"C '" Car Go

Wow how far from the maddening crowd can you get.

The Conservatives are sponsoring a big "C" car in the Canadian NASCAR races. Of course in this case NASCAR is not nearly as popular as in the U.S. and is in reality an elitist pro sport in Canada, like Horse Racing. It has little of the popular support of other Canadian favorite sportslike Hockey, Football, Soccer, Baseball, Basketball or even La cross.

Motor sports fans are extremely brand loyal. Statistics show that motor sports fans are in fact the most brand loyal consumers of any sports fans in the world.
• Corporate Canada estimates 5.3 million (15.2%) Canadians attend Stock Car
Racing events annually in Canada.
63% of fans at the track and viewers at home are between the ages of 30-49.
69% of motorsports fans make between $30,000 - $75,000 a year.
74% are homeowners.
75% are males.

And of course the idea of appealing to white middle class males who follow NASCAR was a policy of the Bush Republicans in the 2004 election. So why should we be surprised that the Harpocrites in Ottawa have now adapted it for themselves. After all they are claiming to want to appeal to ordinary Canadians; like NASCAR fans; middle class, white, males.

The Conservative Party has shifted its advertising strategy into a new gear and slapped the party logo on a NASCAR stock car.

The big blue Conservative "C" made its debut Sunday on the hood and front side panels of car 29 of the Canadian Tire NASCAR series, the Canadian offshoot of the popular U.S. stock-racing circuit.

The Canadian Tire circuit only started last fall after NASCAR bought the CASCAR series here in Canada.

And so long time race driver, bon vivant, raconteur and self published publicist Pierre Bourque, sounds like Bjork, is the beneficiary once again of Conservative largess.

Following the lead of Tim Hortons, Home Hardware and Milwaukee Electric Tool, the white No. 29 car in the Canadian Tire auto-racing series now sports a big blue "C" on its hood and side panels.

Clever move. A 'C' car. Get it, 'C' car go.

NASCAR is new in Canada having bought out the CASCAR circuit last fall. CASCAR was in trouble lacking popular appeal after a decade and needed the support of NASCAR.

The 2006 schedule was very late coming out and key tracks such as Delaware and Race City are missing. The hoped for success and excitement with NASCAR® involvement has not materialized, with many feeling that perhaps their presence is hurting rather than helping. Major sponsorship is desperately needed before this series completely fractures and disappears.

Once again showing the Tories support American and Foreign takeovers of Canadian industries, though they will tell you that's not their message. Their message is they are winners of course.

Which may be hard to sell since Bourque and his 'C' car came in 13th place in Saturday's race at Mosport.

And remember the environment, and the Tories call for cleaning up air pollution. Well thats kinda hard to do when race cars still use lead gasoline which is banned in Canada, except for the race car industry, aviation fuel, etc.. Wonder if the Conservatives will continue the exemption since they have a car in the race.

Canada’s Gasoline Regulations have prohibited the production, import and sale of leadedgasoline since 1990. Gasoline for use in competition vehicles has been provided an exemption under the regulations. The current exemption expires on January 1, 2008.

Gasoline is the most common fuel used in racing. Both leaded and unleaded gasoline formulations are used in Canadian racing. For engines with high compression ratios, a very high octane gasoline is required to prevent engine knock (and resulting engine damage) and to maximize power output. Lead additives are used to achieve this high octane.

Leaded gasoline that is imported for use in Canada has reported lead contents ranging from 0.1 to 4.23 g/L. The Gasoline Regulations have reporting requirements for anyone producing or importing leaded gasoline. The reports indicate that there is no Canadian production of leaded gasoline for use in competition vehicles. In 2005, 1,160 cubic meters of leaded gasoline was reported
as imported for use in competition vehicles. This represents 1.1% of the leaded gasoline pool in Canada (the remaining is used for aviation purposes) or 0.003% of all gasoline produced or imported into Canada.

