The City of Calgary remains the key battleground in the May 29 Alberta provincial election, two new polls say (Photo: AceYYC/Creative Commons).

If the latest Alberta voter intention polls are right – and who would be bold enough to predict that? – Canada’s richest province could soon end up in an excruciating political predicament. 

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith on the campaign trail (Photo: Alberta Newsroom/Flickr).

Well, at least it would be a political crisis, not a constitutional one, which would relieve the rest of the country of having to pay much attention to our lingering misery. 

Let me explain: Two new polls released yesterday – one by Ipsos and the other by Angus Reid Institute – show almost exactly the same thing with slightly different numbers. 

To wit: Overwhelming UCP support in rural Alberta, overwhelming NDP support in Edmonton, and a “statistical tie” (a term beloved by pollsters that means really flippin’ close) in Calgary.

According to yesterday’s Ipsos poll done for Global News, “the race to the 44 seats required to win a majority still goes through Calgary where the two main parties are in a statistical dead heat.”

“So far the NDP campaign is viewed more favourably than the UCP campaign, but neither campaign has substantial positive momentum,” Ipsos said in an analysis of its results. “The NDP are dominant in Edmonton and the UCP is dominant outside the two big cities.”

Alberta NDP Leader Rachel Notley on the campaign trail (Photo: David J. Climenhaga).

“Rachel Notley is viewed as more of an asset to her party than Danielle Smith, but the two remain in a statistical tie as perceived best premier of Alberta,” Ipsos also said.

Province-wide, Ipsos shows the UCP with 48 per cent of decided and leaning voters, the NDP with 45 per cent. It puts the parties “in a statistical tie in Calgary” – 48 per cent UCP to 44 per cent NDP. It says the NDP is ahead by 28 points in Edmonton and the UCP by 34 points in the thinly populated RoA. There’s more on the age and gender gaps in Ipsos’s report. 

The survey of 800 respondents was in the field from May 10 to May 13 and instead of a margin of error, Ipsos offers us a “credibility interval” of  plus or minus 3.9 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

As for Angus Reid, that poll gives the UCP an eight-point lead province-wide but shows the NDP marginally ahead in Calgary.

Reid puts the UCP at 51 per cent leaning and decided province-wide compared to 43 per cent in Calgary. The poll shows the NDP leading 49 to 46 per cent in Calgary (a statistical tie again), 56 to 38 per cent in Edmonton, and trailing 31 per cent to 64 per cent in the sticks. 

“NDP leader Rachel Notley has a 10-point favourability advantage over UCP leader and Premier Danielle Smith in Calgary (48 per cent to 38 per cent),” Reid’s analysis says

The online survey was conducted between May 12 and 16 from a sample of 1,374 members of a larger list of maintained by the pollster. Reid says its margin of error is plus or minus 3 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Now, Alberta is a Westminster-style Parliamentary democracy, as much as Alberta’s Republicanized Conservatives may hate that, so that doesn’t mean we’ll end up with a 50/50 seat split in Calgary when the dust settles on May 29. 

On the contrary, one party will surely win more seats than the other, enough to form a government with MLAs from the other third of the province. If that party is the UCP, it will almost certainly proceed to run the province as if half of Alberta’s population doesn’t exist. 

And given the vagaries of the Alberta electoral map, as of right now it seems the winning party is more likely to be the UCP than the NDP.

But if the UCP only manages to hang on by its fingernails and loses a significant number of seats in the process, which could easily happen with a vote split like we’re seeing this week, that means potential intramural trouble for Danielle Smith. This is especially true if the UCP loses the popular vote but manages to hang onto government. 

If traditional Conservatives in the UCP move to oust Danielle Smith – as their candidates and canvassers are reported to be promising will happen soon when they encounter voters who aren’t New Democrats but can’t stand Ms. Smith – something to akin to civil war could erupt within the UCP. 

After all, neither Ms. Smith nor the Take Back Alberta extremists who engineered her rise to power and the dismissal of former premier Jason Kenney that made it possible are going to relinquish their control of the party without a fight. 

So we could very well end up in a situation where the party that won the popular vote has no immediate hope of gaining power, the party that won the most seats is unable to deliver coherent policy because it’s occupied fighting with itself, the most extreme faction of the government has the ear of the premier and demands policy that will offend almost everyone else, and the roar of the falls grows steadily louder as our flaming raft floats toward the precipice. 

