Apparently looking for something to do while he awaits the verdict in his criminal trial later today, “street preacher” Artur Pawlowski has teamed up with the former holder of the title of Canada’s Worst MP to try to form a new Alberta political party.

Former Wildrose Alliance leader Paul Hinman now has another political party with Wildrose in its name, at least his fourth (Photo: Screenshot of Twitter video).

An alternative explanation for the video posted on Mr. Pawlowski’s Twitter account yesterday afternoon is that he and former Calgary Conservative MP Rob Anders, the latter wearing an “ARREST TRUDEAU” bunnyhug, have formed a new comedy act that’s a dead-bolt cinch to take the nation by storm.

In that case, look for them both on The Debaters soon. 

Mr. Pawlowski was charged with criminal mischief for inciting blockaders at the Coutts border crossing in 2022 and the verdict is expected today in Lethbridge. 

Given his recent congenial conversation about the charges with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, this should give Albertans something interesting to talk about on Day 2 of the provincial election campaign. It will also give Premier Smith something to refuse to talk about, although she’ll hardly be able to claim the matter is still before the courts.

Tax evasion charges against Mr. Anders were dropped last June, but that does mean both men have experience with the justice system, which they think should be fixed by electing Alberta judges like they do in Montana. 

Former Wildrose and UCP MLA Drew Barnes, in his May 1 Twitter video (Photo: Screenshot of Twitter video).

That’s just one of the many policy proposals these two comedians propose for their new political party, which Mr. Pawlowski said in his video will be called the Solidarity Movement of Alberta – a tip of the Canadian toque to his Polish heritage, presumably, not a May 1 tribute to the labour union movement. (Mr. Anders, as former director of something called Canadians Against Forced Unionism, wouldn’t like that!)

Mr. Anders was elected to Parliament six times over 17 years for the Reform, Canadian Alliance, and Conservative parties by the inattentive voters of the federal Calgary West riding, until he was finally run out of politics after a redistribution eliminated his riding and former Alberta health minister Ron Liepert won the fight to represent a new riding covering some of the same territory.

Born appropriately enough in 1972 on April Fool’s Day (as was Premier Smith the year before) Mr. Anders was notorious for such antics as falling asleep on camera in the House of Commons, suggesting NDP leader Thomas Mulcair caused the death of his predecessor Jack Layton, striking butchy poses with his latest firearms, and perhaps most offensively, being the sole MP to vote against honorary citizenship for Nelson Mandela after calling the South African hero a “terrorist.”

A professional virgin, Mr. Anders also once worked as a professional heckler for Republican politicians south of the Medicine Line. 

Other ideas motivating the Pawlowski-Anders joint venture? Oh, ending vaccinations, banning speed radar cameras, and “defunding drag queen story time” (Mr. Anders) and a referendum on Alberta independence (Mr. Pawlowski).

Freed from the bonds of Canada, the latter explained, “we can turn Alberta into the Saudi Arabia of North America.” Actually, a totalitarian feudal theocracy sounds like a good fit for Mr. Pawlowski, if not for the rest of us. 

Also yesterday, another perennial Alberta political fruitcake, former Wildrose Alliance leader and Wildrose Party MLA Paul Hinman, announced he has successfully formed a new political party with Wildrose in its name – the Wildrose Loyalty Coalition, which he brewed up after he was removed as the leader of the Wildrose Independence Party in an internal party dispute. (They do like their wild roses in libertarian circles here in Alberta.)

Mr. Hinman explained how this came about in a Twitter video of his own

Finally, the United Conservative Party’s former loose libertarian cannon on deck, Drew Barnes has decided he won’t be running in the May 29 election for the seat he now occupies, Cypress-Medicine Hat.

This is could be a strategic decision made in hopes for some future consideration in return for making it a little easier for the UCP candidate in the riding, in which some recent analysis suggests there are a surprising number of Medicine Hatters leaning Orange. 

Mr. Barnes, who was kicked out of the UCP two years ago for insufficient loyalty to previous premier Jason Kenney, actually comes across as pretty sensible in his Twitter video, at least in comparison to almost everyone else mentioned up to now in this post.

Today, presumably, we’ll all get back to talking about the only two parties that actually matter in this election – the UCP led by Ms. Smith and the Opposition New Democrats led by former premier Rachel Notley. That is, if anyone can find Ms. Smith to answer questions about Mr. Pawlowski. 

