PHOTOS: Medical air transport – an essential service too important to be left to private insurers and their ilk. Below: Amy and Amelia Savill (CTV News) and Alberta Health spokesperson Timothy Wilson (Linkedin). So now we need to buy medical-travel insurance when we travel inside Canada? Who knew? Certainly not Amy Savill of High Prairie, […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Between a rock and a hard place in Calgary-Foothills, foundering PCs’ second-best hope is an NDP victory on Sept. 3
PHOTOS: Oh, Jimmy! Here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten us into! Former Alberta premier Jim Prentice gets ready to climb onto his bus and lit out for the territories. (Photo actually taken before the election by Dave Cournoyer, used with permission.) Below: Calgary-Foothills by-election candidates and possible candidates Bob Hawkesworth, NDP; Kathy MacDonald, Wildrose; Janet […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
Stephen Harper’s proposed ban on terror travel: subversive, unconstitutional, and unlikely to work, but clever
PHOTOS: Nineteenth Century Mormon men, criminalized by U.S. polygamy laws. Below: Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Senator Mike Duffy, former MP Dean Del Mastro. The Conservative Party’s terror-travel ban proposal is vintage Stephen Harper – subversive, unconstitutional and likely to have unintended consequences, but clever and highly motivating to the conservative base. As added bonuses from […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
When propaganda becomes memory: Pierre Trudeau and the National Energy Program
PHOTOS: Pierre and Justin Trudeau back in the day, with possibly quite a few Liberal supporters in the background. Below: Prime Minister Steve and Defence Minister Jason Kenney. Everybody in Alberta knows Pierre Trudeau and his National Energy Program laid waste to Alberta in the 1980s, and that would include plenty of people out here […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
No losers except Canadians in last night’s ditchwater-dull debate
PHOTOS: Zzzzzzzzz … Why are these men smiling? Below: Prime Minister Stephen Harper, sneering; Opposition Leader Thomas Mulcair, smiling unnervingly; Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, doing his best to look pugnacious; Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, happy to be there. Opposition Leader Thomas Mulcair stayed calm, smiled and looked prime ministerial during last night’s “national” televised […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Is it good news or bad news for the Conservatives if Stephen Harper trumps Trump tonight?
PHOTOS: Stephen Harper, as imagined during tonight’s TV debate. (Photo of Donald Trump by Gage Skidmore.) Below: The real Mr. Harper and another shot of the real Mr. Trump. Now, about that debate tonight, the big question has to be whether it will help the Conservatives or hurt them when Canadian voters tune into the […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
That Conservative foreign policy election plank: shaky, incoherent and quite possibly dangerous
PHOTOS: A screen grab from the Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s notorious electioneering video showing the himself and Defence Minister Jason Kenney in Iraqi Kurdistan, with the face of a Canadian special forces soldier blocked out by the CBC – unlike the version that appeared on the PMO’s website. Note the Kurdish flag in the upper […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
This just in: Prime minister calls early election … I mean, calls an election early … What could possibly go wrong?
PHOTOS: The prime minister of Canada in a Navy hat. The new kind. Yeah! A macho Navy cap! Now where’s Tommy Flanagan, now that we need him again? No, not that Tommy Flanagan! The political strategy guy. Below: Former prime minister Joe Clark, former Alberta premier Jim Prentice and current Alberta Premier Rachel Notley. Let’s […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
From Pacific Western to Trans Pacific: more evidence of how far Canada’s Conservatives have fallen
PHOTOS: All that remains of Pacific Western Airlines sits in a grain field northwest of Edmonton. Below: Alberta premier Peter Lougheed, looking sort of visionary. On this day in 1974, the Conservative government of Alberta took over Pacific Western Airlines. The takeover engineered by Premier Peter Lougheed and his cabinet wasn’t exactly a nationalization, but […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
Shhhhhh! Don’t tell anyone: As PM, Stephen Harper’s economic performance is a bust!
PHOTOS: From the sublime to the ridiculous? Liberal Lester Pearson, the top postwar economic performer among Canadian prime ministers. Below: Stephen Harper, the bottom. Below him: Pierre Trudeau (second best) and Brian Mulroney (second worst). Below them: Unifor economists Jim Stanford and Jordan Brennan. One of the most effective ways to keep a population quiet […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Former Wildrose House leader Rob Anderson to test blogging as a cure for politics
PHOTOS: Former Wildrose House Leader Rob Anderson in the steps of the Alberta Legislature in November 2014, joining union members protesting against Tory premier Alison Redford’s anti-union legislation. Below: Mr. Anderson with Alberta Union of Provincial Employees President Guy Smith and Liberal MLA David Swann. Below them: Former Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith and Independent MP […]
Posted inMedia
Upstairs Downstairs at the Edmonton Journal as Sun staff gets ready to move in
PHOTOS: The Edmonton Journal Building at 101st Street and MacDonald Drive in downtown Edmonton. It remains to be seen who will be Upstairs, and who will be Downstairs, when the staff of the Sun joins the staff of the Journal at the same address in the fall. Below: Journal Editor-in-Chief Margo Goodhand, Postmedia President and […]