Honey! I shrunk the party!
Sharp-eyed denizens of the Twittersphere yesterday noticed a United Conservative party update that, presumably inadvertently, gave away a dramatic drop in party membership since the 2022 UCP leadership contest that put Danielle Smith in Alberta’s top political job.
“UCP membership is currently around 54,000,” said some guy calling himself Turkish Marksman who looks remarkably like the CBC’s Jason Markusoff. Mind you, Yusuf Dikeç, the silver-medal-winning Turkish Olympic pistol shooter, also looks remarkably like Mr. Markusoff, so there’s probably a simple explanation for this coincidence.
That’s “down from the 123,915 members for UCP leadership,” Mr. Markusoff/Turkish Marksman said on the social media application now known as X. It’s also “below Alberta NDP’s after their leadership.”
On May 13, actually a few days before Naheed Nenshi’s victory as NDP leader was announced, the Opposition party revealed its membership had jumped to 85,144 from slightly more than 16,000 at the end of 2023.
Personally, I find math hard enough to be a Conservative, but my calculation is a little more generous, to wit, that if 18,500 is about 33 per cent of the UCP’s membership, then that membership would be about 56,000 – so only a little below where it was three months before the August 2022 peak during the party’s leadership race that was won by Ms. Smith.
This factoid slipped out when UCP President Rob Smith, whose relationship to the party’s Take Back Alberta faction is unclear, bragged in the update that the “Injection of Truth” anti-vaccine revival meeting sponsored by the Calgary-Lougheed Constituency Association on June 22 “featured over 500 in the room and more than 18,000 watching across Alberta at various constituency association ‘watch parties’ …”
“That represents about 33 per cent of our membership,” he boasted, weirdly when you think about it, before going on to claim a huge YouTube viewership and argue this “helped the world know what it means to pursue the truth as a United Conservative in Alberta.”
Now this kind of stuff seemed pretty unhinged on the night after the meeting, but in light of Mr. Smith’s slip – or strategic leak as a warning to the premier – one has to ask: Has Danielle Smith’s embrace of what former UCP leader Jason Kenney used to call the party’s “lunatics” managed to significantly shrink the United Conservative Party?
Since, as Mount Royal University political scientist Duane Bratt sagely commented in response to Mr. Markusoff’s calculated observation, it’s “normal for party membership to drop after a leadership race … I found it more fascinating that the UCP continues to brag about its ‘Injection of Truth’ event.”
No kidding!
Because Mr. Smith’s update also mentioned that more 850 resolutions had been submitted for the AGM, Dr. Bratt wondered, how many “are related to re-litigating COVID restrictions?”
Almost certainly a lot.
Now, as Dr. Bratt quite rightly pointed out, political parties’ membership tends to peak before leadership contests and drop off afterward, so this may not be unexpected. Something similar can probably be expected to happen to the NDP’s numbers when the memberships sold during its leadership race start to run out.
Still, a drop in membership of 55 per cent or more sounds significant enough to make one wonder just how much Ms. Smith’s embrace of MAGA lunacy like the dangerous nonsense peddled at the Calgary-Lougheed meeting is driving sensible conservatives out of the party.
In other words, is anyone left but the anti-vaxxers?
According to Calgary Herald political columnist Don Braid’s column yesterday, “the UCP is a roiling cauldron of discontented, angry members, topped by a more centrist layer that figures she’s doing quite well.”
But is that centrist layer now getting so thin you can practically see through it?
Meanwhile, Mr. Braid suggested, accurately in this case, this means that if Premier Smith wants to keep her job after the party’s annual general meeting in November, she’s going to have to bow down to the party’s lunatic fringe – if only because it’s not a fringe any more, it’s about all that’s left of the UCP.
Well, a lot can happen in a short time in politics and, as the late Lyndon B. Johnson famously observed in 1958 before he became U.S. president, “in politics you’ve got to learn that, overnight, chickenshit can turn to chicken salad!”
The reverse is also true.
If you don’t believe that, just take a look at what’s happened in the past few days in the current U.S. presidential race.
Because Mr. Smith’s update also mentioned that more 850 resolutions had been submitted for the AGM, Dr. Bratt wondered, how may “are related to re-litigating COVID restrictions?”
SOMEONE NEEDS AN EDITOR 🙂
P: My readers are my editors. Thanks for the heads up. It’s been fixed. DJC
Perhaps the “injection of truth” the UCP intended turned out to be something different. I agree party membership numbers generally decline after a leadership contest and election. So the decline itself while a bit large is not that concerning. But the remaining membership tends to get distilled to those who are more passionate.