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33 Comments

  1. Many thanks, DJC, for having the fortitude to peruse the antics of Pawlowski, Anders, Barnes and Hinman. It’s mighty depressing to read this as an observer, it must be even worse as an investigator.

  2. Hi David,

    As someone who was born in Saskatchewan but raised in Alberta, please, please stop saying bunnyhug.

    Thanks kindly.

    1. Tim: I can’t promise, but I’ll consider your request if you’ll explain your reasons. DJC

  3. There are so many pretend conservatives and Reformers that don’t give a darn about the ordinary people in Alberta. They are only there for themselves and their rich friends. They will destroy jobs, not create them, continue to get the worst oil royalty rates and the worst corporate tax rates, wreck the environment, make it harder for seniors and the vulnerable, and destroy public healthcare and public education. This is not what we need, at the provincial level, or at the federal level. It’s a shame how people are fooled by all of this. Anyone who recalls Peter Lougheed, knows he wasn’t this stupid.

  4. Yes it’s true there are only two parties that matter in the upcoming Alberta election -the UCP led by Ms. Smith and the Opposition small “l” Liberal Party led by Ms. Notley.

    1. ronmac- Eye Roll! Yet another person who has Justin Trudeau living in his head. Kinda creepy don’t you think? As for Rachel Notley, from what I have observed from her, she makes her own decisions. She is not beholden to anyone (unlike Danielle Smith). And that Trudeau, Singh, Notley mantra is getting really old and stale. I don’t always agree with Rachel Notley but she makes a whole lot more sense than the weird stuff coming from the other side of sane.

      1. ronmac, I may have to retract some of my comments re: Trudeau. I didn’t have my glasses on and saw a T instead of “I” . Oops. I stand by my comments otherwise. In my opinion the NDP under Rachel Notley are more center left than liberal.

    2. Conflating liberalism and social democracy just belies your ignorance, which I’m sure regular readers of this blog are well aware of.

    3. OK, this is unprecedented: I find myself agreeing — at least somewhat — with Mr ronmac. Only in the most fevered nightmares of Daniele Smith’s and TBA’s world can Rachel Notley’s NDP be called “socialist”. They’re a pragmatic, rational, middle-of-the-road political party that has — at least when they were in government as well as their more recent four years as Official Opposition — eschewed such lefty ideas as public auto insurance, nationalizing power and gas utilities, abolishing separate schools and faith-based hospitals, and putting union representatives on corporate boards.

      In any other province they might even be Liberals. But the Overton window in Alberta politics has shifted so far to the right, it’s practically on the next block, and so — since Rachel recognizes that politics must also be “the art of the possible” — she and the party have virtually abandoned any pretence of being a left-wing party.

  5. Those who want to destroy democracy are affiliated with the UCP including the anti-abortion group, the Christian fascists, the Nazis, bigots, the uniformed, the angry, those who want war, climate change deniers, anti science humans, conspiracy followers, men who want to limit women’ rights, the intolerant, the greedy, the proudly ignorant, and so on. A collective group of the abominable if there ever was one. In spite of Smith’s current messaging about supporting Albertans, she is at heart someone who, following the Koch brothers (who have spent millions trying to undermine democracy) funded The Canadian Tax Payer group, also wants to destroy democracy and Canada in the process. She says she wants to “move Alberta forward”. What does “Forward” mean? For the UCP, moving ALberta forward means turning Alberta into an American Republican state. Places where human rights are under attack, corruption is rampant, extremists rule the day including confederates who want to bring back “whites only”, places where Nazis proudly parade, where the poor are essentially criminalized, women are less-than, guns are seen as a panacea, the threat of civil war is real – in short completely horrible places for the people, except the very wealthy and the unhinged. Note how the media loves to support the UCP and is doing everything it can to ensure a UCP victory. Essentially the message is voting for the UCP is great – better to have an authoritarian, corrupt theocracy than anything that resembles socialism. Currently in the US, Republicans are working to destroy Medicaid, default on the debt ceiling and destroy America in the process not to mention the rest of the world, take away pensions which they call Social Security, change laws so that the act of voting is a ruse promoting democracy in name only. Danielle Smith has stated that she likes Republicans and wants to emulate what they have done in the US here in Alberta. Unbelievably, many Albertans agree with Smith.
    This is the path we are looking at if Smith and her ilk win the election: Alberta will attempt to separate from Canada, those who want to remain Canadian will be damned, Smith will coordinate with the other Conservative led provinces to destroy the Canadian federal government, Donald Trump or someone worse than him will become president of the US. Russia will be given the Ukraine as a gift from Smith and her fellow American republicans, Pierre Poilievre will win the next Canadian election and he will turn Canada into the US. Americans will move north accessing all resources above the 49th parallel and you can look forward to daily gun killings and everything ugly American coming to your front door. This is what Smith means by “moving forward”. The fact that some variation of the aforementioned is possible gives rise to the question, why would anyone want to destroy Canada and adopt the ills of the US as a false answer to our current problems? Many serious problems have been deliberately created by the UCP and the like. So the march to give the UCP the power to control Alberta is a path to our mutual destruction, too bad Canadians across the country do not have a say in their future as Canadians because Danielle Smith will go down in history as being the one person who spearheaded the demise of an entire nation.

