Last week in pursuit of her “parental rights” agenda, Premier Smith announced a set of policies that limited medical treatment for transgender youth and did a whole lot more.
I tried to imagine what it would be like to explain these policies to someone not living in cloud cuckoo land.
Here goes:
Smith says this policy is necessary because…
The decision to access transgender medical treatment is an “adult choice.” It cannot be made by a minor because, as we all know, adolescence is a difficult and confusing time and the minor may make a decision they’ll regret for the rest of their lives. So the decision is reserved for adults…
Ah, so the intent of the policy is to ensure minors can’t access medical treatment without their parents’ consent. I thought this was already the case in Alberta.
Yes, it is but…
It turns out not all adults can be trusted to make this decision on behalf of their minor children. In fact some well-intentioned but misguided adults may encourage or enable their children to alter “their very biology or natural growth.” This poses a “risk to that child’s future” that the Smith will not allow.
Okay, so the intent of this ‘parental rights’ policy is to take away a parent’s right to consent to their children getting medical treatment. Isn’t this another version of ‘welcome to 1984’ where the government tells you how to care for your children?
Yes, but…
Smith is going to let parents consent (or not) to schools teaching their kids about gender identity, sexual orientation or human sexuality by making the schools get parental consent every time the subject comes up.
So the kids who learn nothing about gender identity, sexual orientation or human sexuality at home because their parents think it’s nasty will be left in the dark?
Yes, but there’s also this…
For those parents who have no idea what’s going on in their children’s lives Smith will make the schools get the parent’s consent (if the kid is 15 or under) or notify the parents (if the kid is 16 or 17) if their kid wants to change their name or their pronouns.
What if that blows up in the kid’s face and their families abuse them or thrown out of the house?
No problem, Smith says the abused and traumatized kid can talk to Child Welfare Services who, according to their government website will notify the family and endeavor to keep the family together as they work through this with the folks.
I’m sure that’s comforting to the kid who just got thrown out into the street.
But wait, there’s more…
Smith says the “risks and unfair advantages” that young women and girls experience when competing against “biologically stronger transgender female athletes” in sports has grown too high…
What risks and unfair advantages?
She didn’t say. But she’s going to talk with sports organizations so ensure women and girls have the choice to compete in “women’s only” division while at the same time setting up co-ed and gender-neutral athletic competitions for the transgender female athletes to compete in.
Is this something athletes have been clamouring for? How is she going to get sports organizations to rip up their existing divisional structure in order to create new “women’s only and “co-ed” and “gender-neutral” division?
I don’t know, stop asking questions.
You know what I think? Smith’s policies will increase intolerance for transgender people and will increase ignorance about gender diversity and human sexuality.
Also I would note that the stigmatization of sexual and gender minorities is a classic tactic of right-wing populist parties who oppose teaching sexual and gender diversity in schools and want to take away a woman’s right to abortion.
Is that where she’d headed?
Hold on please, we’re getting David Parker on the line.
Susan on the Soapbox 
Well done!!!
Thanks David!
Yep. There has already been a robocall survey asking about parental consent for abortions. The Gov’t of Alberta says it wasn’t from them, but somebody is certainly stirring the pot.
https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/mysterious-robocall-survey-polling-albertans-on-parental-consent-for-abortions-1.6754063
Val, I have no doubt that a woman’s right to an abortion is up next. This weekend the Globe and Mail ran an article about the rising right-wing populists which indicated that much of their agenda, at least as it impacts women, is to undermine affirmative action, remove abortion rights and push for “traditional marriage” with the wife at home. God forbid that these hapless women should find themselves in “unplanned childlessness” (a new term used at right-wing conferences in Texas and Budapest). This push for babies seems to be related to the “replacement theory” conspiracies.
You know, I risk running afoul of Godwin’s Law, but the Nazis also pushed for more [Aryan] babies in the 1930s …disturbing parallel here.
@ jerrymacgp
No fear of that jerry, Godwin his own self recently gave license to use the word when it applies, pointing out that if the shoe fits more often than not these days, it can hardly be considered your fault for notcing it. And, imo, parallel is an understatement; the UCP are flat-out fascist by any lexicon I’ve looked at.
Project 2025 Is A Brave New Big Brothers’ Handmaidens’ Tale and, like it or not, Alberta is the thin end of that wedge. With the balding gibbon from Gibbons using funds he grifted from somewhere (Albertans, and Elections Alberta who are asking, have a right to know regardless of how desperate Mr.Parker is to hide it) to spend his days wistfully massaging its tip.
So from where I am sitting the similarities are undeniably noticeable. No risk of you running afoul of Godwin when it comes to noting the overt Christofascism of the UCP and their supporters.
Great job of summarizing the situation. As usual. Thank you.
What nobody can help me with is what the problem is, what is the gov trying to fix.
Clearly more harm than good will result from this even if it fails to be implemented. The divide between us is growing and issues like this just seem to amplify and exaggerate the fault line.
Anthony: I agree and you raise a great question. Lawyers are trained to ask “what harm is this statute (policy) intended to remedy?” Smith says puberty blockers can result in irreversible damage, but the doctors disagree. Her concern about surgery is in authentic, partly because in Alberta top isn’t funded before age 18 and no bottom surgeries are performed anywhere in Canada before age 18. It’s as if a teen wakes wakes up on a Monday and is transformed by Friday.
Susan: Thanks for sharing another great blog. I think Danielle Smith is going to end up destroying her term as premier, because of what she says and what she does. She got into hot water as the Wildrose party leader, because of this. Here’s some more fitting music. This is from a well known Canadian artist, Bruce Cockburn. It is Lovers In A Dangerous Time, and it was released in 1984. I did see Bruce Cockburn live, and I also met him. He is in my music collection.
Dwayne, I agree. I think that at some point Smith won’t be able to keep Parker happy, God knows she’ll try) and then he’ll be gunning for her and we’ll go through the same thing that happened with Kenney. This is no way to run a government.
What a great musical selection. How cool that you met Bruce Cockburn (not that I’m surprised :)) I really liked this line in the song “Got to kick at the darkness ’til it bleeds daylight.” That’s exactly what we have to do!
I’ve been to some of his concerts. The first one was in a smallish U of C theatre, just him with an acoustic guitar.
The next was bigger and louder at the Jubilee with a band. I think it was connected to the Stealing Fire album, so 1984.
He played at the Calgary Folk Fest at least once.
Naheed Nenshi at the rally in Calgary on Sat Feb 3 to support trans youth
Katie, thanks for sharing this. Every politician has to push back as hard as Nenshi did. As he said, “this is a real fight.” And we have to fight with everything we have, starting with calling our MLAs and writing to the Premier to tell them exactly how awful this is.
Stirring speech. A lot of people are now suggesting – on the basis of this speech — that he’s going to enter the NDP leadership race.
I hope he does because we need to push back and hard. They think they have us but we will prove them wrong. This weekend protests were clear and strong and I hope we organize something larger and with a clear message especially to Fascist Parker that should not have a place anywhere other than his Nazi friends. What a disgrace this is.
So, where was he during the last election campaign when he could have made a real difference?
Jerrymacgp, Carlos, Caron: I’ve heard the same thing. Interestingly Nenshi endorsed Notley in 2019 and accompanied her on a “whistle stop tour through 8 ridings” but it wasn’t enough. Frankly if he does become leader, I’m not convinced he’ll do any better than some of the other leadership candidates. From what I’ve seen so far, this is going to be a great race with some very qualified candidates vying for our support.
Here’s the link re:Nenshi endorsing Notley: https://daveberta.substack.com/p/nenshi-and-harper-endorsements-set
Susan: Here is something that is quite fascinating, but not surprising. This shows that Danielle Smith is contradicting herself, which she has a knack for doing. The last UCP leader was gone, and TBA (Take Back Alberta) had played a role in that. Maybe Danielle Smith fears she will be next, if she doesn’t give in to the demands of TBA (Take Back Alberta)?
https://edmontonsun.com/2014/12/03/wildrose-leader-danielle-smith-makes-passionate-plea-in-legislature-for-gay-straight-alliances
Dwayne, thanks for that link. Smith made an emotional plea for gay-straight alliances at schools when the Prentice government was trying to get rid of them. That was back in 2014 (she was 43) and now just 10 years later she’s enacting policy that will do even more damage to transgender kids and the 2SLBGTQIA community as a whole.
It’s ironic when you consider she said the reason why transgender kids can’t be allowed to make these decisions is because they’re not adults, and yet here she was an adult who made the right decision at 43 and the wrong decision at 53. I’m not sure why she flipped but I would suspect her fear that Parker could knock her off her perch has a lot to do with it.
Susan: Here is my second song pick. This is from 1958, and was written by Buddy Holly, Jerry Allison, Norman Petty, and Joe B Mauldin, and Norman Petty. It is Well….All Right! I have Buddy Holly in my music collection. On February 3, 1959, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper (J.P. Richardson) were tragically killed in a plane crash, near Clear Lake, Iowa. One of the band members of Buddy Holly’s band at this time was (the late) Waylon Jennings, who was assigned to play bass, and became a famous country music artist. He is also in my music collection.
Dwayne, what a lovely song. It’s been ages since I’ve heard Buddy Holly. I’d forgotten he had such a smooth voice. It is such a shame that he and the others perished in that terrible plane crash.
Susan: I have three versions of this song in my music collection. Buddy Holly’s original version, the version by the British supergroup, Blind Faith, which had Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Rick Grech and Ginger Baker in it, and a version by Carlos Santana.
Dwayne, is there one you like the best or do you like each of them equally for different reasons.
Susan: I like all three versions equally. Even though I saw Eric Clapton once live, Steve Winwood twice live, and Carlos Santana five times live, they never did this song in concert.
Susan: Here is my third song pick. This is a Bob Dylan composition, and it is from 1965. It is Positively 4th Street. Very fitting. The (late) Michael Bloomfield is also on guitar here, as a session musician. He was in The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, with Elvin Bishop, during the 1960s. Al Kooper, who co-founded the jazz fusion group, Blood Sweat & Tears, is on organ here. Bob Dylan is also in my music collection, and I did see him live in 1990.