So those who joined to vote against Smith are probably now long gone, but the still, and seemingly always, wound up anti vaxers remain. It is not a moderate party now, but hey not a moderate leader either, so I suppose they deserve each other, even if in some recent moments they do seem like cats in a bag.
The bigger problem is the extremists who now have more sway are pushing Smith to be even more extreme and if she does not go along, they may push her out too and she knows this. Kenney had his summer of discontent, Smith may have a fall full of it.
Given that that the Alberta Electorate is not loony right, I would say Marlaina.is about to be caught in a trap of her own making.
I hope you’re right, Alberta UCP’s are an unmitigated disaster.
Obscene. I’m sure we all have personal definitions of the word but I encountered a truly obscene event here in Calgary. It was at the Saddledome where I attended a concert by some old fella singing about white weddings or something. Before he started, a sea of drones swarmed the crowd selling 50/50 tickets. Nothing unusual there except the beneficiary wasn’t a food bank, homeless shelter or similar charity.
Nope. The beneficiary was the Saddledome itself where for years billionaires have watched their millionaire players shoot and skate.
The UCP seems to find money for its friends and pet projects and in this instance diverted money from citizens in need to the few without a need in the world. Another example of obscene.
The City of Calgary is already pledged to pay $850 million for the new arena, a figure that will no doubt reach $1 billion before the first 0.1%er puts the blade of his stick on the ice. Coincidentally, this past Friday I was given a tour of a homeless encampment within a few hundred metres of the Saddledome. Six people were residing in the abode, which was constructed from tree branches. The head of the household explained to me that the rustic construction proved less conspicuous than the current style in Calgary architure that leans strongly towards plastic tarps and tents. This sly approach had allowed the fellow to maintain the permanent-holiday property in the trendy riverbank area since last November.
As was Jasper Day where we were all expected to collect our bottles and drop them off for evacuees. Ob.Scene.
Loons led by poltroons! What a lovely story! Alberta at it’s low point!
How would that determination be assessed? Corporate profit in Alberta rose from under 10% of the economy in 1989 to over 22% in 2008, as the price of oil moved to its inflation-adjusted historical peak. Is it possible that the current band of Kon wear plates could enable their owners to loot a greater share of the economic resources of the province?
The UCP doesn’t use the same tabulating system, as the British Reform party uses for counting their MP’s, by chance?
The danger here is that as the loony right gets more loony and more right/wrong, how long will it be before Canada sees the kind of riots the UK has experienced lately, or worse?
Is it a coincidence that one of the con-voyeurs who led the so-called “truckers” during their occupation of Ottawa and attempt to overthrow a recent and duly-elected federal government in 2022, travelled to the UK to rile up those masses just before all hell broke loose in Southport?
Deus ex machina is at work here, as in the UK. We might even see further radicalization as public support for this movement diminishes.
Who is playing God in the machine, and why? Does it matter if it’s a puppet master in a mansion in our country or somewhere else, if the end result is the destruction of democracy worldwide?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/aug/02/southport-riots-parliament-keir-starmer-justice-violence
Well here’s a fun fact for you ; it’s basically impossible for riots like those happening in the uk to happen in Canada, based on population density alone. In the UK you have a much larger % of the population living in dense council housing and post industrial cities with extremely limited opportunities, which has been made much worse by Brexit. The point is these folks basically live on top of each other already, so kicking off a riot is no big thing. As we saw w the “lockdown rebellion” the only way they were able to bring even close to enough people to be disruptive was to bring all of their people to ONE location, and then they were still outnumbered.
Not for nothing this is a real problem for the left organizing in Canada, as we make up a much smaller part of the population. The most effective instances of resistance in Canada have all been indigenous and have all been localized, even if they’re done in tandem with other actions across the country.
Also not for nothing, that’s why the RCMP was designed the way it was, as militarized cavalry rather than a traditional “police force” in order to be a quick reaction force against indigenous or worker led uprisings against the states interests.
Finally the UCP numbers point to the opposite happening, sure at some point it’s going to be unhinged folks left and only unhinged folks, but albertans are already voting with their feet, because most of them, while being quite conservative actually aren’t insane.
