Posted inAlberta Politics

Here we go again: Jim Prentice’s ‘5% Solution’ is bad policy, but irresistible politics

PHOTOS: Déjà vu all over again – the Alberta Legislative Building back in the day. Below: Retired Judge John Major, Winston Churchill and the ever-quotable Yogi Berra. Alberta Premier Jim Prentice’s “5-Per-Cent Solution” announced yesterday, whereby political salaries are symbolically trimmed to help justify other unpopular cuts in public services and an across-the-board attack on […]

Posted inAlberta Politics

The dream of uniting Alberta’s left, revived in the wake of Raj Sherman’s resignation, remains unlikely

PHOTOS: Strange bedfellows? Some sort of accommodation between the Alberta NDP and the Alberta Liberals might be a good idea, but it’s not very likely to happen. Below: NDP Leader Rachel Notley, possible future interim Alberta Liberal Leader Laurie Blakeman, and former NDP leader Brian Mason. OTTAWA Just remember that the Conservative advantage in Alberta […]

Posted inAlberta Politics

Alberta Liberal Leader Raj Sherman quits, completing last-place trifecta of disastrous party leaders

PHOTOS: Departing Alberta Liberal Leader Raj Sherman rallying his troops on the steps of the Alberta Legislature back in 2011. A little creative cropping made the crowd look bigger. Soon-to-depart Alberta Liberal MLAs Kent Hehr and Darshan Kang, both of whom plan to run soon for the federal Liberals. Three Alberta political parties laid low […]

Posted inAlberta Politics

Death of Wildrose founder and Alberta Report journalist-ideologue Link Byfield a major loss to social conservative right

PHOTOS: Wildrose Party co-founder and candidate Link Byfield at then-party-leader Danielle Smith’s side during the kick-off of the party’s 2012 Alberta election campaign. (Photo found on the Internet, creator not identified.) Below: A more recent shot of Mr. Byfield grabbed from the website of a social conservative think-tank, Cardus. The death of Link Byfield at […]

Posted inCanadian Politics

256 years of Rabbie Burns: if the authorities had any idea what he was talking about, they’d round up the Caledonian Society

PHOTOS: Robert Burns, looking almost impossibly poetic for a guy who admired the French Revolution and wanted to put the ruling classes to the sword. Below: A sporran, in case you were wondering; Japanese whisky. Today is the 256th birthday of Robert Burns, the now almost entirely incomprehensible 18th Century Scots poet celebrated by the […]

Posted inAlberta Politics

End of an era in Alberta politics: Former health minister Fred Horne, last of the ‘4H Club,’ says he’s quitting too

PHOTOS: Premier Jim Prentice bowls a strike … as Fred Horne, last of the Alberta legislature’s fabled “4H Club,” goes flying along with Ken Hughes, Dave Hancock and Doug Horner. Well, that pretty well puts paid to the Redford era, doesn’t it? Below: The only known flattering photo of the real Fred Horne (photo by […]

Posted inCanadian Politics

Another door slams in Rob Anders’ face – not even the Wildrose Party wants ‘Canada’s Worst MP’

PHOTOS: Rob Anders and his former mentor Stephen Harper, in cowboy drag. Below: Anders famously heckling a Democrat for a Republican candidate in the United States during his pre-Parliamentary days. Can this really be the end of the road for Rob Anders, the malignantly comedic clown princeling of Alberta politics? So it would seem, but […]