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2006 Alberta PC Leadership Race Ed Stelmach Jim Dinning Ted Morton

everybody’s third choice. one year later.

Today is the one-year anniversary of Ed Stelmach‘s selection as leader of Alberta’s 36-year old Progressive Conservative government (and also a first-anniversary for anniversary for Stephane Dion). On December 2, 2006, Stelmach came from third place to defeat Jim Dinning and Ted Morton in the final weekend of the Alberta PC leadership selection.

Stelmach’s year as Tory Premier has been the most shaky the Tories have witnessed in a long time. I could use this post to write about Ed Stelmach’s Tories and their many, many missteps and missed opportunities over the past year (the Calgary-Elbow by-election, EUB spy scandal, a damning Auditor General’s report, waffling on the royalty review, shutting down debate on Bill 46, taking 4 months to deal with Craig Chandler in Calgary-Egmont, the rest of the Top 10, etc), but instead, I’ll wish Premier Stelmach congrats on surprsing many of us by surviving one year.

In conclusion, I will leave you with everyone’s favorite theme song from the 2006 Alberta PC leadership race:

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Calgary-Egmont Craig Chandler Ed Stelmach

craig chandler: judgment day.

Today is decision day for Craig Chandler.

Today, Ed Stelmach and the Alberta Progressive Conservative Association executive committee will decide the fate of the dually nominated Progressive Conservative candidate in Calgary-Egmont.

As yesterday was this blogger’s Birthday (thanks, Blake), I don’t think there could be a better present that Ed Stelmach and the Alberta Progressive Conservative Association executive committee could give this blogger than Craig Chandler, Progressive Conservative candidate for Calgary-Egmont.

UPDATE: Ed Stelmach has pretty much done what everyone expected he would do and rejected Craig Chandler’s nomination as the PC candidate in Calgary-Egmont. It should be interesting to see what Craig Chandler’s next move will be (considering he won the Calgary-Egmont nomination with the support of the large majority of Calgary-Egmont PC members).

Will Stelmach appoint his favorite candidate or let the constituency association hold another nomination meeting?

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Alberta Politics

ed stelmach invokes closure on bill 46.

As part of his government’s priority of Accountability and Transparency for Building Tomorrow’s Secure Alberta Future, Ed Stelmach has taken a hold of the reigns of democracy by invoking closure on the debate of controversial Bill 46. Official Opposition MLAs were only given four hours to debate the Bill before Stelmach shut down debate on the Bill.

Alberta Liberal MLA Laurie Blakeman:

“The Conservatives aren’t even allowing their own members to speak to it,” Blakeman says. “If you think electing a Conservative MLA will put you on the inside of government, you’re wrong. They’re shutting down their people.”

This is the first time the Stelmach government has used closure. The Klein government used closure 38 times in 14 years but it seldom used closure on more than one stage of a bill.

“Stelmach is Klein on steroids,” Blakeman says. “He’s hyper-Klein.”

The Tories introduced amendments to the Bill this week, but a group of central Alberta landowners (including Lacombe-Ponoka Green candidate Joe Anglin) responded with:

In Bill 46, including the new amendments tabled today, if a person is directly and adversely affected by a proposed project the new commission can still make any decision or issue any order without giving notice or holding a hearing if the commission is satisfied the applicant followed the rules respecting each owner of land. No one knows what the rules are in respect to each owner of land and the rules have not been made or defined. What’s troubling is, Bill 46 allows the commission to make rules and regulations that supersede legislation. In essence the new Commission will be able to make rules to circumvent legislation.

Furthermore, the public can have no confidence in Bill 46 if section 24(1) remains. Section 24(1) allows the Commission to make any decision or issue any order without giving notice or holding a hearing if the commission considers the matter urgent or for any other sufficient reason. Simply stated citizens have no right to notice or to a hearing in Bill 46. Finally, in Sec 9(4) the Commission does not have to afford an opportunity to a person to be represented by counsel.

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A Learning Alberta Affordabilty Framework Council of Alberta University Students Dave Hancock Denis Herard Doug Horner Roles and Mandates

roles and mandates.

Completely under the radar, Alberta’s Department of Advanced Education and Technology released its Roles and Mandates framework document yesterday.

In the early months of 2007, in my role as Chair of the Council of Alberta University Students, I was part of the original consultations for this framework. Though I’m not that they were really ‘consultations,’ as no one seemed very clear as to what ‘Roles and Responsibilities‘ (as it was then known) was supposed to accomplish, only that the Minister wanted to define them.

At the time, the new framework looked suspiciously like a makework/legacy building framework project from new-Minister Doug Horner (Roles and Mandates followed a string of Advanced Education frameworks, including from Dave Hancock’s A Learning Alberta and short-term-disaster of a Minster Denis Herard’s *weak* Affordability Framework).