Someone is bound to say that this is just idle speculation. 

Well, of course it is! 

What else are we supposed to do on the Wednesday night before the provincial leaders’ debate, two weeks before an election when, as nearly everyone who follows politics knows, a week is a long time in politics

Is ‘poop cookie’ the new Lake of Fire? 

Have Danielle Smith and the UCPs candidates said so many outrageous things that Bozo Eruption Fatigue has set in? 

Self-disgraced but still the UCP’s candidate in Lacombe-Ponoka, Jennifer Johnson has a recipe for hate (Photo: Facebook/Jennifer Johnson).

One wonders. When the story broke that the UCP’s transphobic candidate in the Lacombe-Ponoka riding could be heard in yet another recently unearthed video saying that having trans children in schools is like putting excrement in cookie dough, her outrageous remark mainly generated yawns from the party’s leadership.

“Enjoy, I only put a teaspoon of poop in them, but it doesn’t matter because it’s only a teaspoon in the whole batch,” Jennifer Johnson also said during a community education forum last fall. Apparently it was some kind of twisted metaphor about academic test results. Whatever it was, it’s still hate speech. 

Ms. Johnson also spread several other transphobic conspiracy theories not worth repeating here, and called for an end to all sex education in schools – which is worth repeating because it’s not an unusual attitude among the UCP base that may decide who gets to run Alberta for the next four years.

The Alberta Teachers Association and the NDP called for Ms. Johnson’s views to be disavowed by the UCP and for her to be removed from the party’s list of candidates. Ms. Smith dismissed concerns about things UCP candidates say as just the NDP trying to distract voters from their record. 

Judging from the initial reaction on social media, it seemed some readers were more upset that the Calgary Herald used the words “poop cookies” in a headline.

Asked independent journalist Jeremy Appel last night on Twitter: “Is Poop Cookie the new Lake of Fire?”

The UCP is counting on it that so many outrageous things have leaked out about their leader and her candidates that the party is now Lake-of-Fireproof. 

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31 Comments

  1. On one level its hard to believe some would say that about transgender children. She is talking about children. How do people do that? I know how they do it and there are people out there who hate and hate and hate. Just can’t figure out why people want to attack children in this manner.
    The fact the UPC has “permitted” this person to run for office is disgusting.

    So which group iis next? Who will this person attack next? What if this person is elected and given the Education portfolio. Don’t say it couldn’t happen. Remember the Americans elected Trump. Fortunately most of our important laws in Canada are passed in our federal Parliament or we might see transgender children’s rights violated even further in Alberta.

    Life is difficult enough for transgender children, they and their families do not need this extra stress and hate directed at them.
    It is hoped that voters in Alberta send a message to the UCP and this politician.

    With the polls being so close it looks like the National Post is trying to help the UPC get elected. Printing an article referring to those opposed to the UCP as “unhinged” or rather their opinions. The article, as I understood it, was suggesting the opposition to the UPC would help the UPC get elected.

    At least the Canadian Supreme Court decided against Day, so they might not go along with whatever Smith and her party get up to.

  2. A bit of not so distant history conservatives should really remember right now: the last time a party ditched a Premier after she got elected, it was the PC’s with Redford less than a decade ago. Yes, they actually managed to do that, but their own party was collateral damage. It was the last election it ever won.

    Regardless of the election outcome, the UCP will need to come to terms with the kooky element that seems to have obviously taken some hold of it. It will harder and messier to do if they win.

    Speaking of kooky, there are of course the comments by a UCP candidate about poop cookies, getting some recent coverage just as more people are starting to pay attention to the election. Just as dealing with the lake of fire comments was a challenge or test for Smith in a previous election, this could be too. She can’t easily have it both ways: assure moderate voters she is not as kooky as she and some of her candidates often seem, while still appealing to anti vax and social conservative voters. I doubt she will drop this candidate at this point.

    Unlike the last election, this one is not mostly about the economy. Alberta’s economy is doing ok at the moment, but unemployment is still above the national average and wage growth has been very poor during the UCP’s time in power. Despite boatloads of government spending Albertans don’t feel that well off and oil prices have recently been languishing or drifting down.

    As the economy is not a big winning issue for them, the debate seems to be shifting to a variety of other social issues, which are not really not the UCPs strength. They are both divided on these issues and out of step with mainstream Albertans.