Bird: This may be an unpopular opinion here in my own blog’s comments section, but I’m pretty sure the RCMP was set up as militarized cavalry rather than a traditional “police force” in order to be a quick reaction force against an actual military incursion north of the 49th Parallel by the United States in the days of “manifest destiny.” DJC
I’ll grab the ISBN for you at some point, but I currently have on loan from a certain university library a copy of “the secret history of the RCMP” in which they pretty explicitly state it was for suppressing indigenous nations and labour, with the south of the 49th being a (much) secondary consideration. In fact many of the early officers were selected expressly for that reason. We also sent a contingency to fight on behalf of The whites in the Russian civil War, much for the same reason (who were pelted with rocks when they returned to Canada) . The unknown history of Canada is pretty wild, but the idea that the RCMP represent any sort of heroic force, even from their inception isn’t borne out by the facts.
Steady on. Canada is what it is because of an organized left often working in solidarity. Unions, women’s rights, queer rights, bipoc, youth, environment, antipoverty, First Nations yes, and of course international communities like Palestinian, Filipino and Latino. Governments don’t magically decide to enshrine or safeguard our rights, the rights we fought and fight for.
Lately the left hasn’t been as active in organising demonstrations, at least in Alberta, but they are making a comeback ergo Enough is Enough ucp.
Now, if we can find a way to pry off the parasites squatting on Hwy1 whining about carbon rebates.. . I’m working on it.
“helped the world know what it means to pursue the truth as a United Conservative in Alberta.”
I think that the world, or at least the portion of it that’s paying attention, knows that “pursuing the truth as a United Conservative in Alberta” means avoiding it at all costs.
“Why it feels like we’re in a recession (when we’re not) | About That”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRUjmiUNjbc
Was cobra venom a constituent of the Covid vaccines? That seems a plausible explanation for Canadians continuing to accept the absurd claims that the current socio-economic system embodies freedom, equality and/or brotherhood. Paul Kagame, who is both Romeo Dallaire and li’l Magus’ favourite democratic leader, just won his fourth term with 99% of the vote, besting his own record of 98.7%. So things should be looking up in Africa in terms of generating more economic dislocation and desperation, which will hopefully translate into more people fleeing the continent for the post-industrial service economies of Canada and Europe. The great thing about the triumph of militarized global capitalism is the elimination of any obligation to improve socio-economic conditions in colonized lands, whether they be in the Americas, Africa or Asia, and instead we can all make land acknowledgements and buy t-shirts to show how much we care.
Support for Naheed Nenshi seems to be increasing. Who is doing it? It’s Conservatives, like we had when Peter Lougheed was premier of Alberta, not this Reformer nonsense that is in the UCP.
” its membership had jumped to 85,144 from slightly more than 16,000 at the end of 1993.” Do you mean 2023?
Marge: Correct, and thank you, it’s been fixed. No idea where that 1993 came from. DJC
It’s quite surprising that people haven’t kept up with their payments the way the ucp has put so much money back into the hands of the average worker.
JS bow valley— just a thought, but I wonder if it has something to do with that mysterious list of names that Mr Parker doesn’t want to reveal. Maybe someone figured out that 14 yr olds can’t vote, even though they are supposedly registered members. …..hmmm??
It’s interesting that someone, who describes himself as a UCP member ‘for fun’ received an interesting fundraising letter. The letter read like a typical fundraising letter, lauding all the achievements (YADA YADA) since the UCP’s 2023 Election win. But there was one strange bit in the letter that was revealing … a cautionary note about warning Queen Danielle to avoid moving towards the ABNDP in policies. Okay, that remark stuck out like a sore thumb. It’s hard to say what was the original of the letter, so it didn’t sound like a ringing endorsement of Smith, just the UCP itself. I think this may an indicator of a Stelmach moment for Smith c/o TBA? Stay tuned.
David, you’ve earned a gold star, if not a gold medal, for that headline!!!
When you “retire” perhaps consider a stint at the Beaverton!
Patricia
I’m not sure if people realize how odious these people are!
We live in Calgary Lougheed.
By rights we should both be very loyal Conservative voters. We certainly were during the Lougheed days. Our socio ecomomic sitution screams Conservative
But this is a different Party. Neither of us can bring ourselves to even consider voting for our MLA, Eric Bouchard, or Premier Smith. If those two are not enough of a turnoff for us, most of the current Cabinet completes the picture.
Nothing but a shameless bunch of boobs, boot lickers, and incompetants masquerading as our Provincial Government.
This appears to me a Premier and a Party under the thumb of an elected TBA group. A group that does not have the intestinal fortitude or confidence to run under their own banner. And a Premier who skulks about placing her loyalty to the TBA about her duty to Albertans.