As unsexy as ‘Roles and Mandates‘ sounds (and probably is), I’ve been a little disappointed at how low under the radar the entire process has flown. If the framework is as important as CAUS’ latest media release gushes, it’s too bad that groups like CAUS and Public Interest Alberta’s PSE Taskforce weren’t more aggressive in bringing this to the media and Albertans attention (especially with a provincial election around the corner).

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Calgary-Egmont Craig Chandler

the daily craig chandler.

Here is your daily update on Calgary-Egmont’s nominated Progressive Conservative candidate:

Globe & Mail: The Chandler Problem
FFWD: Former radio host a “huge liability”

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Alberta Politics Craig Chandler Ed Stelmach

gary mar, a golden parachute, and more.

A bit of a look around…

– Gary Mar has strapped on his golden parachute and is on his way to a +$230,000 taxpayer funded gig in Washington DC.

– Ed Stelmach doesn’t want to meet with Calgary-Egmont nominated Progressive Conservative candidate Craig Chandler. Stelmach and his inner circle will meet on December 1st to decide whether PC members in Calgary-Egmont made a better decision than a small group of Conservative lawyers.

Concerned Christians Canada are calling it a witch hunt, but I tend to agree with Don Braid:

All this happened because local Conservatives, demoralized after Jim Dinning’s leadership defeat, didn’t have the will to fight off Chandler even though they saw him coming months ago.

– A number of candidate nominations happened yesterday. For the Alberta Liberals, Greg Flanagan was nominated in Calgary-Bow and Tony Vonesh in Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills. The Tories nominated Lindsay Blackett in Calgary-North West.

– Alberta’s Bill 46 battle continues, pitting rural landowners versus the Stelmach Tories.

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2008 Alberta Provincial Election Alberta Politics

more alberta nominations.

A whole load of candidates have been nominated in the past week. In Calgary, three Alberta Liberal candidates were nominated last night Laura Shutiak in Calgary-Fish Creek, Lori Czerwinski in Calgary-Lougheed, and John Roggeveen in Calgary-Shaw.

The saga of Craig Chandler and his victory in the Calgary-Egmont Progressive Conservative nomination continues as the constituency President is now demanding a seat at the table when Ed Stelmach and the PC Inner Circle meet to decide Chandler’s fate this weekend.

In Edmonton…

Edmonton-Ellerslie – Naresh Bhardwaj was nominated as the PC candidate to take on Alberta Liberal MLA Bharat Agnihotri in the next election. Bhardwaj ran for the nominated against 1993 Edmonton-Ellerslie PC candidate Bas Roopnarine and 2001 PC candidate Sukhi Randhawa (of ‘Booze for Votes‘ fame). In 2004, Edmonton-Ellerslie was a three-way race between Agnihotri, Tory Gurnam Dodd, and ND Marilyn Assheton-Smith.

Edmonton-Highlands-Norwood – Former Liberal/Independent/PC MLA Andrew Beniuk defeated T.J. Keil for the Tory nod. Though I was rooting for T.J. (yes, I was rooting for a Tory), I think Beniuk’s name recognition might help him do decently against ND leader Brian Mason in the now merged constituency that Beniuk formerly represented.

Edmonton-Meadowlark – The Alberta Liberals have nominated Debbie Cavaliere to run for the spot of retiring MLA Maurice Tougas. Cavaliere will take on PC candidate Raj Sherman in what is sure to be a hot and probably close race. In 2004, Maurice Tougas surprised many when he defeated backbench Tory MLA Bob Maskell by a slim margin of +100 votes. Edmonton-Meadowlark was also a close race in 2001 when Maskell unseated Alberta Liberal MLA Karen Leibovici.

Edmonton-Mill Woods – The Tories have nominated Carl Benito to run against Alberta Liberal MLA Weslyn Mather. Benito ran unsuccessfully against MLA Don Massey in Edmonton-Mill Woods in 2001. Mather was elected in 2004 with a margin of +2,000 votes over Naresh Bhardwaj (who is now the nominated PC candidate in Edmonton-Ellerslie).

Other recent nominations include Robin Campbell for the Tories in West Yellowhead and Horst Schreiber for the Alberta Liberals in Battle River-Wainwright.

Click here for an up to date list of Alberta provincial election candidates.

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Alberta Politics

stopping bill 46.

This ended up in my email inbox this evening…

– KILL BILL 46 RALLY ¬
What: A Rally of citizens concerned about the negative effects of the Government’s proposed Bill 46 on peoples rights to participate in energy and utilities regulatory proceedings.

When: Tuesday, November 27, 2007 at 12:00 Noon sharp
Where: Alberta Legislature Building
10800 – 97 Ave.
Edmonton, AB

Why: Bill 46 is about to be passed into law by the Conservative Government even though it will have very dramatic negative effects on the ability of the citizens of Alberta to effectively intervene into proposed energy and utility projects that will directly affect them, their lands or the environment. There has been widespread opposition to the Bill and now is the time to show Premier Stelmach that Albertans do not want Bill 46 to be passed into law.

