You want moments in American history? Apropos of nothing, here lies Alexander Hamilton, slain in a duel by his political foe Aaron Burr, who got off scot free. Top that! Below: Danielle Smith, disapproving of my tinfoil cap. Your blogger is normally disinclined to give too much of this space
Continue readingTag: Wildrose Party
Alberta Diary: Yikes! U.S. program with remarkable knack for spotting future foreign leaders picks … Danielle Smith
Wildrose Party Leader Danielle Smith prepares to set off on her 19-day American tour. Future America-friendly leaders may not be exactly as illustrated. Below: Ms. Smith for real. With tout le monde political Alberta focusing on the province’s final farewell to Peter Lougheed, founder of the 41-year Conservative dynasty who
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Some musings on the death of Peter Lougheed, founder of Alberta’s Tory dynasty
Peter Lougheed on the campaign trail in 1971. (Glenbow Archives Photo) TORONTO Peter Lougheed was the last Alberta Conservative leader worthy of the title. By that I mean the premier who in 1971 founded the Conservative dynasty that rules the province to this day was a member of the now
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Newest Alberta poll shows overwhelming support for Premier Alison Redford
Premier Alison Redford with her winning PC machine. Below: Opposition Leader Danielle Smith with her less successful Wildrose machine. Below Ms. Smith: Alberta Scan publisher Paul McLoughlin and pollster Janet Brown. Not only are the Progressive Conservatives the most popular political party in Alberta, but Premier Alison Redford enjoys a
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Environics poll shows Tories in full flower, Wildrose withering on the vine
Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith with some of her party’s social conservative supporters, who came home to roost a few days before the April 23 provincial election … and stayed! Alberta politicians and their supporters may not be exactly as illustrated. Below: Premier Alison Redford and the real Ms. Smith. From
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Fiscal shocker! Redford Tories promise transparency but deliver opacity!
Secretive Redford Tory, left, moves to the right, while Wildrose transparency advocate, right, opts for a totally different course. Below: Doug Horner and Alison Redford, both smirking. This just in! Alberta’s Progressive Conservative government is secretive! Well… yeah! What’s astonishing is that the Alberta news media appears to be astonished
Continue readingAlberta Diary: The Annals of Law Enforcement: Yeah, Alberta’s Tories are sleazy, but now and then they get it right anyway
Just a year ago, it seemed likely police recruits like these would soon be lounging around the dusty streets of Fort Macleod, where not much has changed since the Mounties pounded in their first tent pegs in 1874. Alas, it shall not be. Below: Col. James Macleod; former MLA Evan
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Anti-union Wildrose Party’s fund-raising pitch piggybacks on union’s heavy lifting
Closed? Open? With Alberta Diary you can have it all. This blog is closed for a few days while your blogger takes a short break from writing stuff all the time. This means there can likely be no post on the Conservative Party’s Calgary Centre by-election nomination on Friday, Aug.
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Departed MP’s endorsement, big donations by candidate’s firm, complicate complicated Conservative nomination race
Candidates for the Conservative Party’s nomination in the Calgary Centre constituency prepare for next Saturday’s vote. Below: Candidates Greg McLean, Joan Crockatt and Jon Lord. Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to … get elected. The contest to find a federal Conservative candidate to replace
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Family (values) feud: Wildrose so-cons start sniping at Wildrose neo-cons
Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith: in trouble with her party’s social conservatives. Below: House Leader Rob Anderson. And so it begins: Rob Anderson, an ambitious social-conservative in the Wildrose Opposition’s shadow cabinet has publicly fired a rocket at his leader after she changed her tune on whether a Wildrose government would
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Unsuccessful at the polls, Alberta market fundamentalists want the courts to impose two-tier health care
What heath care for the rest of us will look like if the market fundamentalist right’s battle for insurance companies’ “rights” ever succeeds. Below: Private health-care advocate John Carpay; Alberta Health Minister Fred Horne; Alberta Liberal Health Critic David Swann. Not satisfied with their failure in the Alberta provincial election,
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Risky theories… Dangerous economic experiments…. Can we afford Harper’s Conservatives?
Prime Minister Stephen Harper… (Creepy Voice): “Dangerous experiments and risky economic theories. Can we afford these Conservatives much longer?” Below: Leo de Bever and a youthful Paul Krugman. The Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper and its Alberta branch plant known as the Wildrose Party continue to push risky
Continue readingAlberta Diary: The National Post on union kids’ camps: Threat or menace?
Kids from Friedrich Engels Cabin at Camp Solidarity think about ways to seize control of the means of production at the National Post and establish the Information Dictatorship of the Proletariat. Well, they’ll never get the chance, because they never worked for Ted Byfield! The National Post says union kids
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 readingAlberta Diary: With Alberta’s budget all but balanced, where’s Ted Morton now that we don’t need him?
Cock of the walk: Everybody wanted to talk to Ted Morton on June 26, 2011. His message to then-premier Ed Stelmach: Balance the budget or else. (Calgary Herald photo.) Below: Alison Redford, Rob Anderson. Can it be less than two years since Ted Morton, then Alberta’s steely-eyed finance minister and
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Budget crisis? Civil service raises? Go pop a Valium, Smith!
Hey Marge! Danielle Smith says there’s a budget crisis and this is no time to be giving raises to civil servants! Marge? Typical Albertans may not be exactly as illustrated this summer. Below: Danielle Smith. It’s hard to imagine all that many Albertans getting their knickers in a twist at
Continue readingDavid Climenhaga's Alberta Diary: Wedge politics, not religious freedom, behind Danielle Smith’s refusal to apologize
Police officers walk in Saturday’s Pride Parade. Below: Danielle Smith, Alan Hunsperger. Since she won’t apologize for remarks made by one of her candidates during the recent election campaign that many Albertans thought were offensive and anti-gay, Wildrose Party Leader Danielle Smith found herself trapped this week between a rock
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Wedge politics, not religious freedom, behind Danielle Smith’s refusal to apologize
Police officers walk in Saturday’s Pride Parade. Below: Danielle Smith, Alan Hunsperger. Since she won’t apologize for remarks made by one of her candidates during the recent election campaign that many Albertans thought were offensive and anti-gay, Wildrose Party Leader Danielle Smith found herself trapped this week between a rock
Continue readingDavid Climenhaga's Alberta Diary: Rx for high Alberta health care costs: Not what the doctors ordered!
Alberta ponders how to increase physician productivity – house calls? Below: Health Minister Fred Horne, Alberta Medical Association President Linda Slocombe. Alberta Health Minister Fred Horne’s musings he just might join Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty in declaring war on physicians’ fees is proof the chickens continue to come home to
Continue readingDavid Climenhaga's Alberta Diary: Today’s cabinet appointments likely to disappoint Alberta’s ‘strategic’ voters
“What was I thinking?” A progressive Alberta elector contemplates what he’s wrought by voting “strategically” for the Redford Conservatives. Alberta voters may not be exactly as illustrated. Below: Premier Redford. Later today, Alberta Premier Alison Redford will announce whom she has picked to fill her cabinet. As a consequence, today
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