    It is possible some of the kooky things said and done may be dismissed or forgotten, particularly by some conservative leaning voters, but any talk of poop cookies at this point is to their political peril.

  3. There’s a catchy new campfire song being played in the UCP camp tonight: “Put Another Poop Cookie on the Lake of Fire”.

    This is who they are: toxic, nasty, abusive narcissists who pick on vulnerable kids and laugh in their faces.

    Is this who we are, Alberta? What if it’s your child, your grandchild, your niece or nephew being bullied by these potty-mouthed jerks? They’re not afraid to show you who they really are. What are you going to do about it?

  4. “If traditional Conservatives in the UCP move to oust Danielle Smith – as their candidates and canvassers are reported to be promising will happen soon”

    In a comment last week I made a hypothetical case that TBA leader David Parker could maneuver his way into the premier’s office. If candidates are already telling hesitant supporters that Smith will be ousted, you really have to wonder if the entire plan is already being implemented.

  5. At least in the past you had reason to believe a considerable amount of alcohol was often involved when hateful comments and actions were made by conservatives. Throwing change at people who are living rough when walking around drunk in downtown Calgary is one thing, but to express such hate while sober and with a straight face for all to hear is another.

  6. Has anyone thought to ask Jennifer Johnson if she considers Alberta appointed Chief Firearms Officer, Terri Bryant, to be a feces amongst gun advocates?

    1. Jaundiced: I imagined Ms. Johnson doesn’t know Ms. Bryant’s history, of which Ms. Bryant makes no secret. DJC

  7. I’m not so sure the lake of fire moment was shocking because of what was said but that they did such a poor job of vetting candidates albertans generally could not believe it. The implication being this time it’s no longer shocking because everyone knows the UCP are bigots likely every single candidate they’ve put forth has said something similar at some point I would wager; and they’re proud of it.

    At the risk of sounding like a broken record they stopped shocking me when they cribbed the title of the budget from the “14 words”. They think they’re slick, they hate everyone that isn’t them, and they have no reason to stop, they already know no one in “cuckmonton” isn’t going to vote for them. To be fair? I kind of hate them too, so it’s mutual.

  8. I’ll also say this a single member of the lgbtq+ community in this province has more bravery in their glittery pinky nail than every single one of these losers put together. Rural alberta sure does have a lot of cowards living in it.

  9. DJC: You must have personal experience (and strong views) on how some ridings – say, like in and around St Albert – mysteriously add a huge block of rural voters to a part of an urban centre. I could see a chastened post-election UCP continuing this practice in an attempt to reduce the NDP’s urban advantage. Call it Danimandering.

    1. Pedro: That would require legislative change and, probably, a fight with the courts. The approach now used in Alberta, having a basically non-partisan electoral boundaries commission do the updates every eight years or so, works reasonably well as long as you assume a whole set of assumptions are correct or promote democracy. We don’t have gerrymandering on the level of Republican U.S. states. But the process comes with built-in biases and assumptions that mean Alberta is less representative and less democratic than it could be. DJC

  10. The UCP is getting classier day-by-day.

    Ipsos offers us a “credibility interval”

    This would suggest that Ipsos has switched from Frequentist to Baysian statistical analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credible_interval . I believe it has significant effects on how the firm approaches its work but for the general reader the results are similar to a confidence interval.

  11. So far, throwing out the high and low polls ( outliers ) and using the middle is a good approach as usual.

  12. If the Alberta Independence Party wins a couple of seats in the extremist zones of the province, might we end up with a minority government?

  13. I am amazed that the Alberta Party is polling better than 5% province-wide, yet, they are not running candidates in the majority of ridings. Of course, AP voters could and should suck it up and note NDP, but NEVER!!!!!

    Now that Danielle Smith is trying to moderate the UCP’s position on everything, because the bozo-blowups are getting out of hand, I wonder if there will be a sudden migration to those registered parties that wear their crazy like its something to be proud of. The Alberta US Statehood Alliance for Freedom and Guns would be great idea, if such a party existed. Wait. This is Alberta and it probably does.

    Now that people’s mailboxes are getting stuffed with unsolicited and unofficial campaign literature, denouncing the WEF, Globalists, Jews, and Notley and the NDP, not to mention the other potential conspiracies that take up anyone’s day following, this election is fast becoming a potentially unwelcome watershed. The unwelcome part is where, if Notley wins, the violence is just around the corner. That alone could frighten voters.