    1. Unfortunately, I believe Goethe ‘is’ right , we will be watching with trepidation for the next few weeks. I am not optimistic at this point.

    2. Let’s not get ahead of things. Alberta does not control federal jurisdiction in its boundaries, and when it comes to Alberta secession, citizens in all of Canada really do have control by way of the federal Clarity Act, the SCoC reference opinion on secession of any province, and of course the Constitution.

      I think Rachel Notley should ask Danielle Smith outright how she plans to ignore federal gun legislation, not necessarily to show NDP support for federal gun legislation, but to alert Alberta voters to the certainty that a lot of their tax dollars will be getting spent on court challenges which the UCP cannot win if Smith attempts to thwart federal law—that is, “throwing good money after bad.”

      Smith can’t help responding to whomever asks about her agenda, but she also can’t help putting her foot right into the goo. The more she gets defiant in answering the question, the NDP benefits apace by being able to retort: “Whoa! NOW we’re talkin’ even BIGGER bills from lawyers of the lost cause.”

      That’s a lot worse ‘n’ being called dishonest—as in, promising “We’re not gonna break any federal gun laws,” when almost everybody would understand that it’s a lie. Also not sure what an 8% flat tax on incomes less than $60K would do the Alberta coffers, but less revenue is less revenue the government has to make up somewhere—but it can’t do it when spending large on futile attempts to nullify the Constitution through the courts which, every Albertan should be reminded, is certainly spending scarcer resources on a bad bet. Remind that when BC’s Gordon Campbell made good on his promise to cut personal income taxes, every conceivable government service was saddled with extra fees to make up the difference: BC citizens paid more in increased fees than they got in tax cuts—a lot more. The NDP should challenge Danielle Smith on her math—without, of course, saying, “Math is hard…”

  6. “A professional virgin, Mr. Anders…”
    Is the blogger implying that neither women nor men pay him for not having sex with them?

  7. re: Drew Barnes not running
    While I would love to see the scenario where an NDP candidate slips up the middle of a split vote between the independent Drew Barnes and the UCP candidate, by not running Alberta is spared the possibility of a rather chilling scenario that I heard one political pundit mention. The election is close enough that it was possible for a legislature with both parties having 43 seats, giving Drew Barnes the balance of power.

  8. You could create several daily posts just listing all the crazies with a foot in Alberta’s alternate reality. From small town politicos to farm folk poised on a bale to the skater-haters, Fleury and Salé, the list goes on and on. What is feeding these mutations? We can’t simply blame FOX or the internet. Is it simply a fierce craving for attention in an otherwise empty and meaningless life? Is it another variant of the tiny dictator syndrome? I leave it to you, DJC, to decode this apocalypse.

    1. Given the decades of incessant oil and gas extraction, I’m guessing it’ something in the air. Or the water. Maybe both.

  9. News flash! Harold Jonker is now facing criminal charges for his part in the Ottawa convoy. About time, I say.

    https://resistancecat.substack.com/p/breaking-news-freedom-convoy-2022?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=780702&post_id=118820554&isFreemail=true&utm_medium=email

    The video alone
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLkFmvWvVv8&t=4s

    Jonker owns a trucking firm and 10 to 12 of his trucks were in the convoy. He was a local organizer of it and he talked to a lot of foreign media, always insisting it was a peaceful convoy. Another leader who had a nice warm hotel room away from the honking and squalor.
    Also a repeat political candidate for the Christian Heritage Party: anti-abortion; I’m not sure what else they preach these days.

