MLA and Bill 202 sponsor
Continue readingdaveberta.ca - Alberta politics: What if politicians could stop school kids from starting clubs?
TweetWhat does it look like when a politician tries to build his credibility among social conservative voters? We found out this week when Premier Jim Prentice sideswiped Edmonton-Centre Liberal MLA Laurie Blakeman’s private members bill – Bill 202: Safe and Inclusive Schools Statutes Amendment Act, 2014 – that would allow students
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Alberta Tories are swinging right, paradoxically because of the implosion of their right-wing brethren in the Wildrose Party
Family values: Not so long ago they were all swinging left, but now the Progressive Conservative caucus of Premier Jim Prentice is swinging right. Getting ready to launch, from left to right, new PC caucus member Kerry Towle, Mr. Prentice, new caucus member Ian Donovan, and an unidentified former Redford
Continue readingMy journey with AIDS...and more!: On “The God Article” with Mark Sandlin: I Want My Religion Back – You Can Keep the Ugly Baggage
This post is a work in progress. Please join in with your comments! Please read this article first: I Want My Religion Back – You Can Keep the Ugly Baggage. When my friend and, to the point, Facebook friend, Lori Knight-Whitehouse posted this I replied: Kenn George Chaplin Let me
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Anti-gay pastor, denied by Ric McIver, endorses the PC leadership candidate anyway for his ‘traditional Alberta values’
Pastor Artur Pawlowski and members of his flock march uninvited in 2012 at the head of the Calgary Stampede Parade, also known as the March for Mammon. Pastor Pawlowski, who holds extreme views about homosexuality, also has his own parade, which he calls the March for Jesus. Below: Ric McIver,
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Alberta’s Wildrose Party strategists plan to have drained the Lake of Fire by Sunday
Explaining the new rules to the Wildrose Party’s many social conservatives. Wildrose political strategists may not appear exactly as illustrated. Below: Social conservative pastor and former Wildrose candidate Allan Hunsperger preaching; the late Oscar Wilde being the life of the party. To paraphrase Johnny Cash, they fell into a burning
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: Barbara Kay on REAL Women Canada’s Outburst
In one sense, I was very happy to read Barbara Kay’s column excoriating Gwen Landolt and REAL Women Canada for their attack on Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird this week. I was pleased to see that at least someone on the far right could see the ridiculousness of Landolt’s position.
Continue readingMy journey with AIDS...and more!: Review (and a personal retrospective) – Behind the Candelabra
With only the most scant help from Google I have been trying to remember more about my personal, professional meeting with Liberace (“Please, call me Lee.”) It was some time in the mid-1980s, while I was working at a St. Catharines, Ontario radio station, when the subject of last night’s
Continue readingAlberta Diary: A little nugget from the past: Wildrose candidate’s abortion position
A scene from the Lethbridge-West riding, as seen by the Wildrose Party. Below: Lethbridge-West candidate Kevin Kinahan. During the campaign leading up to the recent Alberta provincial election, the website of Lethbridge-West Wildrose Party candidate Kevin Kinahan had two sections outlining his perspective on the party’s health care policy –
Continue readingDavid Climenhaga's Alberta Diary: Pride Festival’s political participants a positive sign of the times
Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith is imagined being welcomed to Saturday’s Edmonton Pride Festival as Premier Alison Redford and Deputy Premier Tom Lukaszuk, at left, look on. In the event, Alberta political leaders may not appear exactly as illustrated. Below: former politician Doug Elniski, cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead and so-con MP
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