    ‘Berta. We hardly knew, ye.

  14. It really does prove to the rest of Canada just how stupid Albertans truly are. But it’s no different than the stupidity we saw under Ralph Klein. It didn’t matter what he did to us he still got elected. Like Smith the more he insulted them the better they liked it. He even told us what he was going to do to us and that seemed to make him even more popular. He still got a majority government.
    I have told my children that if they can find jobs elsewhere we will support them to move because I can’t see any future in Alberta for our children. The mess these Reformers have created will take forever to fix , Notley will never be able to, and we won’t have any doctors, nurses and teachers who are going to be willing to be abused by these idiots. Even the four doctors from Africa that I knew when Ed Stelmach recruited them refused to stay after they saw how doctors and nurses were treated in Alberta. If Smith is elected we will be in a hell of a mess and apparently Albertans aren’t smart enough to see it.

  15. DJC, Good luck today, you will have a hard time keeping up, best of luck…..
    “what conflict of interest? “

  16. I am not surprised that we are in this position. It’s obvious that our newspaper editors have refused to allow any of us letter writers to try to educate the people and point out what these Reform Party policies will do them. They aren’t smart enough to figure it out on their own. Or as Ralph Klein said “Albertans aren’t smart enough to understand our plans for healthcare reform so we aren’t going to tell you what they are”, and I could tell these idiots anything and they would believe it”. That’s the Ralph Klein I knew , he loved treating people like morons. He was the best one I ever saw. Over the years I have received many phone calls from people praising my letters in the newspapers, even from lawyers. A university professor wanted to know who I was because I wrote the best letters she had ever seen she said. Lawyer Marilyn Burns even invited me to become the next leader of the Alberta Alliance Party in 2003, because of what I seemed to know about what Klein was doing to us. Yet now papers , supporting these fake conservatives don’t want any part of me. They have been refusing to print my letters for several months now and it’s almost like they are being paid by the U.C.P. not to accept them. Have any of you been trying to do it?

  17. I have just learned that the ethics commissioner has found Daniele Smith guilty for her involvement with her criminal Convoy Trucker street pastor pal. I wonder if Dave can tell us what that will do to her?

    1. Alan: No consequences were specified. So, probably, nothing. I will probably have more to say about this later, but there’s only so much one guy can write in one night! DJC

  18. Histrionics free zone. I guess you went to the well too many times. Has the ndp gotten rid of their Chavez loving cadre yet?

      1. It’s not a joke. If Beth Adam’s can apologize for being a communist these guys can. Course she described herself as a Marxist-Leninist, and they don’t change their minds. Supporting an ideology that imprisons and liquidated their competitors is a bad thing. Period

        1. Once again, you’re just describing America, who imprisons more of their population than basically the rest of the world put together, assassinates dissidents, journalists, and foreign dignitaries at will (including Chavez, allegedly) and has run roughshod over the third world since the thirties. Yeah ooooh communism is so scary

    1. which one, Hugo, or Cesar ? They’re both dead so what are you even talking about man.

  19. But then there’s the one who made racist comments, and the one who was cheering for Putin along with the husband of another candidate, and how many more to come?

  20. Another day, another National Post article carrying on about Notley: this one their line is, “Rachel Notley can’t run on her record as premier because its a disaster”. (gee and here I thought Notley did quite well as Alberta’s premier) The article’s author goes on to quote The Fraser Institute located in B.C., every right winger’s favorite “not thinking tank”.
    The writer’s theme seems to be, Rachel Notley is mean to corporations and wants to tax them.

    The other day the National Post had another article up slamming Notley.
    One would think the National Post is working on behalf of the UCP, oh well at least I know one paper not to purchase.

    1. Ontario paper owned by american dark money wants to tell albertans how to feel about their government based on a what a ridiculous think tank based in BC thinks. Do these losers even see themselves ? I saw the column as well, it was corbella right ? Shocking a bootlicking hack is ideologically opposed to the modest economic reforms the ndp brought in.

  21. Just saw the Leaders’ Debate and Smith was … weird.

    Heavily scripted, not really inclined to go off of it either (and likely for very good reasons) Smith really didn’t find any of the fire that would drive home a win. And her voice and tone of speaking, what’s with that? Her voice frequently cracking, or constantly shifting from highs and lows, before her voice completely failed and became hoarse. And what’s with the constantly flapping right hand?

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