Contemplating Regime Change in Alberta

 ‘G Man’, ‘The Red Queen’ and ‘Steady Eddie II’ (and, of course, ‘Darling Danielle’)
Phil Burpee, Columnist, Pincher Creek Voice

As the Voice goes to press with this column, the outcome of this Saturday’s slugfest over assuming the Crown and Sceptre of the doddering and incontinent PC Party of Alberta, and thus the government of our fair province, is as yet unknown. But, as Mr. Rumsfeld would have had it, the known knowns are clearly more in focus than the known unknowns, let alone the best-left-undisturbed unknown knowns. And we dare not even mention the unknown unknowns. What is known is that battle lines are being  drawn with unusual distinction between and among the forces of Gary ‘G Man’ Mar, Alison ‘the Red Queen’ Redford, and Doug ‘Steady Eddie II’ Horner.
And whilst they all affect camaraderie and a certain collegial jollity, it is clear that the knives are out and the smell of blood is everywhere in the wading pool. For what is at stake here is not just the pinnacle of governance of a once inconsequential and snoozy expanse of cows and wheat and trees, but rather the quasi-imperial throne from which pronouncements on energy, economics and hard-core commodity matters will, for at least a generation to come, determine the very nature and direction of the entire country itself. As will go Alberta, so will go, kicking and screaming or otherwise, the rest of Canada. So this Saturday’s little dalliance is no mere whiffle. It is nothing less than the placement of the CEO of Alberta Corp. Ltd. (plc).


And even though this is all a tawdry little piece of second-rate theatre moving into the forty-first straight year of Tory rule, there is some reason for interest in all this. It could actually be that the rudderless hulk that has become the Tory ship of state in Alberta is finally waking up to the fact that it may be time for the officers in charge to drag their flattened posteriors up out of their mess (mm hm) to the bridge in order to peer out onto the ominous and fog-shrouded waters ahead. For it may well be indeed that the Titanic is once again afloat, and once again steaming towards its implacable nemesis. And as the bleary eyes and rum-soaked brains struggle for comprehension, a vision appears above the swirling waters  -   a vision more terrible than the mighty ice berg of yore, more soul-chilling than the dreadful call of Davey Jones' locker, more intimidating than all the great rogue waves of a thousand sailors’ nightmares  -  it is the appalling spectacle of the Avenging Angel herself, risen up in righteous fury, aflame and incandescent with messianic zeal, her hair ablaze, her gnashing grin a blinding torch, her eyes merciless and raptor-sharp  -  oh ye mortals quail and quiver  -  it is none other than ‘Darling Danielle  -  She who would be Top Gun’. Be afraid then you mewling Tories  -  the pirate ketch Wild Rose is tossing grapples over your gunwales and the libertarian hordes are swarming aboard. Repent you Tory sinners while you may. Judgment is nigh. Mercy has fled you. The Libertarian Libertines have brought the Reckoning!

Well, we’ll see about that I guess. By all accounts Ms. Smith and the Wild Rosers are positively giddy with excitement and anticipation at the prospect of going into an election against a new PC leader who is perceived as 'moderate', as apparently are all three of the current contenders. Of course, 'moderation' within the folds of the Alberta PC Party is a highly flexible term. What it actually means is that the reactionary candidates of the right, viz. Messrs Morton and Orman, failed to make the cut and got unceremoniously dumped like so much yard refuse. Rick Orman was just a resurrected Tory corpse from way back in the eighties, but the real surprise was seeing the transmission drop out of the juggernaut that was Ted Morton's (aka Frederick Lee - oops) campaign and skid to a desultory, smoking stop in the middle of the highway. There suddenly stalled the man from Wyoming, He-Who-Had-Been-Poised-To-Create-the-New-Party-Of-The-Right-But-Opted-For-A-Plump-Cabinet-Post-Instead. In the great roller derby that is Alberta politics, poor Ted 'the Blond Bomber' Morton got hip-checked over the rail and tumbled in a shambles into the rowdy arms of the spectators. Ah, truly, it is a cruel universe devoid of justice. He'd squeezed Eddie's cojones over the budget, collapsed the Stelmach administration, and now had come to reap his grim reward  -  the sideline.

