Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Adam King discusses how governments and employers have memory-holed some of the most important lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic as to the…
Alberta NDP
The last thing Alberta New Democrats need is a dumb fight over their name, which is just fine as it is
It would be a pity if the coming NDP leadership race got sidetracked into a silly fight about whether Alberta Opposition party should change its name. Former Calgary-Currie NDP MLA…
Danielle Smith summons Ed Stelmach, Lyle Oberg from the Alberta political crypt to help sell the breakup of AHS
It was an interesting strategy for Premier Danielle Smith’s government to trot out former premier Ed Stelmach, the man most associated with the creation of Alberta Health Services back in…
What’s next for Rachel Notley? Is there a path to the PMO for Alberta’s former NDP premier?
So what’s next for Rachel Notley? Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh (Photo: David J. Climenhaga). The buzz grows louder by the day that sooner than later Ms. Notley is going…
Alberta medical clinic’s ‘membership’ billing scheme won’t hurt a bid by PM to attack Pierre Poilievre through Danielle Smith
There must have been a moment of pure delight in the Prime Minister’s Office in Ottawa when the story broke about Dr. Sally Talbot-Jones’s plan to get her patients to…
Calgary medical clinic tells patients they’ll need to pay up to $4,800 a year for timely access to physician
Since the Alberta government has the power to outlaw fees like those about to be charged by a Calgary medical clinic for patients to get timely access to their physician,…
Ask Me Anything about Alberta politics episode
You shared your Alberta politics questions and we answered them in our annual Ask Me Anything episode of the Daveberta Podcast. New and recent episodes of the Daveberta Podcast are…
Better late than never, one supposes, NDP hammers Smith Government’s scandalous RStar scheme
It’s not a bad thing for Alberta’s NDP Opposition to hammer the Smith Government’s scandalous RStar scheme, as they did yesterday, but it’s frustrating to have to wonder where they…
UCP addiction to inflicting ideological solutions on real problems means plague of drug deaths is unlikely to abate
In a better world, the conveniently timed post-election release of statistics showing Alberta had the deadliest month on record in April for fatal drug poisonings would have discredited the “Alberta…
Yes, Danielle Smith can just apologize and shrug off her ethical failings – so it’s time for a new NDP strategy
Irfan Sabir, the NDP Opposition’s justice critic, wasn’t wrong when he complained on Saturday that Danielle Smith shouldn’t be able to rattle off a meaningless apology in the Legislature and…
Jason Stephan, temporarily missing MLA, suggests he had no idea in March there would be an election in May
Jason Stephan, the Red Deer-South electoral district’s absentee MLA, apparently now wants us to believe he had no idea in March that there was an Alberta election scheduled at the…
Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Matthew Cunningham-Cook and Andrew Perez highlight how Suncor and other dirty energy giants have poured loads of windfall profits into stock buybacks…
Rachel Notley is no Jim Prentice or Danielle Smith, so she’s not about to quit in a tantrum or a snit
Bored reporters were trying to gin up a little post-election excitement yesterday speculating about whether Rachel Notley will stay or go now that her New Democrats are back in Opposition,…
Consequence culture strikes! Former health minister Tyler Shandro finds himself out of a job
CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. – By any reasonable standard, Tyler Shandro was an appalling minister of the Crown. Calgary-Acadia’s new MLA, Registered Nurse Diana Batten (Photo: Alberta NDP). It’s hard to think…
Despite complaints from the left the NDP shifted too far right, it was a left policy blunder that lost the Alberta election
CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. – It’s ironic how, despite complaints from the left about the Alberta NDP’s undeniable shift to the right, it was the party’s sole left-wing policy concession that appears…
Rachel Notley’s unforced error – that 3% corporate tax increase – probably cost the NDP the election
SAINT JOHN, N.B. – The principal unforced error that most likely cost the Alberta NDP the May 29 election was the foolish decision to blab about a 3-per-cent tax increase…
Premier Danielle Smith, fresh off election victory, suggests resurrecting the Family Compact to run Edmonton!
Even before the dust from the historically close 2023 Alberta general election has settled, Premier Danielle Smith was blabbing about creating an extra-parliamentary council of UCP electoral losers to act…
Hot take: If you were hoping for sanity in Alberta after yesterday’s election, you can forget about it
Those praying for a degree of sanity to prevail after yesterday’s Alberta provincial election were bound to be disappointed by the apparent result last night. NDP Leader Rachel Notley concedes…
No predictions today, but the stakes are high, maybe existential, so just go vote!
One of the dirty little secrets of Canadian politics at the end of the beginning of the 21st Century is that a lot of political professionals have come to recognize…
Sunday Evening Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – David Cox talks to Akiko Iwasaki about the reality that we’re still far from being done with major harm from COVID-19. Keith…