Who: Concerned citizens, landowners, environmentalists and social justice activists – everyone interested in fair and transparent government.

Contacts: Southern Alberta: Mike Judd, 403-627-2949
Central and Northern Alberta: Joe Anglin, 403-843-3279

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2008 Alberta Provincial Election Alberta Politics

trustees everywhere…

With parties nominating their candidates left, right, and centre, there are a noticeable number of former school board trustees being nominated.

Two former school board chairs have been nominated in Calgary. In Calgary-Egmont, former Calgary Catholic School District Chair Cathie Williams will be taking on Tory star candidate Craig Chandler. In Calgary-Mackay, former Calgary Board of Education chair Teresa Woo-Paw is the Tory candidate taking a run for Gary Mar’s soon to be vacated seat as Mar leaves on a taxpayer funded jet plane for the posh life in Washington DC. Another former CBE Trustee, Carole Oliver, is the Alberta Liberal candidate in Calgary-Fort. Calgary-North Hill PC candidate Kyle Fawcett is also a former CBE Trustee.

In Medicine Hat, former trustee Karen Charlton is running for the Alberta Liberals.

In Edmonton, former Catholic School Trustee Janice Sarich will carry the Tory flag against current MLA and former Public School Board Trustee Bill Bonko in Edmonton-Decore. In Edmonton-Whitemud, former Trustee Nancy Cavanaugh is mounting a campaign against Tory Health Minister Dave Hancock as the Alberta Liberal candidate. And last week in Edmonton-Meadowlark, former Catholic School District chair Debbie Cavaliere was nominated as the Alberta Liberal candidate. And according to his official candidate bio, Edmonton-Beverly-Clareview ND MLA Ray Martin is still the Edmonton Public School Board trustee for Ward D!

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2008 Alberta Provincial Election Alberta Politics

a look around.

– I went to the latest Young Rutherford coffee night yesterday and enjoyed some great conversation about municipal affairs in Edmonton with Edmonton-Rutherford MLA Rick Miller and Ward 5 City Councillor Don Iveson.

– Mary Christa O’Keefe has written a great article on former Edmonton City Councillor Michael Phair in this week’s VUE Weekly.

– I’m excited to see underdog T.J. Keil take on former MLA Andrew Beniuk in the the Edmonton-Highlands-Norwood PC nomination.

Andrew Beniuk has a mixed political past as he was originally elected in 1993 as an Alberta Liberal in Edmonton-Norwood (defeating then-New Democrat Leader Ray Martin). Beniuk then sat as an Independent MLA in 1995 before joining fellow social conservative Liberal MLAs Julius Yankowski and Paul Langevin in joining Ralph Klein’s PC caucus in 1996.

Beniuk ran for re-election in 1997 but was defeated by Alberta Liberal Sue Olsen (Beniuk actually placed third in Edmonton-Norwood, behind Olsen and New Democrat candidate and former City Councillor Sherri McKibben). In 2001, Beniuk was also defeated in his attempt to unseat Alberta Liberal MLA Bill Bonner in Edmonton-Glengarry (now Edmonton-Decore).

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Calgary-Egmont Craig Chandler Ed Stelmach Tom Olsen

is ed stelmach waffling on craig chandler?

The ongoing saga of newly nominated Calgary-Egmont Progressive Conservative candidate Craig Chandler continues as Ed Stelmach is now saying that he wants to meet with Chandler before allowing him to run for his party. This is a confusing about-turn by Stelmach, who refused to take action this August after Chandler declared that:

To those of you who have come to our great land from out of province, you need to remember that you came here to our home and we vote conservative. You came here to enjoy our economy, our natural beauty and more. This is our home and if you wish to live here, you must adapt to our rules and our voting patterns, or leave. Conservatism is our culture. Do not destroy what we have created.

You can watch Stelmach’s original reaction to Chandler’s comment in the video below:

And this is only the beginning in the long list of tasteless comments and declarations from Craig Chandler – just take a browse through Chandler’s online homes – podcasts of the Freedom Radio Network and a webboard called Project Alberta. Yes, Chandler is a grown man who posts on a webboard.

If Stelmach is really going to refuse Chandler’s candidacy, it would have made a lot more sense to have done so before Chandler overwhelmingly defeated Jonathan Denis and Rick Smith in last week’s nomination in Calgary-Egmont. I’m not sure what is different about Chandler now (but I guess that’s what you get when you have someone like Tom Olsen running your media machine…)

For more on the Chandler saga, see Calgary Grit’s extensive post.

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Municipal Politics Public Transit

edmonton city council transit challenge.

