Yesterday, the Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Commons warned Members of Parliament that individuals associated with the anti-vaccine-mandate truck convoy nearing the nation’s capital have been trying to suss out the location of their Ottawa residences. Also yesterday, Jason Kenney used a news conference supposedly about COVID-19 to defend the demonstrators. Sergeant-at-Arms Patrick McDonell, whose […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
UCP MLAs on Legislature committee refuse to receive Auditor General’s reporting findings on how government handled COVID-19
Alberta’s Auditor-General has completed six performance audits of the United Conservative Party Government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. But the Legislature’s Public Accounts Committee, dominated by UCP MLAs, has refused to receive Doug Wylie’s reports – so the committee will never do its job of reviewing his recommendations and calling on the affected departments to […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Maverick Party obviously has no problem with its party secretary’s role in anti-vaccine-mandate truck convoy protest
The Medicine Hat woman who is the public face of the GoFundMe campaign that has now theoretically raised more than $5 million to support the “Freedom Convoy 2022” motorcade protest against COVID-19 vaccine mandates remains a senior officer of the separatist-leaning Maverick Party. The Maverick Party website identifies Tamara Lich as secretary of the party’s […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
With ‘red alerts’ plaguing Alberta ambulance calls, health minister Jason Copping forms advisory committee to search for a fix
With EMS “red alerts” spiking in Alberta and both Calgary and Edmonton running out of ambulances to respond to emergencies roughly every 90 minutes, Health Minister Jason Copping yesterday announced he’s forming an advisory committee to study how to improve ambulance services in Alberta. To be fair, Mr. Copping also announced a “10-point plan” he […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Is the UCP suggesting it’s time to show Russia a thing or two by halting the TMX pipeline expansion?
Will members of all Canadian political parties soon demand that we halt the TMX pipeline expansion project? I ask because, with the current great power tension in Ukraine likely to reach some kind of a climax soon, we are already hearing fierce calls in Canada for severe and even warlike sanctions against Russia for any […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
Online fund-raising campaign for rolling truck blockades to protest vaccine mandates linked to right-wing separatist groups
An online fund-raising campaign organized by a person associated with the Maverick Party and other western separatist causes now indicates it has raised close to $2 million in the week to bankroll highway disruptions by truckers angry at Ottawa for imposing a vaccine mandate on cross-border essential workers. The “Freedom Convoy 2022” campaign’s GoFundMe page […]
Posted inBestsellers
To Paradise by American novelist Hanya Yanagihara tops Independent bookshops’ Alberta fiction bestseller list
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold by independent booksellers in Alberta during the week ended Sunday, Jan. 16, 2022. The lists are compiled by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta, and include sales at Audreys Books and Glass Bookshop in Edmonton. I don’t have much to say about any of the […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Not much edification in yesterday’s COVID-19 newser as Premier Kenney and officials ‘filibuster’ the hard questions
There was little informative or edifying about the mostly successful effort by Premier Jason Kenney and three of his senior health care enablers to run out the clock on reporters’ questions at yesterday’s COVID-19 news conference. Facing not only the potential for difficult questions about the chaos in Alberta’s schools and hospitals driven by spread […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
As energy minister, acting Alberta justice minister Sonya Savage also has a less-than-stellar record
While Kaycee Madu cools his jets in the political penalty box for phoning Edmonton’s police chief about a traffic ticket, it’s worth noting that acting justice minister Sonya Savage has not exactly covered herself in glory during her two and a half years as energy minister. Touted as a high-profile oilpatch insider when Premier Jason […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
What did Jason Kenney know about Kaycee Madu’s phone call and when did he know it?
What did Jason Kenney know and when did he know it? Those are the most important questions arising from now-suspended justice minister Kaycee Madu’s telephone call a little over 10 months ago to tell Edmonton Police Chief Dale McFee he’d been ticketed by a city traffic cop for distracted driving. Whatever the purpose of Mr. […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Kenney benches Justice Minister Kaycee Madu after revelation he phoned Edmonton police chief about traffic ticket
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney put his justice minister on the bench last night after a CBC story revealed one of the first things Kaycee Madu did after a traffic cop handed him a $300 distracted driving ticket for talking on his cellular phone as he motored through an Edmonton school zone was to call the […]
Posted inCanadian Politics
Research paper argues Canadian Taxpayers Federation pushed ‘anti-Indigenous political rhetoric and policy’ over 21 years
Locating the Canadian Taxpayers Federation clearly in the ecosystem of neoliberal advocacy, a recent paper in the Canadian Review of Sociology analyzes more than 400 documents published by the CTF over 21 years to argue the organization has pushed “anti-Indigenous political rhetoric and policy.” Lead author Kyle Willmott, a professor at B.C.’s Simon Fraser University, […]