The estimated breakdown of leaded gasoline sales for racing in Canada is as follows:
stock cars – 15 to 40%;
dragsters – 40 to 50%;

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Ron Paul and Barry Goldwater

Doug Mataconis of the Liberty Papers reports that Ron Paul is the only elected politician that has won his seat three times against the incumbent, without party support. Which is no small feat. Mataconis points out why;

Paul was helped by the fact that he was running in areas of Texas where the prevailing political beliefs are conservative, but a conservatism that is of the Barry Goldwater/Ronald Reagan leave-me-alone type than the interventionist/Christianist conservatism that prevails elsewhere in the country

This makes sense and why Ron Paul has broad based support amongst libertarians. However as I pointed out in Mr. Conservative; Barry Goldwater had no kith nor kin with Reagan, who was responsible for allowing the interventionist/Christian types into the ruling echelons of the party. Goldwater blamed Regan for abandoning the libertarian/conservative traditions of the party.

Of course the current crop of neo-cons masquerading as Republicans, Lincoln would be ashamed, would rather hearken to the days of Reagan, and his electoral victory, then the days of principle and defeat; the Goldwater era.

Which is why a politician of principles like Ron Paul stands a snowballs chance in hell in the Republican party of today.

h/t to Go Ron Paul!


SEE:

My Favorite Conservative

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Canadians Support Ron Paul

Republican Libertarian candidate for President; Ron Paul's support online comes from Canada, or at least a web based company founded by a Canadian, but published with American content. And noticing this has not been the usual libertarians of the right, the so called Blogging Tories, but the progressive bloggers.

Because basically the right wing which makes up the majority of BT are war mongering opponents to libertarianism. And Dr.Paul is outspoken against the war in Iraq.

As one Canadian progressive blogger put it:

Colbert, Stewart and Maher on Ron Paul (includes video)

I don’t agree that Stewart and Maher let him off easy, rather they were probably just as blown away as I was that a Republican could articulate a common sense foreign policy agenda. Stewart and Maher (video) gave the American public a chance to hear the stark differences between Ron Paul’s views and all of the other Republican candidates. In my opinion, Paul is the only Republican candidate running whose foreign policy ideas/plans are not completely wacked and terrifying to the average world citizen. I also think Maher’s political views are actually much closer to Paul’s than Stewart’s or Colbert’s.

The American pundit blog Wonkette that noticed the Canadian source of Ron Pauls online support called Canada the Evil Empire (tongue in cheek).

Of course as anyone who watched Twin Peaks knows, Canada is the evil empire of the north that terrifies Americans.

Or if you listen to debates on single payer health care in the U.S. you find the same fears expressed. Socialism, Single payer health care, Canada, are all used in the same sentence.

Which is why Democratic Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich is more Canadian than American, he supports a single payer Canadian style Medicare system. And as I said here unfortunately neither he nor Ron Paul stand a chance of winning their primaries.

But for a truly evil Canadian style libertarian socialist alternative to the two party candidates, a Paul/Kucinich ticket would be just the thing. Of course they would have to decide which one was running for President and which for VP. They are the ultimate geek ticket. Just look at those hairstyles.




SEE:

Liberal Republicans

Ron Paul Quotes Ayn Rand

Ron Paul

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An End to Colonial Assimilation?

With the Harper Governments announcement that it was abandoning forty years of colonial assimilation that was Liberal Indian policy of Trudeau and Chretien. This is one Liberal policy I am happy to see torn up. Could this be a new beginning for Canada's First Nations peoples?

Statement of the Government Of Canada On Indian Policy, 1969

Presented to the First Session of the Twenty-Eighth Parliament

by the Honorable Jean Chrétien, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development

The Government believes that its policies must lead to the full, free and non-discriminatory participation of the Indian people in Canadian society. Such a goal requires a break with the past. It requires that the Indian people's roles of dependence be replaced by a role of equal status, opportunity and responsibility, a role they can share with all other Canadians.