Dwayne, this selection was absolutely bang on! Great choice. I’m trying to imagine Dylan back in 1990, he must have been amazing to watch. I really liked the last line: “Yes, I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes You’d know what a drag it is to see you.” Loved it.
Great choice in these times we thought they were changing; but no so much anymore.
Susan: Here is my final song pick. I had to share this, because on January 23, we lost a great folk music artist, Melanie (Melanie Anne Safka Schekeryk) at the age of 76. She would have been 77 on February 3. This is her composition, Beautiful People. It was recorded live in London, England on July 14, 1971. She was one of the artists at Woodstock, in 1969.
Dwayne, this was a beautiful song with a lovely message. I remember the first time I heard one of her songs. It was Brand New Key. Melanie has such a quirky voice and her lyrics are so original. Thanks
Danielle Smith hasn’t solved the Health Crisis that was her first priority. Failed in her pie in the sky robbery of the CCP. So to change every thing up she’s decided to pick on the most vulnerable in our Province the trans gender youth, once again she has shown she doesn’t know the first rule of being a Premier, she doesn’t care about any of us who don’t agree with the U Clown Party’s mandates. So so wrong from cozying up with the insane conspiracy spreader Tucker Carlson, next will it be abortions or not making new covid vaccines available, three more years of this nonsense will certainly put the province back into the days of Bible Bill and Ernie the money grubbing Manning. Heaven Help us !!!!
Paul Pearlman: yes, the distraction value of this attack on transgender youth is extremely effective. That Smith would stoop so low is shocking. But what really floors me is how passionately she defended gay-straight alliances 10 years ago and how quickly she threw transgender kids under the bus last week. The harmful outcomes she tearfully described in 2014 are just as real and as dangerous to transgender kids today. And yet, it’s full steam ahead.
The expression “power corrupts” is bang on here.
Well put.
What exactly is the problem with kids wanting to be called by a different name or pronoun….er nothing, but it means we don’t have to talk about the actual crises that exist in healthcare, water management and firefighting, not to mention homelessness and affordable housing etc etc
Pamela: exactly. I remember when Jordan Peterson went nuts about pronouns a few years ago. He said if he refused to use someone’s preferred pronouns in his classroom he would be sent to jail (cue Tucker Carlson) and damn it, he believed in free speech so he was prepared to go to jail. Here we are years later and he’s still refusing to use preferred pronouns and he’s still not been carted off to jail in handcuffs. He’s a melodramatic baby but his schtick has made him a multi-millionaire.
The sneakiest part of this is that by removing the rights of trans women in sports, Smith can justify removing the rights of all women. Minors aren’t capable of making decisions, nor are their parents, nor are trans women, not are women in general. Mother Smith is in charge now. Mother Smith will tell everyone what to think and do and be.
Albertan, you’ve touched on a really important point.
I’m troubled that more people aren’t talking about this policy as what it really is: government overreach into the personal decisions that should be made by a citizen (with parental consent if the citizen is a minor) and their doctor. This lays the foundation for the State to ban abortions for minor females (even with parental consent). The list of off0limits procedures will grow. I’m certain of it.
Well Marlaina DeSantis strikes again. I have no words….
Sharon: every week Marlaina goes lower than we thought possible.
Good explanation, but I wonder if this is just a distraction so the UCP can sell off a few more coal mines in our critical headwaters and maybe save politicians the notoriety of getting sued by foreign coal companies? The real costs would be toxic waters in drought stricken prairie rivers for the next 50+ years, paid by future generations of Albertans.
Carl Hunt: yes, the distraction value of this anti-transgender youth policy is enormous because it’s vulnerable kids who are in the cross hairs. I would like to compile a list of all the stupid policies she’s put forward that have crashed and burned, but there are so many it’s hard to remember them all. So far I’ve come up with APP, the electricity market debacle, the moratorium on renewables, the Dynalife labs debacle, attempting to politicize municipal governments, meddling with the justice system to “free” the Coutts paster, pretending covid doesn’t exist in the last vaccine rollout. I know there are tons more. It’s shocking just how incompetent this government is.
I appreciate the public discussion you have created about ‘parental rights’ and hope you will save your list of “stupid policies” for the three months leading up to the next election.
If you think this attack on teens announced by the Parker Government’s spokesperson, Marlaina Smith, is grotesque, just wait till you see the policies when they have control of the Province’s schoolboards. Make no mistake about it, they will gain control of the school boards as easily as they gained control of the UCP Board of Directors.
One more prognostication. How long after she gets her hands on our CPP contributions will it take for Smith to turn our pensions into nothing more than glorified RRSPs? Our retirement benefits will follow the price of oil up and down like a roller coaster. That ought to make everyone in this province pro oil expansion which no doubt is part of the equation.
Jaundiced Eye: you’re right, they’ve made no secret that this is the next step in their plan to take over of the province. You mentioned Smith’s designs on our CPP. The TBA types are hosting town halls in which they extol the virtues of APP, which as we know from the Free Alberta Strategy document is a stepping stone towards Alberta leaving confederation. Smith is Alberta’s own Mini-Me.
Thank you for another very well written cogent piece. As Sharon said, Marlaina DeSantis strikes again. Marlaina’s contempt for trans kids could not be more obvious despite her looking straight into the webcam and lying. The question is why. Does she just hate these people? Is it to distract the rubes from the hundreds of more important issues facing Albertans? Whatever the reason, Marlaina should be ashamed of herself. But it’s become painfully obvious that Marlaina and many of her party members have no shame.
Public Servant, thanks. it’s interesting that you mention the video. Some people (including Nenshi who later backtracked) said she came across as “compassionate”. This shocked me because in my mind she was being insincere and the words coming out of her mouth were cruel. She was coming down on transgender youth and their families harder than any other premier in the nation. It was, as you say, a shameless display from a party with no heart.
I think she prides herself on being a communicator and she and the video makers worked hard to lull people at the start of her announcement. If people did not listen carefully, they might stay lulled.
She’s a known liar and she may be fiding that fewer people will listen to her or trust her.
valjobson: I think you’re right, she does pride herself on being a communicator. She certainly worked hard to appear caring in that video, what with the soft spa music in the background and the beige room with the banal painting in the background, the message was “nothing to see here, go about your business” when in fact her words conveyed just the opposite.
I noticed when she said some things that were meant to be caring she’d crinkle her eyes, as if she was trying to see through smoke, I’m going to watch her more closely because that may be her “tell” the sign that she doesn’t believe what she’s saying.
Kenney had a “tell” as well. Whenever he got into an area he knew wasn’t backed by evidence he’d start to stammer ever so slightly.
We need only of those trained FBI investigators who can spot when a person is lying to help us suss out when these guys are BS-ing us.
The Peace Country Progressive Alliance hastily organized a protest yesterday. People attended the North end constituency office of the two MLAs for Grande Prairie and area to post signs on the windows. Then folks gathered at City Hall downtown on 98th street and spent an hour on the sidewalk waving signs at motorists driving by. I haven’t been much of an activist on 2SLGBTQ+ issues in the past, but felt that this issue demanded I show up. We got far more honks and waves than middle fingers — although there were a few of those, as well as some long stares. There wasn’t a lot of foot traffic — this is Grande Prairie, after all, where nobody walks anywhere.
I don’t claim to be an “ally” — IMHO, to claim allyship one must invest some time and effort. I know a fellow who is straight and cis — a city firefighter who’s run for the provincial NDP here a couple of times — who sits on the board of the Grande Prairie Pride society. That’s allyship. The most I can claim at this time is not being an enemy, and it was as “not an enemy” that I joined those activists yesterday to speak out.
The Alliance posted some photos on their FB page: https://www.facebook.com/pcpagp
jerrymacgp: this is a very touching story. If more people who see themselves as “not the enemy” bothered to show up like you did, these horrendous policies would never be proposed in the first place. Well done!
So much for the NEW Conservative freedom ideology. From Danielle Smith to Pierre Poilievre, it is nothing but fascism light. The only reason they do not come out of the closest as fascists is because they know that will not be easy.
It is time these people pack their bags and go preach somewhere else, or face the consequences. If they continue with this cumulative fascist process, there will be problems.
I am a senior but fascism will not be repeated, not under my watch.
They are slowly implementing their sick mentality but it will fail.
Lets get Nenshi elected and the games are over.
Carlos, I found your second to last paragraph inspiring. I suspect many of the people who comment here have a few miles on them and yet they’re still engaged and prepared to fight against rising right-wing populism and incipient fascism. I see this commitment to freedom and democracy and the rule of law in my friends and family. I take heart from that because it means we have not and will never, give up.
Susan you got it and even if these people push it far enough to cause more than just name calling, I will be there.
I am not afraid of any of them or their threats.
They are cheaters and deceivers, we are smart and resilient.
Thanks for this post Susan. This latest Smith move is a bit of a ‘head-scratcher’ non-issue until a view from a slight distance allows connecting some dots. Smith craves attention reinforced by the years she’s spent on media (podcasts, interviews, YouTube etc) and the more controversial the more ‘clicks’, views and attention. Also a good distraction from issues of real importance in AB (economy, housing, healthcare, education, power grid reliability, drought …) this also fits the controlling narrative of the Take Back Alberta (to the 1950’s), gang – which seems? to control the balance of influence in the UCP which keeps her in power – which she seems to crave. All these real issues in AB are just the Ottawa Liberal’s – or specifically JT’s fault anyway, right?
But … here we are, distracted by this fabricated, outrageous none-issue and falling into the predicted attention on Smith craving. Perhaps the upside is AB & Canadians in general will finally be completely exasperated and start to get involved and change the course of this dystopian narrative.
So Susan, thanks again for creating this forum. “Great things never came from comfort zones” author unknown.
Kathleen, you’re very welcome. Don Braid recently suggested that Smith unleashed this horrific policy in to ensure her survival at the upcoming leadership review. Seems to me if she stoops to this, she’ll do anything to stay in power. Very sad indictment indeed.
PS Loved your quote at the very end of your post.
