Alberta's next step: idiocracy

With Bill 18, Danielle Smith is seeking to create a foundation of knowledge that doesn't currently exist; not for posterity, but positioning.

When Danielle Smith first became leader of the United Conservative Party back in October of 2022, I did two or three spots on national news out of Ottawa and each time, I was asked some version of “what do you expect to see from her as Premier?”

I kept up with Danielle Smith after she pulled the pin and blew her political career to smithereens. I didn’t tune in all the time, but I caught portions of her show on 770 once in a while and she mostly appeared the consummate professional. She was good at her job, seemed oddly reasonable about the fact that we had an NDP government, and I mostly enjoyed listening.

Things changed in January of 2019; she started to take on a harder conservative edge, which wasn’t unexpected, really, it was just different. Then, the pandemic hit and, like far too many people (charitably) who were just looking for answers, she latched onto the only people providing them — people who knew nothing about the problem but weren’t afraid to conjure explanations that ranged from conspiracy theory to seriously uneducated opinion.

I didn’t catch every moment of Danielle Smith’s decline, but I listened to her mind-bendingly contradictory justifications and commentary near the end of her stint at 770, and signed up for her newsletter afterwards for reasons I can only describe as morbid fascination.

I opened them every week as some sort of act of defiance against the assault on my understanding of both the English language and every identifiable logical fallacy.

This was the knowledge and experience, friends, that I brought to trying to formulate an answer to the question: “what are you expecting to see from Danielle Smith as Premier?”

In the end, I decided to go with the only thing I knew for certain; she’s unpredictable. She’s contradictory, illogical, and most everything she says and does.

I had absolutely no idea what to expect from her because she had, based on my experience, equal opportunity to be both a reasonable person and a stunningly horrific mess; in those early days, she was Schrodinger’s premier.

“Both sides”

On April 10, when Smith introduced Bill 18, the “Alberta” Priorities Act — an act that will require municipalities, post-secondary institutions, and every other organization under legislative authority of the province, to apply for permission from the Government of Alberta before they apply for federal grants — a lot of people were asking questions.

Rajan Sawhney, Alberta’s Minister of Advanced Education, said that she doesn’t ”believe the intent of this bill is to stop funding. It’s to have an understanding and knowledge and information about what is being funded.”

On X (Twitter), Sawhney said that “Albertans have a right to know exactly what these grants are and what they are funding. If passed, the Provincial Priorities Act will enable us to collect that information.”

They could, however, collect that information now as the grant information is publicly posted and available. What they don’t currently have access to is research proposals that are not approved and funded.

Smith spoke to that more specifically in an interview on CBC April 12 (reordered to make sense).

“I have been given enough indication that the federal government uses its power through researchers to only fund certain types of opinion, certain types of researchers,” Smith said.

“We want to do a review and see if there’s a way that we can make sure that we maintain the environment at universities that all people from all political perspectives are able to engage in a robust debate and have a robust research agenda.”

“If we did truly have balance in universities then we would see just as many conservative commentators as we do liberal commentators, we would see just as many conservative journalists as we do liberal or progressive journalists.”

“If there’s a need for us to use our own spending power to make sure the broad range of research and opinion is taking place at universities… maybe we have to have our own research grants to make sure we have that balance.”

Smith’s intentions are clear: the government of Alberta will begin funding research projects that can serve as evidence for conservative positions.

It makes sense… if…

I’m sure you’ve seen polling on different questions sectioned off by political affiliation. Conservatives tend to have less trust in experts and academics and liberals tend to have more trust in those same people.

Many conservative influencers believe that research and data, most of the things we have accepted due to robust research generally, is liberal. They don’t believe that liberals rely on it because it demonstrates that something is/is more likely to be true, but that they rely on it because it fits with their ideology.

Conservatives of today have fewer experts and academics who think like they do. There is no great trough of statistics and research for them to go when they’re bombarded with it constantly from “the left”.

The exchange below clarified my thoughts.

I read Max’s comment and snickered, but it dawned on me that Peter’s question absolutely is serious.

“Where are all these professors who disagree with you? Like, actual significant disagreement on the fundamental role of government and structure of society?”

Because as much as self-proclaimed libertarians and freedom-obsessed conservatives dismiss and disavow credentialed experts and decades of research, they are desperately seeking expert and academia to validate their opinions and beliefs about what they want to be true.

At a Strong and Free conference online during the pandemic, Danielle Smith made an almost insightful comment, saying “I don’t know why all conservatives don’t think like we do.”

Now, she’s figured out a way to provide a safe space for those who think precisely as she does without their peers asking questions, potentially without any rigorous peer review to ensure any standards are met at all, paid for by Albertans.

It’s a chance for her to really develop that “decision-based evidence-making” model she’s been working toward.

Idiocracy is a cult classic comedy that became a documentary, unfortunately.

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