  10. Pawlowski is no Lech Wałęsa and Anders is not a bunny that I want to hug. Thanks for the much-needed comedy relief.

  11. Why is it that Conservative politicians (Danielle Smith now) always make tax cuts their priority?

  12. “Former MP Rob Anders and street preacher Art Pawlowski”—-Two who flew over [or escaped from] the cuckoo’s nest and landed in Alberta, where; being the typical conspiracy theory birds of a feather they found and then acquired an entire flock of both sympathetic and admiring strange birds with the same peculiar ideas and attitudes. And even a radio talk show host/aspiring demagogue was thrown in for good measure.

    Hint for the apprenticing pedant:

    “According to Diogenes Laërtius’ third-century Lives and Opinions of the Eminent Philosophers, Plato was applauded for his definition of man as a featherless biped, so Diogenes the Cynic “plucked the feathers from a cock, brought it to Plato’s school, and said, ‘Here is Plato’s man.’ ” When asked about the origin of his epithet, cynic deriving from the Greek word for dog, Diogenes replied that it was given to him because he “fawns upon those who give him anything and barks at those who give him nothing.”

  13. They are well suited to each other.

    Likes attract likes.

    We had the misfortune of having Rob Anders as our MP for a few years. Fortunately he was thrown out by the constituency organization. And then failed to get the nomination in another riding.

    The replacement, Ron Liepart was only marginally better inasmuch as, to may knowledge, he did not fall asleep. He was just a guy who wanted to put in the minimum amount of years to get his MP pension.

  14. “we can turn Alberta into the Saudi Arabia of North America.”
    Either the pastor is extraordinarily tone-deaf, or you’re right, David, and this is the model of social organization he aspires to.

  15. I have been told by anonymous sources that Rob Anders and Artur Palowzski are grooming backers for a re-invented Stampede Wrestling franchise. They are billing their tag team as “The Legends of Sleepy Holler”! Their signature will be their folding chair slam, followed by the sleeper hold.

  16. Messers Hinman, Anders and now Pawlowski join the other inventors of radical-right political parties. (I wonder how long Drew Barnes is willing to wait for an invitation, presumably from Ms. Smith. If he gets impatient, will there be another wild-rose themed party on the horizon?) It’s a well-established cottage industry of sorts, here in Oilberdusan. But hey, everyone should have a hobby.

    1. Mike: I think she wanted to take him back when she took back Todd Loewen, who Mr. Kenney fired the same day as Mr. Barnes. No, I think he stayed out for some other reason and possibly has a long-term plan that doesn’t necessarily involve remaining in the legislature. Or maybe he just read the writing on the wall. DJC

  17. Well, day 2, and is this the “lake of fire” that we’ve been waiting for…
    Press Progress— new video resurfaces– Video shows Danielle Smith endorsing Illegal Convoy Blockade……

    And this coming on the heels of Artur being handed the sentence of as he said earlier ” the will of God “….. I sense a martyr in the making.

    Well.. DJC , you have your work cut out, we are 100% behind you, stay strong.

    1. Randi-lee: I’m in Red Deer tonight on my hard-to-use laptop grinding out a post on the very topic you suggest. It’s sure to be full of typos. DJC

  18. What a cute couple! May they enjoy much happiness together. 😉

    Does anybody have any details on who is funding The Buffalo Project? I just received an anti-NDP piece in the mail (along-side a piece from a UCP candidate who doesn’t know my postal code isn’t in her riding). This group has a stated purpose (separation of Alberta, anti-vaxers and other fascist ideals), but does anybody know who is writing the cheques or leading this organization? There are, of course no details on their website (buffaloproject.ca).

  19. Among Rob Anders many achievements, the one that I am surprised has not popped up more was his brief and, for him, regretful stint as a sperm donor.

    It was during his university days that Anders, in something he referred to as an “act of poor judgement” assisted in the siring of offspring for desiring parents. At the time that this story broke, Anders was basking in his “Snack-Pack” glory days, along with Rahim Jaffer, Jason Kenny, Ezra Levant, Matthew Johnson, et al. At the time, I wondered why when this story broke, Anders did not vehemently deny the claims. Instead, Anders was very candid about this surprise feature of his life and spoke far too much about it. I suspect that this revelation served as a nice distraction from Ander’s professional virgin revelation. I mean it was clear to me that, in a surprising fit of genius, Anders had found a way to father children without having sex, literally. Though I also wondered about some other revelation that was in the offing that could further complicate Anders already complicated life. What if Anders had contributed the seed that would have caused a lesbian couple to begin their happy family? Now, that’s the sort of achievement that Anders would really have a hard time coming to terms with.

  20. How’s Rob Anders’ alleged tax evasion case going? Asking for concerned tax-paying citizens.

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