Wildrose did not become a serious threat to the PCs until the Oil&Gas Bros began showering it with money and organizers after Ed Stelmach began threatening to raise royalty rates. The reborn PCs will have a tough time getting support from that quarter as Gov. Smith seems mainly concerned with keeping O&G happy. I don’t know what it will take for rural Albertans to realize how destructive the UCP are but with a lack of resources or the ability to foster those resources from big time conservatives, as the saying goes the PC dog won’t hunt.
Gov. Smith is not shy about using the bully pulpit to steal the O2 in the room and is deft at dealing a continuous stream of bad policies to keep the either either outraged or inured/indifferent. As you say, it’s a choice on her part and so far it has worked for her. I’m afraid, as Albertans, we’re going to be the ones who have to suffer the consequence and try to pick up the pieces of a dismembered body politic.
That’s fair. It’s too far out from an election — and they aren’t even a full-on party yet — for me to tell how it might go for them. But their voice in the legislature will help.
Frankly, I don’t understand this new nostalgia for the Alberta PCs. From the mid-1980s on they were a shell of their former progressive selves living off Albertans’ political inertia and oil royalties.
The ossification of the federal party at the hands of Manning & Harper set the stage for Kenney to nail the last few planks in the ABPC casket.
Guthrie & Co are not the saviours of conservatism in Alberta, that flaming long boat has sailed on the sea of authoritarian populism leaving an oily smudge on the water.
I obviously don’t agree with you on everything, but I enjoy your writing. Please keep at it, and have a good weekend.
It’s simpler than that. Conservatives will never vote NDP. If conservatives have the option of voting for a PC party or the separatist UCP led by Danielle Smith, I hope they choose the PCs.
It’s like 1967 all over again. That was when the Alberta PCs under Lougheed started playing their campaign against the Social Credit party. This feels like deja vu
I immediately thought about how the PC holdovers, not seeing themselves in the UCP, took over the Alberta Party. That nosedive crushed a party that had momentum. Do you think this approach of essentially starting over will lead to a better outcome?
I’m not positive yet — too far into the future for me to get a good read. After the nasty back and forth, zero sum, us vs them… there *may* be a market. That they’re in the Legislature will be helpful, to be sure.
There are those who’ve voted NDP because of lack of choice to the histrionics of the UCP.
The NDP have not capitalized on what were gifted advantages to them - bizarre interim premier, racist politics, rage based public positions, scandals, incompetency, amongst others. In fact the party seems to be inaccessible unless as Deidre noted, you’re inner circle.
A fundamental of sales, and let’s face it politics is sales, is face time with clients, advertising, seizing air time. All of which these two conservatives have done in spades this week. In one week they’ve taken over second position politically in this province.
There are many Albertans walking the middle road who, I believe, will go with a new/kinder/moderate Conservative Party.
I’m also not a person who understands “progressive” and “conservative” policy.
Does the policy do what it’s meant to for the people it’s supposed to help? Does it reduce/remove harm/barriers/obstacles for the people it’s supposed to? Then do that and I don’t care what people call it.
Will a new PC party deal with climate change and the need to phase out the fossil fuel industry and focus on renewable energy any better than the UCP government? I am doubtful. The former Alberta PC party kept moving healthcare toward a private model, too, albeit more cautiously. These vital issues are some of many that the NDP will handle much better in government than ANY patched together conservative party.
Let's not get too nostalgic about the PC's. Lougheed's gentlemen's agreement- give us unfettered capitalism and in exchange the riches would belong to Albertans- was nice for awhile. Bountiful public services, beautiful cultural spaces, life was good, at least if you were the right colour and gender and not a survivor of the Residential School system.
But then the bottom fell out, and it became clear that in the giddiness of winning the NEP battle, we had lost the war. The checks and balances and just plain prudence that should have tempered the party were never put into practice. And the people who were the last in were the first out. And those are the people are feeding the separatist resentment. Their schools and clinics are gone. Rural crime is real. These people are not voting for a return to a new improved PC government. (That would be the Alberta NDP by the way, speaking of parties being alike). They are voting for LESS government. Less interference into things they do better by themselves.
So while Danielle Smith depends on the same donations as the old PC's so the resource companies can keep pillaging us, she is also very attuned to the disquiet within the circles of citizens who rightly feel left out of the decision making. And whether or not the rest of us find their solutions logical, or palatable, they are Albertans and deserve to be heard, not pandered to.
Political parties are nothing more than the people who make them run. They are neither good nor bad, only reflections of those people — to me, anyway. Jason Kenney taught me that.
There are tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of voters in Alberta who will never vote NDP. Same with UCP. Separatism is a non-starter for many Canadians, and time travel isn’t available to fix the problems they’re still complaining about. Sometimes you just have to move on without the people who are stuck in the past.