This is horrendous hateful policy. I’m not surprised at the timing however. In the last few weeks we had an electric grid that couldn’t keep up – and the UCP has been clamouring that we need oil and gas to keep up to demand…. and then the province with all the oil and gas ISN’T KEEPING UP TO DEMAND! And we had water shortages in Edmonton and probably in the rest of the province for all of 2024. And it came out that the tar sands industry is lying about emissions and that they are thousands of times higher than reported. And she invited Tucker to come and spew his own special brand of hatred.
I’m not saying she’s not going ahead with this policy. She absolutely will, and she’ll do her best to outlaw all abortion and then birth control. She’ll probably outlaw the teaching of evolution as well. And these are awful things but what she’s deflecting from is also absolutely awful.
And yet so many Albertans support her. SMH.
Janna, you highlight the irony of living here in Alberta very well. The coming drought is going to the ultimate test of the UCP’s devotion to the fossil fuel sector. When the water dries up, who will they force to curtail demand? The oilsands? The farmers? Ordinary citizens like you and me? If the recent electrical emergency is any example, they’ll bend over backwards to keep the fossil fuel sector intact for as long as possible. As one wag put it on Twitter, that’s when the citizens of Alberta will discover that they can’t drink oil.
I have to wonder if Smith’s brief winning streak is ending and she has made a mistake with this policy. Yes, it panders to the base and perhaps politically she was even forced to do so. But if this is the case, it is not a sign of strength, but of weakness.
In the past, Smith often talked about her libertarian philosophy, but what is libertarian about this heavy handed approach with teachers, schools and children who, although minors, do have some rights too? So this seems contradictory to her past positions and image. While it may motivate some of the social conservative base, it may turn off more moderate conservatives who narrowly and somewhat reluctantly supported her in the last election.
Ironically, given the number of people who have turned out to demonstrate again this, Smith may have also motivated a lot of people who are worried, upset and angry about what she has done. Like her predecessor, she also keeps on being a headache to her Federal leader who would like moderate voters to forget about some of the extreme and foolish positions conservatives in Canada embrace.
Divisive politics can be a winning game, but it can also be a zero sum game or worse too. And those that are hurt by what you do are often the most motivated and remember come election time.
Dave: I saw the press release on this topic, fairly recently. In the press release, right off the bat, Danielle Smith was contradicting herself. She looked very uncomfortable speaking, from her scripted speech. These are the only words I can use to describe the speech, but it looked like she was being held captive, and was forced to say these things. David Parker and TBA are likely behind this. If Danielle Smith doesn’t comply with whatever his demands are, she will be done as premier of Alberta, and someone that is worse will take over the UCP. Because of Danielle Smith’s penchant for sticking her foot in her mouth, and her contradictory nature, it’s not likely she will finish her term as premier of Alberta. The UCP doesn’t seem to be cohesive enough to stay together, because there are moderates in the party. It would certainly be a relief if David Parker was kept away from politics.
Dwayne, I concur. I watched the presser on Global BC.(recorded). Because I have a penchant for what goes on in the background and analyze the looks on people’s faces when politicians speak, I watched the first minute and then had to stop and rewind . Danielle walked in head down and walked to the podium, put her ‘notes’ down, then did a slight head tilt to the right and looked at the man who had come in with her, and went to stand against the wall parallel with the podium. The strange look on his face got the hair on the back of my neck twitching. Danielle turned back, looked at her notes and started speaking. The only way I can describe her face was sadness as she was speaking; and in the meantime he kept checking the clipboard (?) he had. As she continued, he slowly edged back….satisfied that she was following the script?
It was rather unnerving and the comments about selling ones soul really seems to ring true here.
Is that glass ceiling coming down?
As far as Pierre, I’m not a doctor but I DO play one on TV; puberty blockers for children shall only be allowed when they are adults at 18. I’m amazed that only Nenshi on power &politics gave this a passing mention, when IMHO , reporters let this one slip by….If you are an 18 year old adult, you are not going through puberty.
Or did I miss something 50+ yrs ago .
P.S. Never mind Danielle from 10 yrs ago…what about 2/3 yrs back, when both her and Pierre were both yelling at JT ,
MY BODY….MY CHOICE !!the government can’t tell me what I can or can’t do with my body.
And look how well that’s turning out in Alberta right now….rise in Meningitis, whooping cough, and if the measles outbreak in the UK is any indication, it’s going to go like last years wildfire, especially with all those freedumb loving antivaccers. Unfortunately another case of the children suffering because “parental rights ” you know!
Because I’m not a subscriber, I only got a brief glimpse of Parker’s interview with the National Post Thanks Lisa, but what I read, goes with the face of Danielle’s “handler”. Hmm ? Is that why she opened an office in Ottawa? Oh to be a fly on those walls.
Dave, Dwayne and Randi-lee: you’ve raised a very interesting question. Given Smith’s position as a libertarian this policy should be anathema to her, and yet somehow she was able to implement the policy and then double down on it when it was challenged. That leads us to Dave’s point that this isn’t a show of strength but one of weakness. She’s heading into a leadership review. The UCP board is controlled by TBA. She either dances to their tune or they throw her out and find someone else who will.
Randi-lee’s comments about the press conference and the fellow holding the clip board are also interesting. It reminds me of something I heard from a work colleague who did deals in China. He said that when his company went to China to negotiate a deal, every member of his team was introduced to every member of the Chinese company’s team, except for one person who’d sit quietly in the corner, not saying a thing. My friend soon learned that this silent observer was the most powerful person in the room because he reported back to the government who controlled everything.
Susan: This is the only way I can leave another comment, so that you can respond back (when you have the time to do so). When you are in your late 20s, your way of thinking has changed, from when you were 18, because you have a little bit more life experience. When you are in your 30s, you get more life experience, and when you turn 40, you should have enough life experience to be able to spot when someone isn’t really supporting what they say. You could have a psychologist analyze Danielle Smith in her speeches and videos, and they would say that she’s lying, and being forced to say things that she truly doesn’t even believe in herself. Anyone with enough life experience can see the same thing. When Danielle Smith lies, she shows a smirk on her face, or has a stammering speech, that’s very broken. Ralph Klein was strikingly similar. When he spoke to the media, he’d have a smirk on his face, when you knew he was lying.
Dwayne, I found your comment very interesting because I too have noticed that smirk. As you point out some of her predecessors did the same thing. I noticed that Jason Kenney for example was usually a smooth, articulate speaker and every so often he’d start um-ing and er-ing and saying “I believe….” That for me was a dead givaway that what he was about to say was a lie.
I was reading about a British Tory MP who was caught in a flat out lie. they admitted that they’d lied and then they said they didn’t see why the press was making a big deal about it, it’s not as if they’d caused any harm. I couldn’t believe the arrogance. In the past politicians who lied would say they’d “misspoke”. Now they say “I lied, so what.” Welcome to the post-truth Trump era.
Susan: There was an error with how my last comment got posted, so you’ll have to respond this way.
Yay! Marlaina Smith, DaveyP and the UCP solve another problem that never existed so they can blow their, ‘see, the problem is gone!’ doqwhistles calling the hateful basest of their truly base base to heel/snark_off
Seriously though, the drought stricken gormless will lap her offal up like it was ambrosia;
this particular chestnut of a sneer signal has been tailored to act as a wedge that the UCP are hammering in to divide parents/children/students/teachers in order to provide cover for their planned encrapification of education, as they are in the process of doing with Albertans’ healthcare.
“Laws for thee, but not for me.” too. Eg.
https://www.readtheorchard.org/p/take-back-alberta-refusing-to-co
“Founder David Parker says he won’t provide the names of his donors to Elections Alberta until all of its employees are fired.” – Jeremy Appel
if the donations to Backsliding Alberta’s Davey Parker the gibbering gibbon from Gibbons, are all above-board and from Albertans, then why is he so desperate to avoid revealing them to Elections Alberta, as required by law?
Also, how far along in the investigation are police authorities on his seeking to have elections Alberta staff removed and replaced with his BFF’s?
Finally, who died and made him Alberta’s Prince Balding? No one, that’s who.
Except for that last one, I’m just asking questions here.
GoinFawr: It appears to me that TBA is very much like a cult, and is subverting democracy. David Parker was never elected, and he believes that he has political power and clout. If he is messing with the political and democratic process in Alberta, he will have to face fines for that, by none other than Elections Alberta. If Elections Alberta, who are an apolitical entity, fine David Parker, I’m not sure if that is enough to teach him a lesson. If David Parker does something very nefarious, he may face jail time, like members of Grant Devine’s PC cabinet in Saskatchewan did, long ago. Elections Alberta issued around $200,000 in fines to UCP members, including a UCP MLA, for breaking election laws. The Kamikaze Campaign also happened. The UCP are subverting democracy in other ways, such as having forfeited by-elections in vacant ridings, who lacked an MLA, has the lowest Legislature sittings of any province, or territory, in the entire country, tries to pass controversial legislation, prior to a weekend, or a long weekend, won’t allow public forums on controversial topics, such as the unpopular Alberta Provincial Pension Plan, has bullied municipal leaders, who disagree with the UCP’s bad policies, and has created Bill 8, which changes the gift limit amounts MLAs in Alberta can receive, which makes bribery for MLAs possible, and this bill also ties up the Alberta Ethics Commissioner, rendering them absolutely powerless, prior to a provincial election in Alberta, so that they cannot investigate any MLAs for unethical and illegal activities, at that time, thereby allowing them to run. Unless people wake up in Alberta, things are not going to improve.
Alberta is a much smaller place than these folk seem to think, and the way they are messing around with Albertans’ rights they’re going to find out.
Dwayne – I fully agree with you and I just hoped that Elections Alberta had more power than it seems to have. David Parker has to go and fast, but he cowardly hides behind the curtains but controls his bunch of borgs including puppet Danielle Smith. She, of course, is not the best crayon in the box and keeps spitting lies and Taliban like ideologies reflecting those that want the women back in the kitchen and treat their kids by their Christian Sariah law that we are all sinners awaiting the second coming. Now their representative in Ottawa Pierre Poilievre and his gang are delaying the MAID access for people with mental issues because of course GOD is the only one who can decide when one dies. They all believe in their weird stories of creation, all different ones we have around that encompass from Adan and Eve to people coming down in flying saucers and have the guts to ridicule those that, like myself do not believe in God. As a decent citizen I and only I, have the power to decide when my life ends, not a judge, not a pope, not a politician or anyone else. So stopping people from choosing freely to be able to die with dignity is just causing people to throw themselves from bridges or shooting themselves in the head. Unfortunately these so called Libertarians only believe in freedom for the ‘chosen’ like themselves.
