daveberta.ca - Alberta Politics and Elections

With the election polls opening in less than 8 hours, here’s a look at some of the races outside of Calgary and Edmonton that I will be keeping an eye on after the polls close tomorrow night.

Both Lethbridge-East and Lethbridge-West could be close tomorrow night. I’m giving Alberta Liberal MLA Bridget Pastoor the edge over Tory Jason Herasemluk in Lethbridge-East (Lethbridge-East has been held by the Liberals since 1993), but Lethbridge-West is a more open race with Tory MLA Clint Dunford’s retirement. Bal Boora and Greg Weadick have been duking it out in Lethbridge-West and it could go either way. Look for the Wildrose Alliance to potentially play the role of spoiler in these races.

I expect most of rural Alberta to stay coloured in various shades of blue tomorrow night, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t interesting races outside Edmonton, Calgary, and Lethbridge!

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m really looking forward to see how Alberta Green candidate Joe Anglin does in Lacombe-Ponoka against Tory Ray Prins. Anglin is a strong candidate and has excellent local name recognition. It would be great to see a Green be elected to the Alberta Legislature, and after Bill 46 and the AEUB spy scandal, Anglin would be a much stronger advocate for the region than backbencher Prins.

It would be nice to see Wildrose Alliance Leader Paul Hinman get re-elected in Cardston-Taber-Warner, but it could be close as Hinman is facing off against former Tory MLA Broyce Jacobs. Peace River and Dunvegan-Central Peace are on my radar for potential pickups for the Wildrose Alliance. If they are going to pick up seats, I think it’s likely that it will be in the northwest corner of Alberta rather than the south. A backlash against the proposed nuclear power plant in the Peace Country manifest itself into a win or a strong showing for the Wildrose Alliance in these two northwestern constituencies against what could be described as two weak cabinet ministers (Frank Oberle and Hector Goudreau).

Other potentially interesting races I’m going to be keeping an eye on include Red Deer-South, Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo, Medicine Hat, West Yellowhead, and Whitecourt-St. Anne.

With the election polls opening in less than 8 hours, here’s a look at some of the Edmonton and area races that I will be keeping an eye on after the polls close tomorrow night.

Over the course of the past 28 days, I’ve had many Tories tell me that they expect their party to gain a large number of seats in Edmonton in order to offset expected gains they expect Kevin Taft‘s Alberta Liberals to make in Calgary. The main argument from my Tory friends seems to be:

1) Because Ed Stelmach from Vegreville, Edmontonians will vote Conservative.
2) Because his name is “Ed,” Edmontonians will vote vote Conservative.
3) Because Ed Stelmach isn’t popular in Calgary, Edmontonians will vote Conservative.

I really shouldn’t have to explain why these are pretty weak arguments. Though I think that my Tory friends sounded a bit optimistic, I have no reason to believe that Edmonton is any less competitive than it has been in past elections – the capital city has had a competitive political environment on the provincial level since 1986 (with the exception of 1993).

Currently, the Alberta Liberals hold a plurality of Edmonton’s seats and though I can’t see them being at risk of losing much ground in Edmonton there are some obvious competitive races between the Liberals and Tories that could go to either party. My list of competitive races between the Liberals and Tories includes Edmonton-Castle Downs, Edmonton-Decore, Edmonton-Ellerslie, Edmonton-Manning, Edmonton-Meadowlark, Edmonton-Mill Creek, Edmonton-Whitemud. In the Edmonton area, St. Albert, Sherwood Park, and Spruce Grove-Sturgeon-St. Albert also look like they could be in play tomorrow night.

Edmonton is also the only place in Alberta where the New Democrats could be considered electorally relevant. Look for them to concentrate their energies on trying to hold on to their current four seats. Though I tend to believe that Edmonton-Calder, Edmonton-Highlands-Norwood, and Edmonton-Strathcona will stay New Democrat this go around, I believe that Edmonton-Beverly-Clareview is in play with both Alberta Liberal Dawit Isaac and Tory Tony Vandermeer running strong campaigns against Ray Martin. The New Democrats have pockets of support in other Edmonton constituencies where they could play the roll of spoiler in tight races between the Alberta Liberals and Tories, but I have a hard time seeing them build on the four seats they won in 2004.

Here’s a bit of comic relief for the last day of Alberta’s 2008 election campaign…

Enjoy…

I went to the Alberta Liberal rally today in front of Edmonton-Strathcona Alberta Liberal candidate Tim Vant’s campaign office on Whyte Avenue. Here’s a couple of pictures…

Here’s a bit of a look around the start of the last week of Alberta’s 2008 provincial election campaign…

– Hey, Ed! You say Kevin Taft‘s environmental plan will cost Alberta 300,000 jobs. Where’d ya get your numbers? Kim Trynacity would like to know (Rumour has it that Ed’s source also thinks that Taft’s environmental plan will cause the breakdown of civilization and ignite a global zombie war).

– What would Preston think? Former Reform Party communications guru Ron Wood fires off a letter of support to the Alberta Liberals.

– Ed Stelmach pulls out the Ken Lay card in the final week of the campaign, but a Tory insider thinks Stelmach is playing from the wrong deck:

“Taft is not the problem — it’s the 18 per cent undecided that’s the problem,” the Conservative said. “They’ve got to be running a campaign in the final week to get the undecided off the couch.”

“Now that you have their undivided attention, start talking about your campaign, your candidates and what you will do. Don’t send out bulletins obsessing about Taft.”

– Some are more equal than others. Why are rural Albertans worth more than city folk?

– Keep it classy, folks. Aman Gill, Alberta Liberal candidate in Edmonton-Mill Creek, is the target of racist vandalism.

– Calgary-Egmont is the “Baskin Robbins of the Conservative Party.“