Wildrose did not become a serious threat to the PCs until the Oil&Gas Bros began showering it with money and organizers after Ed Stelmach began threatening to raise royalty rates. The reborn PCs will have a tough time getting support from that quarter as Gov. Smith seems mainly concerned with keeping O&G happy. I don’t know what it will take for rural Albertans to realize how destructive the UCP are but with a lack of resources or the ability to foster those resources from big time conservatives, as the saying goes the PC dog won’t hunt.
Gov. Smith is not shy about using the bully pulpit to steal the O2 in the room and is deft at dealing a continuous stream of bad policies to keep the either either outraged or inured/indifferent. As you say, it’s a choice on her part and so far it has worked for her. I’m afraid, as Albertans, we’re going to be the ones who have to suffer the consequence and try to pick up the pieces of a dismembered body politic.
That’s fair. It’s too far out from an election — and they aren’t even a full-on party yet — for me to tell how it might go for them. But their voice in the legislature will help.
Frankly, I don’t understand this new nostalgia for the Alberta PCs. From the mid-1980s on they were a shell of their former progressive selves living off Albertans’ political inertia and oil royalties.
The ossification of the federal party at the hands of Manning & Harper set the stage for Kenney to nail the last few planks in the ABPC casket.
Guthrie & Co are not the saviours of conservatism in Alberta, that flaming long boat has sailed on the sea of authoritarian populism leaving an oily smudge on the water.
I obviously don’t agree with you on everything, but I enjoy your writing. Please keep at it, and have a good weekend.
It’s simpler than that. Conservatives will never vote NDP. If conservatives have the option of voting for a PC party or the separatist UCP led by Danielle Smith, I hope they choose the PCs.
And thanks, you as well!
But *I hope* their voice in the Leg will help.
It’s like 1967 all over again. That was when the Alberta PCs under Lougheed started playing their campaign against the Social Credit party. This feels like deja vu
This is the kind of history I want to be part of.
I immediately thought about how the PC holdovers, not seeing themselves in the UCP, took over the Alberta Party. That nosedive crushed a party that had momentum. Do you think this approach of essentially starting over will lead to a better outcome?
I’m not positive yet — too far into the future for me to get a good read. After the nasty back and forth, zero sum, us vs them… there *may* be a market. That they’re in the Legislature will be helpful, to be sure.
There are those who’ve voted NDP because of lack of choice to the histrionics of the UCP.
The NDP have not capitalized on what were gifted advantages to them - bizarre interim premier, racist politics, rage based public positions, scandals, incompetency, amongst others. In fact the party seems to be inaccessible unless as Deidre noted, you’re inner circle.
A fundamental of sales, and let’s face it politics is sales, is face time with clients, advertising, seizing air time. All of which these two conservatives have done in spades this week. In one week they’ve taken over second position politically in this province.
There are many Albertans walking the middle road who, I believe, will go with a new/kinder/moderate Conservative Party.
This seems a common reaction, but I have yet to see any examples of how this new “PC” party is in any way progressive. It’s just the UCP minus Smith.
I’m also not a person who understands “progressive” and “conservative” policy.
Does the policy do what it’s meant to for the people it’s supposed to help? Does it reduce/remove harm/barriers/obstacles for the people it’s supposed to? Then do that and I don’t care what people call it.
Will a new PC party deal with climate change and the need to phase out the fossil fuel industry and focus on renewable energy any better than the UCP government? I am doubtful. The former Alberta PC party kept moving healthcare toward a private model, too, albeit more cautiously. These vital issues are some of many that the NDP will handle much better in government than ANY patched together conservative party.
True, but the majority of Albertans have not prioritized these issues - as indicated by the voting pattern.
Let's not get too nostalgic about the PC's. Lougheed's gentlemen's agreement- give us unfettered capitalism and in exchange the riches would belong to Albertans- was nice for awhile. Bountiful public services, beautiful cultural spaces, life was good, at least if you were the right colour and gender and not a survivor of the Residential School system.
But then the bottom fell out, and it became clear that in the giddiness of winning the NEP battle, we had lost the war. The checks and balances and just plain prudence that should have tempered the party were never put into practice. And the people who were the last in were the first out. And those are the people are feeding the separatist resentment. Their schools and clinics are gone. Rural crime is real. These people are not voting for a return to a new improved PC government. (That would be the Alberta NDP by the way, speaking of parties being alike). They are voting for LESS government. Less interference into things they do better by themselves.
So while Danielle Smith depends on the same donations as the old PC's so the resource companies can keep pillaging us, she is also very attuned to the disquiet within the circles of citizens who rightly feel left out of the decision making. And whether or not the rest of us find their solutions logical, or palatable, they are Albertans and deserve to be heard, not pandered to.
Political parties are nothing more than the people who make them run. They are neither good nor bad, only reflections of those people — to me, anyway. Jason Kenney taught me that.
There are tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of voters in Alberta who will never vote NDP. Same with UCP. Separatism is a non-starter for many Canadians, and time travel isn’t available to fix the problems they’re still complaining about. Sometimes you just have to move on without the people who are stuck in the past.
Not a bad approach, since the bulk of those stuck in the past are already advanced in age.
Yeah. I think part of the problem will take care of itself over the next decade.