GoinFawr, Dwayne and Carlos: thanks for that interesting chain of comments. I’d like to pick up on the comment that David Parker and TBA are operating like a cult. Someone I follow on Twitter shared a tweet in which Parker said his wife has described him as “messianic.” Sadly this is not a good thing. People who think they answer to a higher power believe it’s okay for them to do whatever they have to do (including breaking the law) in order to achieve their purpose. Not only is this the height of hubris, but it’s also incredibly dangerous.
We rallied in support of transgender kids and we’ll continue to rally in support of LBGTQ rights, abortion, etc.
That fact we even have to say those words is shocking, but here we are.
My personal take for the moment is that we shouldn’t over react to this silliness….its Smith doing politics, reassuring her right wing that she has the future well in hand, and that conservative Christian values still rule the land. Yes, some young people may find themselves in situations less supportive….but these are a very small number of young people….and in many cases, they already have a robust support system.
We should be vigilant for sure….but we should also remember: politicking is different from governance. The UCP love to politic….and gender issues are a fun place for them to do that. But when it comes to administering the policy, I suspect rhetoric is going to stand in for enforcement, in the majority of cases.
And what’s next for Smith……….in her crusade for the safety of the status quo?? I suggest she go after Vegans. After all, who do we think it is putting our cattle industry at risk??? Surely its not the drought. Check out the destruction of little Sibbald lake if you want to see what Vegans have forced our cattlemen to resort to!!!
In short my fellow progressive politicos: Let’s not over react or feed into Smith’s need to create conflict, wars of words and nasty exchanges about the sacred nature of our samenesses.
We have bigger issues and much larger threats confronting us. What she’s got planned for our eastern slopes comes to mind….not to mention our pension plans.
Ingamarie, while I agree that we have big issues and large threats confronting us, I am very concerned about this attack on transgender youth, their parents, their teachers and their doctors. I object to it for three reasons:
First, the State has no business interfering in the medical treatment of minors (who it must be remembered require parental consent for treatment). Essentially the State is saying it doesn’t trust parents and doctors to do right by these kids, so it will strip these parents and doctors of their right to make these decisions. (For the kids’ own good, of course).
Second, they’re meddling in the teaching of sex ed in schools, which has been proven to be effective in reducing unwanted pregnancies in teenagers.
Finally, this decision will cause untold grief in the lives of young people who are especially vulnerable.
It’s just inhumane.
I don’t disagree with your concerns Susan…its more that much of her bill addresses things that are already in place…particularly regarding surgeries….and how she’ll enforce it all is pretty up in the air as far as I can see.
I think its a distraction….and am glad young people are stepping up, but don’t want to over heat the issue…..since it’s red meat to the kind of rage farmers that attacked a municipal by law to cut down on paper waste.
And it does strike me as somehow sad and pathetic, that while we get ready to put restrictions on issues of sex ed and sexual health, a genocide is ongoing in Gaza that the mainstream is only too willing to ignore. So currently, I’m ashamed of most of us, for what Smith is trying to do, and what our mainstream majority is only too willing to ignore.
We may be privileged, but we’re mostly not the humanitarians we imagine.
Smith is I believe a media junkie – anything to keep her name in the news is good, no matter how idiotic/harmful. I suppose as an older woman she doesn’t have much if any concern about policies that might harm women since she is not likely to be personally affected by (for instance) an abortion ban. Regardless, as others have noted we’ve bigger issues. Has anyone noticed the announcement by AimCo that they’ve created a new billion dollar fund to invest in ‘alternate energy technologies’? I’m not sure if this is to take away attention from the AimCo CEO talking about possibly purchasing the Trans Mountain Pipeline when/if the Federal government decides to sell it – using public pension funds to do so. Consent of fund members not mentioned as possibly being required. A telling harbinger of what might occur if the UCP ever manages to get its paws on CPP contributions made by Albertans. I’m also not sure if ‘alternate energy technologies’ actually means technology not based on oil or gas production.
Linda, I’m no so sure Smith was happy with being in the spot light on this issue, but in true Trump-fashion, she’s not backing down. Apparently the way to diminish the damage done by a harmful announcement is to double down on it because the public (idiots that we are) will change their minds and decide that this “bad” thing is actually a “good” thing because Smith/Trump keeping saying it is.
Your point about the AIMCO investment is an interesting one. I haven’t seen much on this other than they’re investing $1Billion (it had $135 billion under management at the end of 2022) in a variety of energy transition opportunities including:
– industrial decarbonization, carbon capture and sequestration (CCS worries me given how many writers say it’s overblown as a solution
– Sustainable solutions and renewable fuels (which would be good)
– Low-carbon renewable energy production and related technologies (which would be good)
– Electrification, storage and energy efficiency (I’m not really sure what this is)
What I find interesting about the announcement is that it appears to undermine the conservative belief that climate change isn’t real or if it is, it’s not as bad as you think. I’m looking forward to seeing what specifically they invest in or whether this is all hype. Here’s the announcement: https://www.aimco.ca/insights/new-fund-for-energy-transition
Susan, what I find of interest in the AimCo announcement & what makes me wonder just how much of this fund will be ‘invested’ in renewables is the pause the UCP under Smith put on renewable energy projects last August. Insofar as I’m aware, that ‘pause’ in the approval of renewable energy projects still exists. So just exactly how will that new $1 billion dollar fund under AimCo management make money, if they can’t get project approval? Doesn’t industrial decarbonization, carbon capture and sequestration all pertain to oil & gas related projects? To me, this smacks of a feel good announcement that masks how the funds will actually be utilized. For instance, many energy companies have a number of wells that need cleaning up. Smith & Co. want to grant public (taxpayer) money to encourage said companies to comply with the law that already exists – in other words, taxpayer pays, NOT the company whose mess it is. So will this new AimCo managed fund be used to ‘fund’ cleanup projects that should have instead been done at the expense of said companies in the first place? I simply have no trust when it comes to the UCP meddling in how public pension funds are handled.
Breaking news: Pierre Poilievre has finally committed himself.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/pierre-poilievre-danielle-smith-transgender-1.7106283
Let the culture wars begin!
Mike J. Danysh: How will this mesh with the CPC’s deputy leader, Melissa Lantsman, or others in the CPC fold, like Candace Bergen? It may even ensure the CPC get defeated in the next federal election.
Good question. It seems Poilievre told his MPs to shut up while he decided what to say about it. I doubt the few remaining moderates, like Candace Bergen, will be happy about this. But at their last convention, 69% of Con members voted to support something like this.
We now have four Con provincial governments pushing this stupidity: New Brunswick (first to try it), Ontario (less strident), Saskatchewan (very strident, invoked notwithstanding clause) and of course Oilberduh (most strident of all).
How many Con MPs will fall into line is an open question, but in the Prairies, I’d say it will be “lots.”
Everyone needs to watch the interview DSmith had with Vassy. Or. Watch Lisa’s comments on TicTok or X. Lisa nails Smith every time!!
Oh,Mike, you had my hopes up just for a second ” Breaking News–Pierre Polievre has himself committed “…..
And I 100% agree with Kathleen about Lisa….she is what MSmedia should be, imo. Her latest on Parker should be available for everyone to see (I’m perfectly fine with a few bleeps.At this point I bleep every time I see Pierre’s face on TV)
Kathleen and Randi-lee: I haven’t seen the Vassly clip yet, still trying to find it, but I absolutely agree with your take on Lisa. Nails it every time.
Mike: I thought the quote was perfect: “Let parents raise kids and let provinces run schools and hospitals.” This is the exact opposite of what Smith is doing. She’s not letting parents raise their kids, she’s blocking the parents’ right to access medical treatment for their kids. Also, as far as schools and hospitals, all we’ve heard from Smith is griping that the feds aren’t giving her enough money for schools, hospitals, or for that matter, affordable housing and cleaning up the mess left behind by the oil & gas sector.
Double-speak right across the board.
It always amazes me when Conservatives talk about parents rights and individual rights.
They actually mean the rights they think parents should have which it pretty well seems not much.
The same with MAID which is now stuck again because Pierre Poilievre does not believe people with mental issues should have access to it.
Summarizing extreme right wing rights apparently mean what offends their religious beliefs.
I am sorry I meant
Extreme right wing rights apparently mean what does not offend their religious beliefs.
Easy to know what that means because these people mostly live in the 12th century unless of course it is for themselves and their families. In that case they suddenly somehow see the light and everything is allowed.
Smith knows what she’s saying doesn’t make sense, but relies on her skills in bafflegab to keep people flummoxed on the issue. Like Jason Kenney before her, who regularly displayed “circular thinking” to justify morally reprehensible positions she has an astonishing willingness to gamble with people’s lives to score political points with their base of supporters. In Kenney’s case his contortions in trying to “play” everybody eventually cost him his Premiership- and you can bet Danielle Smith is very wary of ending up like him. And after all, David Parker of the “Take Back Alberta” gang said so. He has stated in no uncertain terms that he put her in office and he can take her out if she doesn’t dance to his tune. She, like all the other women in this province according to him, is just chattel. She is his proxy, and is only there to serve him.
The other observation, as others have also noted, is Smith uses these little “stink-bombs” to create a distraction when things are getting tense around other troublesome issues. She pulled this one regarding /”trans kids”/”sex education”/”parents’ rights” out of her fanny pack just when 1. family doctors were having a 24 hour social media marathon raising awareness about the crisis in family and rural medicine 2. the NDP are having across-the-province town halls on her proposal to take Albertans out of the CPP 3. Alberta’s fire chiefs are urgently asking the provincial government to explain how it’s getting ready for the upcoming wildfire season and to release its preparedness strategy. 4. the province is in Stage 4 drought with record lows in water reservoirs.