A couple of weeks ago, I became involved with the Transit Riders’ Union of Edmonton. TRUE is a committee of Edmonton Transit Service riders who are currently researching and developing strategies to improve the quality of public transit in Edmonton.

Yesterday, TRUE issued a challenge to Edmonton’s City Council to rely exclusively on transit for the week of November 19-25. Ward 5 Councillor Don Iveson, Ward 4 Councillor Ben Henderson, and Ward 6 Councillors Amarjeet Sohi and Dave Thiele have all accepted the challenge and will join hundreds of thousands of Edmontonians on the bus this week.

By accepting the challenge, it says a lot about these four City Councillors and their commitment to improving public transit, something that is essential in creating an efficient and manageable city as Edmonton grows.

You can read coverage of the media challenge here, here, here, and in Russian here.

Here are some pictures that I took at the media conference on the steps of Edmonton City Hall.

City Councillors Ben Henderson, Dave Thiele, and Don Iveson.

Ward 5 City Councillor Don Iveson.

Ward 6 City Councillor Amarjeet Sohi
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American Politics

chuck norris approved.

I thought this was fun… thanks to A for the link.

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Uncategorized

fu_k

Since I first began blogging in January 2005, all sorts of interesting reactions have found their way into my email inbox. For the most part, the feedback is good (so keep on sending it). Many people disagree with me, which is fine, but the yusually remain civil about it. Even when the negative and mean-spirited stuff makes it into my email inbox I usually ignore it.

But last night I feel that someone out there crossed a line, and now I will share it with the world.

After going through the trouble of finding my facebook profile (which I feel might be somewhere on the other side of the line), this person sent me what can only be described as a less than coherent message. The message was from Mr. Brad Janzer, who, according to his facebook profile is a single male conservative Christian from Medicine Hat interested in women.

Here is Brad’s contribution to Alberta’s great political debate that found its way into my facebook inbox last night:

you guys are a bunch of whiny babies, get a real job and pay some taxes instead of just whining about not gettin your fair share of what other albertans have worked so hard for.
get a life you fuking loser

Putting the spirit of the message aside, I really worry about the state of political debate in Alberta when a person can’t even spell the *f* word right…

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Calgary-Egmont Craig Chandler

live from the edmontonians for craig chandler party!

It’s 9:01 pm on Saturday November 17 and I’m blogging live from the rockin’ “Edmontonians for Craig Chandler” party in Edmonton.

It’s a raucous night as Craig Chandler supporters from across northern Alberta have gathered for a night of Ayn Rand-flavoured debauchery and debate! The Ezra Levant Go-Go Girls are here in force and are handing out left-over copies of the Western Standard.

The pasty-skinned young Chandleristas in the room are chanting “adapt or leave! adapt or leave!” to the cheers of the crowd!

It’s rockin’ and everyone in the room is anxiously awaiting the news of Craig Chandler’s landslide victory in the Calgary-Egmont Progressive Conservative nomination!

9:14 pm – It looks like Craig Chandler’s vision for Alberta and its voters has spawned support across Canada! Afar in the blogosphere, it looks like Derek is the new President of the newly-formed “Torontonians for Craig Chandler” chapter. I’ve heard that the TFCC is already planning a Craig Chandler victory parade on Church and Wellesley tomorrow morning!

9:24 pm – The crowd is on tenterhooks as Craig Chandler supporters gather around the radio waiting to hear if the next PC candidate for Calgary-Egmont has finally been nominated. If anyone has heard how it went today in Egmont, the frighteningly large (and slightly threatening) crowd of Chandleristas would really like to know!

9:32 pm – I’m wondering how rockin’ the Jonathan Denis and Rick Smith Edmonton parties are. Not as frighteningly rockin’ as this one me thinks…

9:49 pm – Still no results. This is starting to get boring…

9:55 pm – Good lord, they’ve replaced the Pat Robertson techno-remixes with old podcasts from Chandler’s Freedom Radio network…

10:06 pm – Still, no results… I wonder how the Calgarians for Craig Chandler party is going?

10:21 pm – The young Chandleristas are starting to get restless. It’s past their bed time and want to hear results. I wonder when Paul Wells and Warren Kinsella are going to wade in with their coverage of the night? (Even The Shotgun is silent tonight…)

10:22 pm – I’ve just been informed through a media source in Calgary that Craig Chandler has been nominated as the Progressive Conservative candidate in Calgary-Egmont!

Copies of the Western Standard are being thrown in the air with glee by the young Chandleristas! I am frightened!

No news on the vote breakdown, but Craig Chandler has been nominated to carry Ed Stelmach’s Progressive Conservative flag in Calgary-Egmont against Alberta Liberal candidate and former Calgary Catholic School District Chair Cathie Williams.

(commissioned art work by the artist formerly known as Holtopia)

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