It is a disaster for middle of the road Albertans. It may show up at the next election.
Glad to hear it! Tell your friends! UCP never again.
Now that everyone is becoming aware of the weaponized nature of social-media and agents of foreign interference in our midst, it will not be long before the backlash comes. Seeing that various populist CONs movements are popping up everywhere, their agents are getting caught red handed. Skippy Pollivere has taken to running from questions regarding Russia-bot farmers parroting his talking points. The best part is that Elon Musk is having daily conniptions over the backlash from his antics. Now that Musk posted on X that the UK is on the verge of civil war, thanks in no small part to his now un-policed X platform becoming a conduit for salacious rumours about migrants in the UK, ‘broken Britain has turned on the state and the police, like the unwashed morons they are. Never had a job because of immigrants? No. More like you own bestial inclinations have got the better of you. Now that Taylor Swift’s Eras World Tour has been stymied by terrorist plots, X and Telegram excited hordes are raging at everything. Tampons in the bathrooms? Only in mixed gender use once, but would a CON know any better? And Musk is now suing anyone who refused to advertise on X — didn’t he tell these people to ‘go F themselves’? The man has got to lay off the Ketamine. And the UK Home Secretary has had enough of this and is considering (maybe) declaring X a terrorist organization and Musk an agent of violence to UK national security. Oh, please let it happen.
Meanwhile, Canada basks in Olympic glory and some more achievements in the face of far more powerful players. The next year will be tumultuous and excellent for popcorn addicts.
This is very good news. The right media and her X have tried to bamboozle us into believing UCP is going strong but really, it’s being ripped from the inside out. Good. Go for her jugular. Replace her with someone even wackier then election then Nenshi.
It’s not unexpected for any party’s membership to swell prior to a leadership convention and shrink thereafter, but in Alberta’s UCP it seems like it SHOULD mean more than that. And it probably does.
We’ve become inured to pundits “analyzing” absurd rumination of the likes of Donald tRump, the benchmark having now been set this low for the last decade or so. MAGAnauts, American or Albertan, are predictably getting crazier the more the sane majority ignores them. Oddly it seems a calm before a storm despite the largely preposterous racket. The real Q is whether it’s ominous. And it probably is, but omen of what, we just can’t know.
My political teeth were sharpened in BC where I live, and well I remember—since it hasn’t been all that long ago—how BC wore the national mantle of “crazy”, “polarized”, and “hyper-partisan” politics in La-La-Land-North (with its little enclaves, the Okanagan “Texas-North”, the Kootenay “Utah-North”, and the Peace’s “Alberta-West”). The “calm before the storm” feeling here feels conspicuous considering a potentially history-making election is approaching in just a few months. Even in the most controversial days of federal politics—Mulroney and Chrétien and Preston and Stockwell and Martin and Dion and Iggy and Harper—all would have been drowned out here for at least a year before one of our patently nasty BC general elections.
The patent has lapsed. That kind of “nasty” was from an innocent era seemingly bygone today. In BC it’s almost crickets right now. And I suspect it’s somehow related to Alberta, Canada, America, Gaza, Ukraine-Russia, and UK in about that order. I would simply label the atmosphere as the pong of the partisan-far-right’s sweaty throes.
What more can we glean from any of this, let alone Alberta’s situation? I’m a tether myself to the bole of speculation as I crawl out onto an iffy, possibly dying limb and boldly say that we are witnessing the Mongoose-vs-Cobra trance-stance, tense, expectant, nervous, almost paralyzed with fascination.
The eventualities which will relieve this conservative constipation are, first and foremost, whether tRump is defeated in November, a decisive milestone after which Canada’s federal-party clinch will be broken up and its two main contenders ordered to their respective corners before coming out slugging—and Alberta’s TUBCRAP government reacts as we’ve become accustomed.
Even BC is distracted by the US election because it matters whether a tRump loss affects one of MAGA’s—I guess you could say, “MACA’s”— most imitatively flattering apprentices, Pierre Poilievre. As it is, BC’s NDP government only gains confidence in winning an unprecedented third term this October when the upstart BC Conservatives can’t help themselves from adopting MAGA talking points (yes, we even have anti-vaxxers here—even the strangest bedfellows, the granola anti-vaxxers).
Again, with all this criticality happening around the globe (called “globalization”), I’m astounded at the peaceful pre-campaign season here in BC. Something has changed, that’s for sure. It’s just more naked in Alberta—and skeletal in the USA.