Not to mention all the other significant issues Smith’s extremely partisan and inept government are faced with. Her modus operandi has become so obvious- to feed red meat to her base while distracting everyone else from the sell-out of the province to corporate interests, the impending and existential perils of climate change, and the dismantling of a functional, democratic society. Smith’s all-in on such high stakes we have to hope she and the TBA/UCP crew bite the dust before our province does.
Dakota: agreed.
So here’s the thing, lobbing “stink-bombs” and bafflegab at the people only takes you so far.
This spring when the forests burn and the fields turn to dust and the reservoirs dry up we’ll get a chance to see just how far Smith’s “oh, look over there” tactic gets her.
Punching down on trans kids by “saving them” from over imaginary unwarrented state-driven medical tampering is just the smoke to gin the base. I suspect its not that Smith cares, its just that there are so few kids this applies to, she’s willing to use them as disposable pawns. She said as much when she said children’s social services would be there after …… (being beaten up, thrown out, discarded etc).
The nut of the Smith intervention seems to be the egregious parental Opt-In requirement prior to teachers delivering the approved Alberta sex-ed curriculum in various grades. Despite what idiots and it-won’t-work-that-way handwavers say, the sheer logistic overload of the repeated hassle of sending a note home with the kid for the parents to read/sign and kid return is deliberately designed to make sex-ed teaching untenable.
TBA wants sex ed to stop in the schools. Ignorance then is default to abstinence – and hey, if hetero-normativity can be enforced as the state default, all those default White cis-normal hetero kids will naturally wait until the age of majority and then get married and have loads and loads of White babies to keep the White Christian Canuck ethno-state percolating along. This is the other, hidden reason for the RW shrieking blither around “uncontrolled immigration” that’s raised its ugly head in the last 6 months.
Never mind sex ed came into the schools because parents were doing such a god awful job of it – I remember the health authorities concerns over elevated rates of teen-age pregnancies & youth sexually transmitted disease being the primary health care decision points to drive the introduction of sex ed into the schools in the first place.
TBA wants Alberta back to some mythical yesterday state – right now, they have a majority political party elected to help them along with that kind of social engineering here in Alberta. We all know how the fundamentalist mind works. So get busy, get involved in “your side” and get into the community and have your way. Whinging and whining won’t do it folks, we have to get off our butts.
Lee Neville: thanks for this. I often wonder why TBA and other conservatives believe the “mythical yesterday state” was so spectacular. Seems to me the only upside for these guys was that white men were at the top of the pyramid and everyone else was subservient. But here’s the thing, that lopsided power structure won’t fly today.
For one thing today’s families need dual incomes to make ends meet. The glory days of “no wife of mine is going to work” are long gone. And today’s working women (with a few exceptions) don’t take kindly to working a full day and then running home to make dinner, supervise homework, and tucking the kids to bed hubby lies on the couch and snaps his fingers for his wife to bring him another beer.
As you point out the consequences of Smith’s TBA directed policies will come back to bite us, it’s just a matter of time.
Not only will the lopsided power structure not fly, but the days of a single earner income being sufficient to support a family are long gone. Most families require both adults/parental units earning full-time incomes to cover the bills/mortgage/child-rearing costs – its not a luxury for the female wage as so often biffed away by these RW Happy Daze nostalgic fantasists. This rugged god-fearin’ blue collar dude with his white wimmen barefoot, pregnant, dumb and at home popcorn-popping out white babies may fly in the back corners of East Gumboot-North Horselips – but it should pass a moments muster in the real world. Anyone who says they’ve got a simple solution to a multi-variate, complicated hair-ball of a problem is either bu*f**k crazy or a simpleton escaped from their supervised nap.
It seems that the moratorium on renewables is still on and it is February. I think the UCP is hoping we forget it and Alberta can no longer develop its renewable energy sources. Let us send emails to the Taliban and request this moratorium to go and fast.
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2024/02/05/opinion/ideology-renewable-energy-growth-alberta
Please send a message to Madam Smith requesting this moratorium to go.
Well, Smith SAYS the moratorium will end on schedule:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-renewables-pause-ending-soon-1.7105233
We shall see….
Albertans were told the absolutely arbitrary 7 month moratorium imposed on renewable energy projects was implemented so that there would be some time for regulations to be introduced, legislated and such, yet to date there isn’t so much as even a report, let alone any new rules, and now things are going back to business as usual with no new legislation or regulations?
Yeah, that’s a tell: as if such a heavy handed moratorium was necessary for anything other than damaging private industry by government action, the exact opposite of the small-gov’t platform the hypocrite UCP ran on.
Good point GoinFawr.
Mike, I share your skepticism.
Carlos, thanks for the reminder that Smith put the brakes on our burgeoning renewables sector at the worst possible time. I’m waiting with trepidation to see what she comes up with. I worry she’ll impose regulations that are so onerous that the renewables sector will grind to a halt. This is what happened in the UK which it imposed a (temporary} ban on offshore wind projects. As a result of the ban the British public paid over 5 billion Euros more for power and even though the ban was lifted no new wind power applications had been accepted because the barriers to entry were too high. Just another example of taking care of your corporate friends at the expense of your citizens.
Here’s the link: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/27/zero-onshore-wind-plans-submitted-in-england-since-de-facto-ban-was-lifted
There’s one item that’s been overlooked in these comments. Smith said that the sex-ed curriculum would have to be approved by–who was it?–the Cabinet? Some Minister or other? Smith herself, as Premier? Anyway, a non-teacher, non-trained, non-qualified politician.
As somebody or other said, “What could possibly go wrong?”
LOL
Yes it is hard to find words to explain this circus.
Remember take the government out of the bed room?
Well it seems that our freedom fighters actually like to be in the bedroom and make the rules of the game. Do they also want Arian babies?
These people are so backwards that using redneck is an insult to the word.
Carlos, I wonder what it is about these conservatives that makes them so bloody interested in what goes on under the covers.
Ummm…jealousy?
Mike, apparently the sex-ed curriculum has to be approved by the Dept of Ed, who presumably approved it the first time it went into the curriculum. So now they get to approve it again. How’s that for reducing red tape and cycle time?
It could be worse. If it’s just rubber-stamping something they did already, that might slip under David Parker’s radar.
I suspect that the Education Minister, one Demetrios Nicolaides, will have to sign off. I wonder how carefully he’ll read it all?
Susan: firstly Thank You ! Another light in the darkness. We really do need advocates such as yourself!!
This ol’ Commadore has too much information stored and it takes awhile for the right info to get spit out on the floppy disk…lol
So I have a legal question— Danielle, speaking on Power &Politics , when being pressed on whom she talked to said ” I’ve spoken to a woman who had the surgery–Lois Cardinal– who regretted having the bottom surgery, and as matter of fact, she sued the government….at which point she ticked, and went into a spiel. ” So,because I need to know, I went searching; Duchess Lois of Alberta— okay fine, you be you, some interesting X ‘tweets ‘, a story byline about her procedure, in Montreal, but nowhere could i find anything about ” sueing the government. Can you steer me in the right direction on this ( if it’s true, which at this point is debatable).
One other thing I’d like to point out in this debacle. I don’t have the number on hand, but if memory serves, there was alot of the Conservatives who voted against (or “abstained “) the bill to ban conversion therapy. So they think it’s okay to try and program children into becoming “normal ‘ God fearing, bible reading Christians. I smell the fires of the inquisition here. And going by Parker’s rhetoric : “he says a democratic revolution is needed.”
He had also posted on X something to do with accounts being frozen, going after Scotia bank and Elections Alberta .The source of those donations really would be interesting.
Will the EA actually be able to do the right thing? We can only hope!
You’re welcome randi-lee.
I’ve poked around but have yet to find the lawsuit Smith referred to, but let me tell you, if Smith is creating government policy on the basis of one lawsuit then she’s in big trouble because Egale and Skipping Stone Foundation have said they’re commencing legal action. So what’s she going to do, continue with her policy because Lois Cardinal sued the government or cancel her policy because Egale and Skipping Stone are suing the government.
It was a stupid thing to say, but par for the course.
Lois Cardinal had that surgery about 14 years ago in Montreal. I wonder which government she sued, Alberta, Quebec, or the federal gov’t if it was involved with funding the surgery? But I saw a recent interview where she was conflating this surgery with sterilization of Indigenous women which seems unlikely.
There are also articles from anti-trans sources about her story which is sad if true, but I don’t know.
Got to luv Shsan for her analysis
Davidcodeclements: Thanks.
I am finding the comments of They Premier of Alberta very confusing. It is difficult to try to understand those who claim their awareness and sincerity about caring for Trans and gender-diverse persons. When talking in paradox, it would in my humble opinion best to use non-binary expressions so everyone can be included and respected. May they soon accept their proper pronoun to avoid biases and errors when speaking on such topics? I would not want to use what I cannot confirm.
Susan, just a follow up: re Lisa Cardinal– I’m going to go out on the limb here, but I would have to say that there would have had to have been some kind of interaction with Danielle or someone ” in the loop ” so to speak, otherwise how did she become aware of Lisa Cardinal to start with. I wouldn’t think she just pulled that name out of the air unless there was some kind of connection somewhere. And I’m pretty sure, she said “our government ” when she was speaking to David Cochrane. If it was the federal government, I’m sure she would not have passed up the opportunity to slam them. Whether it was warranted or not.
Again on her talk show, ( courtesy of Lisab/tiktok ) — listen to the words, and imo– Danielle uses personal terms ” someone I am close to/ in my family . Is this what Parker is holding over her?
And just as a sidebar, I don’t suppose Parker and his ilk have anything to do with the petition to get rid of the mayor of Calgary??
People ignored what d’rump was saying he would do, shluffing it off as ” well he’s just saying “. just ignore him. WRONG!! Parker has said he was going to ‘replace ‘ all the school board, councillors, etc.
So far it seems very few people are paying attention to him, at least as far as I can tell. And his personal attacks on S.Hoffman are going unanswered ( David @AP) . He reminds me too much of that other un-elected influencer down south, Steve Bannon. Who really is pulling the strings ….