So, what's the line-up? OK, let's have a look. Eddie-clone Doug Horner should probably feel somewhat embarrassed at having hoped to secure his rural bloc for this vote while everybody was smack dab in the middle of a late harvest. And indeed we see that the voter turnout for this first round was depressingly low. Horner's people in fact dreamily say that everybody was busy on their tractors the first time around and will make the effort to get down to the Hall for the second. Yeah, well.....maybe. And maybe they'd rather have a toothache than bother. Then there's Ms. Redford, an outsider and, by all accounts, a veritable Tasmanian Devil amongst the lethargic hogs that typically constitute the PC Caucus. She has no friends and craves none. With a seemingly high-functioning cerebral cortex, she is certainly an anomaly amongst Alberta Tories. Of course, she is a British Columbian, and her credentials are therefore suspect, coming, as she does, from a land afflicted with a multi-party democracy  -  anathema to all true Albertans. Oddly, she seems to think that people ought to take precedence over money  -  a real head-scratcher for the prevailing government. We haven't heard this kind of reasoning since the days of Peter Lougheed  -  the last great Socialist Premier of Alberta. And then there's the 'G Man' himself, of course  -   the Marster, the Blue Machine. Here's a wiggledy-wagging little enthusiast from the Court of King Ralph himself. If you liked the fat, dopey, whatever, suck-it-up sort of thinking that so dignified the administration of Mr. Klein, then Gary's your man. This is the guy who had an epiphany and figured out that the best way to deliver health care in Alberta was to make everybody pay for it and see to it that the rich folks got the bed pans without the chips in them. Waydago Gary  -  very incisive. And now he's got Danny Williams plumping for him up in Newfie II (aka Ft. McMuray), the gentleman who winged down to Florida to get his ticker repair done at a high-end clinic while the rest of the Rock stood in line for theirs.

By the time you read this, dear Reader, you'll know which one of these fine birds has got the nod. Perhaps the most depressing aspect of the whole thing is that we have come to recognize that this business of electing a leader of the Alberta PC Party has become a proxy for the democratic process itself. Dropping the writ for a provincial election has become a costly, ludicrous and predictable exercise in futility. We just get a PC government anyway. So the real vote is now  -  or that's what they would have us believe. So confident are they in this process that they will allow any Albertan to come on down, drop five bucks, and sign up as a member. Then vote. Yikes.

There it is then. This weekend we will see the reinvigoration of the leadership  of the bloated and morally bankrupt Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta. The new leader will assume the mantle of state, and along with it the responsibility for, amongst other things,  the worst environmental record in the country, the highest per capita usage of food banks, the highest incidence of child poverty, and one of the lowest hydrocarbon royalty regimens in the world. Danielle Smith will rise, wraith-like, to challenge the new Monarch. It's a peculiar situation. Do we root for the incumbents, the larcenous and senile Tories? Or for the new contenders, those odd people of the Wild Rose with the strange glint in their eyes who you might not necessarily want to have sitting beside your Auntie at the church social. If I had to choose between a bloaty bull and a rabid dog, I think I'd get the rifle out for both.

The rifle is, of course, our vote. We have been lulled into believing that outcomes are foregone conclusions. They're not. Our democracy is not a plaything. The nature of the government of Alberta will be determined at the next provincial election. The charade this weekend is a coronation, not the result of a true process of popular representation. I will grit my teeth and at least try to enjoy the ruckus that is unfolding, so unusual within the normally sleepy domains of the ruling Party. I even look forward to Ms. Smith tearing into the flabby old Tory backside. But what I really hope for is an expanded regard for the importance of exercising our right to determine our collective evolution as a province and as a people. Because it is truly the case that we always get exactly the government that we deserve. Politicians themselves can never be blamed in any absolute sense. When things go wrong, there is, sadly, no-one to blame but ourselves. Such is the burden of responsibility.



Phil Burpee
October 1, 2011

Burpee is a carpenter and farmer living north of Pincher Creek. He keeps an eye on the world from under the big Alberta sky.