As I said to my friend, I have a “tin-foil” theory, but speculation isn’t facts ,no matter what PP says.
very nicely said randi-lee. Loved it and it is time that we destroy as much as we can this constant propaganda trying to convince us that they are the libertarians that understand freedom but all I hear and very well is that never before has any conservative government been on people’s bedrooms like this Danielle Smith joke. It is as if I am witnessing a bad nightmare of stupidity and ignorance of basic societal skills. All I hear is people trying to bully the citizens to some kind of Talibanic dream paradise.
Thank you those are very interesting thoughts.
Carlos, reciprocated!! with an ironic LOL…
I know that I shouldn’t be surprised, but I used to be much more optimistic, back in the day….but I get truly frustrated with today’s reporters. It’s funny that no one has told Danielle/ UCP /TBA and especially PP ,that they are following the same path that led P.E.Trudeau to say “stay out of the bedrooms”
or in this case the Dr’s examining room.
And why has no one noticed that PP has some kind of a predilection (?) for single moms with 2 kids**…his go to when he’s trying to emphasize a point . Odd how often he runs across these hard done by women (JT’s fault)….
(1)Brianna that had her accounts frozen- no food for kids ….yet drove 100 miles so she could meet him in person ???
(2) Arrive-can app user quarantined, wages stopped- no food for kids…. so traveling outside of Canada, but no food for kids ???
(3) I’ve forgotten the other airport one…that was an real eye roller. His latest one was the 29 yr old stuck in her parents basement and couldn’t have kids because she wouldn’t be able to buy a house until she was 40.
The only thing missing from the repertoire, was ,” I met this woman, poor woman, tears in her eyes….Oh right, that was Mustafa missing his wedding, passport issues.
**What is the term for people that transfer personal feelings without being conscious of it ? He’s been out campaigning/but not campaigning for a yr & half, back and forth across the country, never at home, leaving the poor woman with 2 kids alone, printing up apple Tshirts for his “merch” for sale.
But it’s not right for MSM to compare him to d’rump. I say, if it looks like a….
and misinformation, exaggeration, and especially the so-called parliamentary “privilege “is still a LIE , by any other name Mr.Polievre,and also applies to Danielle.
Whoah! My apologies Susan, seem to have hit a nerve today. Time-Out! Dare I say, Happy Family Day ?? well I will and hopefully it’s a good one, optimistically, but I will settle for uneventful. Ta! Cheers!
Now there seems to be a push by the UCP government to advertise and promote adoption. Is this just a coincidence? Not a chance. Add that to Smith’s talk of fertility. What’s next? I have an idea, something about history repeating itself.
Albertarian– Danielle and or Parker: trans gender policies, parental rights (====) , conversion therapy, fertility, adoptions, human trafficking crackdown in Alberta, and next on the list imo, is what Alabama just brought into law about frozen embryos ….Makes all the hairs on the back of my neck start crawling.
For those who never had a “proper education ” or have seemingly lived in little bubbles, HISTORY, is what happened in the last 5, maybe 10 yrs. News that doesn’t affect them personally, is not important ( until it’s too late) and with the distorted messaging being put out, that is not being fact checked and called out by MSM , we are heading into the the inevitable position of — “gee, I didn’t see that coming “–.
20 or so years ago my sister and I first said, wtf?? are they deliberately trying to dumb people down? The answer is yes.
I’ve lost track of the number of books I’ve read (historical fiction, my go to) about the church, the kings and the serfs or as PP is fond of saying ” the common people/ unwashed masses.
IMHO, it’s why they took the ‘Progressive ‘ out of the logo, now it’s just CPC, and all their policies are totally “regressive”. Educated serfs are rather hard to keep under control, they start wanting to have what their betters have….next thing you know, they are going to think they are equal.
—But don’t worry, donate to me, and I will fix everything, donate to ME your hard earned tax dollars and I will fight the government that’s taking your tax dollars , when you elect me to be the government—
A friend of mine used to have an apropos expression ” You cain’t tell a Heinz pickle nuffin”…
It looks that we exhausted talking about someone that does not deserve our attention.
I have been very bothered with this concept of ‘Conservation’. It seems it actually means more extermination than anything else.
We encroach on their territory, we ruin their rivers by over fishing and by destroying habitat and then when the animals have no option but come to our cities to try to survive we kill them indiscriminately.
This article mentions that last year alone we killed 603 bears in the name of conservation!!! This is to me just absolute madness. In a time when animals are being hunted without mercy and many tortured and abused for a profit, we have the guts to call this Conservation. The worst part is that we think we are doing a great job.
Read this article and look up more if you are interested. I find this an absolute arrogant and criminal activity. I cannot believe that a country like ours is actually doing to the bears what other countries have done to the rhinos in Africa. Disgusting.
https://thetyee.ca/News/2024/02/20/Town-Beloved-Bear-Was-Killed/
By the way the problem is not too many bears – the real problem is too many humans and we are now having 7 million visitors to our unique parks under the name of tourist industry. This is not tourism anymore it is an invasion. It is already difficult for locals to visit the parks in peace. We are better than this.
Carlos— CONservation ,like the CON-serve-atives has become a symbol of our times. During all the reporting of the wild fires in BC & ALBERTA last year, only once did I hear someone make even a passing mention of the plight of the wildlife. Millions of acres of habitat destroyed, how many animals, birds, reptiles etc.died ? How many ecosystems partially or permanently damaged…And the animals that managed to escape and are now coming into human contact, out of the simple need of food and shelter, well excuse me, not in my neighborhood….hmmm, sounds familiar.
Pretty soon Mother Nature is going to really lose her temper and that cuff is going to hurt, alot.
‘Pretty soon Mother Nature is going to really lose her temper and that cuff is going to hurt, a lot.’
Mother Nature is already showing us not to play a dishonest game, but it seems we think we can deal with it. We will SEE!.
Randi-lee I am still hopeful one day we will learn how to work with nature rather than against nature, but first we have to learn the obvious – nature’s technology is 4 billion years old. We cannot even comprehend what 1 billion means never mind what nature does for us. One day humanity will look back and realize what we have destroyed but the real question will be – is it too late?
Crisis are overwhelming us in all different directions and most of us are realizing how insignificant we are.
I hope Mother Nature stops us on our tracks sooner than later because we will not change.
Randi-lee you mean the fires had an effect on wildlife? Did even any journalist in Alberta cared about that?
I hope mother nature hurts us very seriously, I mean it, because until then we will be reading Cinderella and the Seven Dwarfs and playing Dragons and Dungeons.
By the way Randi-Lee, I read yesterday that there are still 92 fires burning underground. Not enough rain or snow to extinguish them. What was the answer from our genius government? To cut firefighting budgets. So anyone with a very small brain knows what will happen this Summer, except of course our government.
I thought we were done with UCP nonsense this week but we are not lucky enough to not get some kind of genius statement every other day so that we do not fall asleep.
This one, of course, is very charming. The Government refuses to release the results of their own ‘Consult Albertans’ charade, and we all know why but I forgot they are libertarians that truly believe in freedom. They forgot to mention during elections that the small print said ‘ Only when it is convenient’.
https://albertapolitics.ca/2024/02/dont-imagine-for-a-moment-the-ucp-has-lost-interesting-in-getting-its-paws-on-your-pension/
I wonder if these very Devoted Christians have ever heard of the Ten Commandments?
David Staples from the Edmonton Journal, who likes to pat any UCPers on the back, is not very happy that Daniella Cinderella is not cutting personal taxes (not now she says – the same conversation of the last 43 years) – after all they need all the money to cut business taxes even more – 8% is too high of course especially when they have to pay their CEOs millions a year so that those hard working people can have a jet and a yacht and homes in all they favorite vacation paradises. I just read yesterday that City Bank is laying off thousands of their employees while increasing their CEO income to 26 million a Year. I am sure that she will no longer have any problem putting butter on the table. I hope so. Wonderful to know that some of us can actually afford all those luxuries.
Our premier does not believe in concrete and real renewable energy but she believes in unicorns.
Did Staples actually believe it was going to happen?
WOW I thought journalists with that amount of experience would have by now built a certain amount of political intelligence.
Tough luck David, it is about time you start looking at the reality path, instead of supporting fascist dressed up as libertarians that love freedom ( of course they mean their freedom)
Pierre Poilievre the new ‘know it all’ is now aligned with Cinderella on the transgender issue. I wish him well because he has a young daughter. Daughter maybe Son maybe non binary, depends how much estrogen and all the other chemicals they force onto to the cows to get them to produce more milk and more calves. I am sure he approves of those chemicals because it makes so much more money!! Grow economy Grow.
The bill is at the door now, of decades of abusing nature and all that took 4 billion years to create. Oh SORRY I forgot it was all created in seven days according to the books he is guided by. Sorry PP we cannot solve the problem in 7 days.
Carlos– I’ve always found it ironic that O&G industries whose biggest supporters seem to be the conservative evangelicals, always quoting their bible, (which as you said ‘7 days’) making their millions on/from a species that died off millions of yrs ago.
— we had a grade 9 science teacher who used to literally smack his head on the blackboard, saying ” you guys are driving me crazy “…..in retrospect, our apologies Mr Menzies, but on the bright side, some of us did listen AND we did learn and amazingly continue to do so.
Danielle’s video, I found almost frightening— she looked like she was about to burst out laughing. Whether from knowing how ridiculous the statements were and trying to sell them while keeping a straight face or something worse. IMHO ,All she was doing is gloating about the people who did not hear her say, before the election, I will not speak of this….NOW……the now is here.
I grew up on a farm, due to life’s circumstances became a city girl, then managed to get back to an acreage . First lesson of farming: respect Mother Nature (and not to be confused by PP and the industrial agriculturalists , who seem to spread alot of b.s., but like them it’s artificial) if you look after the land, it will sustain you, but you have to put in the work…You can’t keep taking and not put anything back. The I.A.s didn’t learn there lessons from the tobacco industry, they’ve just literally moved on to greener pastures and because of Prosperity Theology ,take it, make it, waste it, all in the name of ____?
Mother Nature will have the final word, no matter what Elon thinks or does; as a friend said to me recently, all that wealth accumulated is of no importance to the maggots, THEY are not prejudiced, or racist or elitists.
Carlos: What are your thoughts on this?
https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Solar-Energy/Could-Solar-Power-Become-Americas-Leading-Electricity-Source.amp.html
This is known all over the world except in Alberta.
She can do whatever she wants but in the end we are the ones who will pay the price for not having gone as fast as everyone else. The usual, nothing really new about this.
She can try as hard as she wants but with solar getting cheaper and cheaper every year and considering that the technology is still in its infancy and the possibility that soon one panel will do the job of 5 of the previous generation there is no way to stop it. She will become such an obvious dinosaur and will be pushed aside as NOT USEFUL.
Wow, here’s Smith taking off her mask inside the luxurious Ranchmen’s Club; gloating about pushing homeless people around, and planning to get rid of public servants because she thinks they are a bunch of NDP supporters.
No doubt she will replace them with incompetent rightwing hacks and mediocrities who can’t do their jobs.
https://www.theprogressreport.ca/black_tie_business_elite_crowd_in_calgary_applauds_danielle_smith_as_she_brags_about_tearing_down_hundreds_of_encampments_in_edmonton
valjobson920 TBA is in control of the UCP. That’s a fact.
Remember when Rachel Notley shocked us all, herself included, by winning the 2015 election? The entire bureaucratic establishment expected to be purged–and heaved a collective sigh of relief when Rachel decided NOT to punish them for being Tory hires. (I think she should have at least thinned out the obviously biased Old Tory apparatchiks, but she didn’t do much of that–more’s the pity.)
Rachel also kept both a wage freeze and a hiring freeze, for the first three years anyway. It took a special act of God to get approval for a new hire in those days.
Nine years on, and here we are with a small-minded egotist in charge of the government. I wonder how many of those suspected “NDP supporters” are hangovers from the bad old days of the Old Tories.
Whatever their political colour, those bureaucrats Smith’s gonna fire will take a LOT of institutional knowledge with them. This will result in even more disruption. One good way to destroy a large organization is to purge the old-timers who’ve learned the ins-and-outs of the place (largely because they wrote the various instruction manuals!).
This is just amazing. A foreigner millionaire walks in Alberta, maybe even without a visa, and declares that she does not accept a NO and announces ‘I will be back’, meaning I walk on water because I am rich and powerful.
She is back and the UCP, for sure getting a little gift under the table is ready to please her.
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2024/02/28/UCP-Gives-New-Life-Contentious-Coal-Mine/
Gosh are we a BANANA Third World Republic.
I am sure the ranchers that battled her last time will be waiting for her and I am so sorry I am not one of them.
According to the article Brian Jean use to write articles against coal mining.
MONEY TALKS
As I expected Danielle showed us her disdain for renewable energy with the new rules. This is going to affect us for decades but does she care? Of course not she will have her bank account for a great retirement somewhere outside Canada where she will pay no taxes and that is what is important to her and her gang.
The fact that thousands of oil wells are contaminating farm land is the cost of doing business. The fact that it is estimated that it will take 200 billion dollars to clean up tailing ponds is just a side story. But man those awful looking wind towers is unacceptable and covering farm land with solar panels is just horrible, even if temporary to assist us during transition.
Now to top it all Albertans will be the only Canadians that will not have access to pharma care. Are we all not so happy to have these experts running our lives for us and making the decisions that benefit only them.
We as Canadians should be able to stablish pharma care directly with the Federal government. It is a federal program and just because we have a sicko trying to be a leader should not exclude us from that program.
The Charter of Rights should allow us to choose to do it directly with the Federal Government. After all why should I, as a senior, be excluded from a Canadian Program? As far as I know Alberta is not an independent nation and I am a Canadian – Albertan not the other way around.
As far as Daniella, Parker, Lagrange and the rest of them can exclude themselves from the program. They will have enough anyway, we all know that. So what do they care? Their objective is not us , it is the money pharma care will allow them to donate it to their Lords, the Oil companies.
Yeah, our saviours Danielle and Adriana don’t like the pharmacare plan–despite the fact nothing but the existence of the plan has been announced. In fact, I think it’s a plan to make a plan (though I’d be delighted if I’m wrong about that).
But as for Smith’s posturing: it’s classic RepubliCon rage-farming. “Why is it that people who know the least, know it the loudest?”–source unknown
Great post by David Climenhaga as usual, one of the few journalists that still understands reality.
https://albertapolitics.ca/2024/02/will-take-back-albertas-sinister-supremo-meekly-submit-to-the-premiers-command-to-quit-tweeting/
One of his paragraphs sounds very interesting to me
‘As reported by The Globe and Mail yesterday – which means that as of now it’s officially news everywhere in Canada – Premier Smith said at a news conference that she had advised Mr. Parker to “to delete his X account and to get some help” after he took to tweeting crudely about Mr. Poilievre, his wife Anaida, and their relationship.
That, Ms. Smith said, was “inappropriate and hurtful.”’
Sounds like a schizophrenic telling another schizophrenic that he needs to see a psychiatrist as soon as possible. What a world. Parker (Putin 2.0) needs to be told and forced to shut up or go to a psychiatric institution. The freedom to say whatever he wants is not FREEDOM, it is lunacy, and lunatics should get help even in a province without a mental health program of any value.
Perhaps the nut bar team is starting to turn on each other? Parker’s tweet about Poilievre & his wife was circulating. So, using Poilievre tactics on Poilievre! Then Smith calling out Parker! I agree, seems a schizo recognizes a schizo. Given enough time till the next Federal election, they may destroy each other?? If Parker is indeed as powerful as he thinks, perhaps that will also end the DS rule – through another leadership confidence vote?
Leadership confidence vote does not exist in the UCP. We have to call it for what it is so that we have a chance to battle back these scum bags. I know this very unCanadian and unprofessional but I do believe the time to accept this kind of behaviour is gone and we are risking the future of our kids by being nice. David Parker is a sick person and he has to be treated the way he treats people..
The UCP is a circus of crazy animals
I doubt that Parker will ever rise to the level of Vladimir Putin. (I sincerely hope he will remain a local gadfly, for Canada’s sake. It’s too late to stop him from damaging Alberta.)
I suspect little Davey Parker is closer in spirit to a different Vladimir: Lenin. When Lenin and his co-conspirator Leon Trotsky began plotting to overthrow the Russian Emperor, they called their group the “Bolsheviks.” In Russian, that’s “majority party.” They labeled the Tsarist government “Mensheviks,” which means “minority party.”
No doubt the Tsar’s ministers laughed off this little cabal of would-be revolutionaries, who doubtless had their office in a shoebox. By February 1917, they weren’t laughing anymore.
Will Davey Parker rise to the prominence and importance of either Vladimir? Not likely. It’s even less likely if he keeps up his keyboard-warrior schtick and irritates the True Leader of Canadian Conservatism, the great Pierre Poilievre.
Oops. This was supposed to be a reply to Carlos’s comment, above. Sorry….
Hi Mike
When I said (Putin 2.0) what I was thinking about was meanness.
If David Parker was ever to reach Putin’s level in terms of a leader it meant Canada had already flipped. It is possible by the way because I have seen it happen, but not likely.
The reason for my reply is more to do with your ‘The Great Pierre Poilievre’. I know your comment is sarcasm do not worry.
If we make the mistake of electing this extremist, more known to me as the Bitcoin King of Canada, I will try to see if I can find a family member somewhere in the Free World so I can escape for 4 years.
He has said many times that he is the ONLY Canadian that can resolve our current crisis. I do not trust people that are the ONLY ONES ever.
Justin Trudeau has made mistakes like we all do, but I never felt as a Canadian that we were in danger of becoming the US 51 State. I am not so sure with Mighty Poilievre. After all he seemed to have been very supportive of the American subsidized Ottawa convoy. Wasn’t one of the convoy’s objectives to overthrow the Canadian Government?
Correct if I am wrong, I love a good discussion.
Hi Carlos. I can’t say I ever thought of Putin as being merely “mean;” that’s why I missed the connection. Putin is dangerous, megalomaniac, and possibly has delusions of godhood. Unfortunately he’s also the “elected” leader of a nuclear-armed country, so nobody’s gonna force him to take treatment (unless his generals revolt when he says, “Launch the nukes!”).
Parker is a local yokel with a big mouth and delusions of grandeur. He’s managed to rouse a surprising number of people who feel cheated or threatened by something, or many things. In this, Parker is closer to Donald Trump than to Putin. Remember, when Trump first tried for the Republican presidential nomination, in 2014 or 2015, he said that lots of Americans were no better off than they’d been 20 years before—and he was right. Real wages had been stagnant in the US (Canada was almost as bad) and anyone who wasn’t rich knew it.
Parker, like Trump and many other populists, has whipped up a lot of anger out of old grievances. Pierre Poilievre has been doing exactly the same thing, using Justin Trudeau—and Covid, taxes, housing prices, etc—as his scapegoat. Still, with the possible exception of rural Saskatchewan, I doubt Parker will make much headway outside Oilberduh.
In part, that’s because Pierre, the angry young man of federal politics, got there already. First it was Max Bernier (and where’d he disappear to? Will he stay hidden?), now Poilievre, cozying up to the noisiest, most “I know my rights!” Republican-wannabes in Canada. The FreeDumbs keep trying to march on Ottawa again, but that just fizzled out. There just isn’t much room left for David Parker.
As for what PP wants to do with—or to—Canada, I’m not sure. (Maybe he isn’t, either.) He doesn’t have much of a platform that I’ve heard, not many plans to build anything, but boy does he love to tear stuff down. I can’t believe PP would turn separatist, if for no other reason than non-Alberta voters would say no. (Quebec included; the would-be separatists know they’re better off in Confederation but always complaining they want to leave.)
Poilievre’s populist noises seem to me more intended to get votes from the angry-right FreeDumbs, not really to encourage the breakup of Canada. Of course, that’s what Jason Kenney did to win the 2019 election, rile up all the habitual Cons who COULD NOT BELIEVE!!! that their party LOST AN ELECTION. We all know where that led. Like Kenney and now Smith, Poilievre may learn to his dismay that waking up The Mob is a lot easier than lulling them back to sleep.
But breaking up the country? Joining the US? No. I doubt Poilievre would even consider it. (Being annexed or conquered by a second Trump administration is less unlikely; it is Trump, who’s even more megalomaniac than Putin. But still, the idea reminds me of snowballs and Hell.)
Hi Mike
I could not agree more with you , we just have different ways to express it. Furthermore English is not my first language and sometimes I say things that mean the same you say but they are imperfect.
I agree 100% with you about Putin and especially Trump who I consider as dangerous and has megalomaniac as Putin or more. He is certainly way more volatile.
I appreciate very much that you reply to my comments and generate discussion which is tremendously beneficial for both of us and for those who are kind and interested enough to read it.
My intention is purely to raise discussion that we so much need in a world that is deliberately becoming more introverted.
Thanks Carlos, it would be nice if people would get back to talking about problems, instead of shouting insults at each other. We might even be able to solve some problems, rather than making them worse.
Somehow, we’ve got to break down the walls that cordon off “progressives” and “conservatives” (insert your favoured terms for these polarizing and polarized categories, as desired). But I have no clue how to do it, and it needs to be done fast. One thing is obvious, the extreme example of the Trump Republicans mucking up the US government shows how NOT to do it.
There is one ray of hope for us progressives. It’s been said that, as big problems get closer to being solved, those who benefit from “business as usual” fight harder and harder to protect their old power base—because they know they’re losing. I think that’s true in business, in politics, in personal relationships (not the voice of experience, on that one).
I’ve read two short books on what’s going wrong and how to start fixing it. “On Tyranny” by Timothy Snyder has lessons from various countries in the 20th century that are relevant to Trump-era America. “Collaborating with the Enemy” by Adam Kahane has advice on how to start meaningful consultation among groups who can’t stand each other. Looks to me like Alberta, Canada, the US—the whole world!—need lessons in both.
Hi Mike
That book by Timothy Snyder is very good. I also read it and Susan has mentioned it many times. I have not read the book by Kahane , I did not even know that author. I just started reading ‘I Have Been Thinking’ by Daniel Dennett.
Anyway I have already posted much more than my fair share this week. Thank you for your comments. I not only enjoy them but appreciate your openness to a serious conversation.
Mike — where is Maxine?? coming out from from under where ever it is he seems to go long enough to try and distance himself from a “former PPC candidate “… who just happens to be at the heart of the ‘Arrive- Can APP” controversy…one David Yeo.
Article in Press Progress– People’s Party disavows former candidate…..and who is (was ? by now) a DND employee.
Now if I was going to write a fictional story….but I will behave.
And as a sidebar to the discussion between you and Carlos re: Which Vladimir may I add a few rubles worth…
Marlaina as Catharine and taking license with time frame, Parker as Rasputin.
My Biographies on them were unfortunately lost in a move, along with numerous others, so I cannot give the references I would like– but the “Manifesto on the Freedom of the Nobility “, first by Peter III and confirmed by Catharine..’ enlightened despot/absolutist .
“Enlightened monarchs distinguished themselves from ordinary rulers by claiming to rule for their subjects well being”—John Stuart Mill.
“Referendum” meaning in Alberta in 2024= since you gave me the mandate of a majority government “DS”; I work for Albertans, they gave me their voice. Ergo: R-star, people will get used to paying out of pocket, private hospitals & schools, coal mining the Rockies ( because it’s better for Albertans to let the companies mine ,than for them to have to pay for the $2 billion (?) lawsuit which just happens to be represented by the Bennett Jones- yes, Jason Kenny’s employer.
Throwing the tax on EV’s is such an incredibly childish thing, with the most ludicrous explanation…they weigh more?? Seriously?? given the number of trucks in Alberta? private and commercial?
It annoys me to no end, when politicians like DS & PP treat us all like we’re stupid. They may pull the wool over the eyes of their sheep as they fleece them, but not all of us are that gullible.
Well, the Ide’s of March are just around the corner, I wonder what they will bring? Legend, history or just another rewritten manuscript ??
Hi randi-lee. LOVE the quote from John Stuart Mill. Here’s another, that’s all too appropriate to your comparisons: “History never repeats, but historical situations recur.” (Arnold Toynbee?)
Parker as Rasutin? Jeez, I hope not. He’d bankrupt the pharmacare program trying to swallow it all. How about a Bismarck-wannabe? Parker’s pretty young to be the “grey eminence” behind the throne, but you gotta start some time.
When Danielle Smith—like Jason Kenney and Pierre Poilievre—says she represents “the people” I hear the words “some of” in front. Most notably, the people who own oil wells; the people who hate “wokeness;” the people who give money to their campaign funds (see 1st example).
The tax on EVs (as David Climenhaga pointed out to me) is partly red meat for Smith’s base. It’s another way to say, “I got your back, oilpatch workers!” But DS & PP (like JK before them) treat us as stupid because—surprise, surprise—so many of us are! You can’t make a man change his mind when his paycheque depends on not changing it.
Ah, the ides of March. I don’t think Danielle has to worry about reprising Caesar’s role just yet. Parker’s not quite ready to ditch her. As for the future, Smith will become legendary in the sense of “See what she did? Don’t do that.” And Oilberduh peons have no memory for politics. No need to rewrite the manuscript. Just change the date and pick an anonymous staffer to be the new “author.” Nobody will pay attention, anyway.
PS: as for Max, I don’t care where he’s hiding, as long as he stays there.
As if Smith and the UCP have not harmed Alberta’s clean energy industry enough, they plan to tax EVs for weight, although some gas guzzlers weigh more.
They are so obviously biased in favour of the filthy oil industry. How dare they interfere and tell us what we can or cannot drive?
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-budget-evs-danielle-smith-nate-horner-property-1.7129945
That is what they call freedom
Val, it does feel a lot more like punishment for the heinous crime of burning less stuff. It won’t stop me from buying an EV, though.
I am surprised they did not as far as banning electric cars in Alberta. The only concern I have is that does not seem that there is a plan to deal with the batteries once they have to be replaced and that seems to continue the same thinking pattern that brought us to the crisis we are in now. I also read that replacing those batteries on a Tesla seems to mean trading in the whole car. I remember the story of someone that wanted to replace the battery and Tesla wanted something like 30 thousand dollars and he ended up dynamiting the car in public as a kind of protest.
Carlos, I remember that story—and I don’t blame the guy. (I suspect, though, he paid even more in fines and cleanup costs than he did for a new car!)
But it’s nowhere near as bad as the EV-bashers want us to think. I have more bookmarked web pages than I can remember on battery EVs, their problems and advantages. The Ex-Twitter version is:
• Battery EVs really are much less damaging than fossil cars. For one thing, fossil fuels cannot be “recycled” into new fuel, despite attempts at synthetic (aka “hideously expensive”) e-fuels.
• Any car or truck (or plane!) can be largely recycled, if it’s worth while financially. This applies particularly to EV batteries.
• There’s already a large, growing but totally private (i.e., not nationally coordinated) battery recycling industry. It will continue to grow as EV numbers grow.
• I hear (from an electrician I know) that it’s easier to get replacement EV batteries—some, anyway—than people are told. Companies like Tesla or Nissan would rather sell you a whole new car. There are training programs, e.g. NAPA and EVFriendly, for mechanics to specialize in EV repair. I’ll have to follow up on this one, since I want to learn who can test an EV’s battery before I buy.
Now, for some sources of (less or positively biased) EV information. Since WordPress hates web links, I’ll limit the number I post here.
https://cleantechnica.com/
https://www.canarymedia.com/
(More shortly!)
Now, some debunking information, courtesy of the Guardian:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/series/ev-mythbusters
More generally, from Europe (this is the “green” site, political etc. news by clicking on blue “Euronews” in the header):
https://www.euronews.com/green/green-news
You can find articles on EVs, batteries, etc. on National Observer (paywall), some on The Tyee, and of course on CBC (that oh-so-lefty news organization).
As I hinted above, both Cleantechnica and Canary Media tend to be biased in favour of green technology—and they acknowledge it openly. I think that’s fair, especially because so much MSM coverage is negative; particularly thinly disguised opinion pieces in the PostMedia papers.
Enjoy!
(NOTE: it appears this comment either wasn’t accepted earlier, or maybe I clicked “Cancel.” Let’s try again. First part of my reply to Carlos re EVs and battery recycling:)
Carlos, I remember that story—and I don’t blame the guy. (I suspect, though, he paid even more in fines and cleanup costs than he did for a new car!)
But it’s nowhere near as bad as the EV-bashers want us to think. I have more bookmarked web pages than I can remember on battery EVs, their problems and advantages. The Ex-Twitter version is:
1 Battery EVs really are much less damaging than fossil cars. For one thing, fossil fuels cannot be “recycled” into new fuel, despite attempts at synthetic (aka “hideously expensive”) e-fuels.
2 Any car or truck (or plane!) can be largely recycled, if it’s worth while financially. This applies particularly to EV batteries.
3 There’s already a large, growing but totally private (i.e., not nationally coordinated) battery recycling industry. It will continue to grow as EV numbers grow.
4 I hear (from an electrician I know) that it’s easier to get replacement EV batteries—some, anyway—than people are told. Companies like Tesla or Nissan would rather sell you a whole new car. There are training programs, e.g. NAPA and EVFriendly, for mechanics to specialize in EV repair. I’ll have to follow up on this one, since I want to learn who can test an EV’s battery before I buy.
Now, for some sources of (unbiased or positively biased) EV information. Since WordPress hates web links, I’ll limit the number I post here.
https://cleantechnica.com/
https://www.canarymedia.com/
Hi Mike
I fully agree with what you said on your post. There is no doubts that EVs is a great step forward. My point is more that we have to stop allowing industry to put out products without any concern or care about what to do with it once it gets unusable. We have done enough of that.
It takes longer of course to develop new products but we cannot afford to continue dumping garbage everywhere. Right now we are dumping one full garbage truck in the ocean every minute. We love to point out that is happening in the third world but we never admit that it is the garbage we force on them for money. To me that should be banned and we should deal with our garbage, and grow up.
Firstly, Dear Susan, hope that all is well with you, and secondly Thanks again for giving us a platform to vent some of our frustrations over what is supposed to be “our” elected representatives.