The policies proposed recognize the simple reality that the separate legal status of Indians and the policies which have flowed from it have kept the Indian people apart from and behind other Canadians. The Indian people have not been full citizens of the communities and provinces in which they live and have not enjoyed the equality and benefits that such participation offers.

Ironically it is a policy that Harpers grey eminence Tom Flanagan of the Calgary School agrees with.

“Europeans are, in effect, a new immigrant wave, taking control of land just as earlier aboriginal settlers did. To differentiate the rights of earlier and later immigrants is a form of racism.”

So sayeth Tom Flanagan, Stephen Harper’s advisor and mentor, a political science professor who the Tory leader first met at the University of Calgary.

In order to become self-supporting
and get beyond the social pathologies
that are ruining their communities,
aboriginal people need to acquire the
skills and attitudes that bring success
in a liberal society, political democracy,
and market economy. Call it assimilation,
call it integration, call it
adaptation, call it whatever you want:
it has to happen.
Tom Flanagan, First Nations?
Second Thoughts, pp.195-196.

And Harpers announcement would be more credible if this wasn't happening;

- Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice replaced some of the country's most seasoned federal land-claim negotiators with hand-picked choices who have comparatively less experience - including his former law partner. Critics say the unusual political handling of the lucrative contracts is further proof that Conservative vows to shun patronage were hollow at best. It will also slow down complex land-claim talks as new negotiators climb steep learning curves, they say.

And while the Harpocrite Government practices realpolitik to avoid a showdown with First Nations peoples, their reactionary right-whing republican base uses this opportunity to attack the leadership of of those same first nations as unconstitutional.

According to a press release from the right-leaning Canadian Constitution Foundatiom, prominent legal experts agree with Chief Mountain and Nisibilada that the “third order” of government created by the Nisga’a Treaty violates Canada ’s constitution. Retired Supreme Court of Canada Justices William McIntyre and the late Willard Estey, retired B.C. Court of Appeal Justice D.M. Michael Goldie, former NDP Attorney-General Alex MacDonald, the late Mel Smith, Q.C. and former B.C. Attorney-General Geoff Plant have all stated publicly that parts of the Nisga’a Treaty are unconstitutional and therefore illegal.

Chief Mountain’s constitutional challenge has received funding from the Canadian Constitution Foundation, a registered charity with a mandate to promote and defend Canadians’ constitutional freedoms.

The foundation's website says it was founded in 2002 to explain to Canadians "the role of the Constitution in their daily lives, to teach them how to recognize infringements and abuse of the Constitution in the world around them, and to help them defend its principles from improper decisions or actions of governments, regulators, tribunals or special-interest groups."

The foundation, which believes the Constitution only recognizes two levels of government - federal and provincial - has a board of directors comprising some prominent conservatives.

Its board includes Ezra Levant, publisher of the Western Standard magazine, and William Johnston, a family physician in Vancouver and president of Canadian Physicians for Life.

Foundation executive director John Carpay, a former Alberta director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, says the Nisga'a dissidents claim that the treaty "violates their constitutional rights as Canadians. It does so by creating a third order of government that is not accountable to either Ottawa or Victoria. "

One Step forward two steps back. Of course recognition of liberal human rights vs. collective rights is what this is all about. Whether Trudeau or Harper, both the Liberals and Conservatives see assimilation of first nations as an imperative, no matter what else they say. It's what they do that counts.

For over 100 years, aboriginal children, about 150,000 of them - Metis, Indian and Inuit, some only five years old - were yanked out of their homes and jammed into residential schools, some hundreds of miles from their families. They were not allowed to speak their native language, many died from tuberculosis and others suffered sexual, emotional and physical abuse.

In a shameful attempt to cover their butts, governments passed legislation that made it illegal to resist giving up these children, thus legalizing cultural assassination.
Given this history and the documented facts, it was heartening to see 270 MPs vote to apologize, but it was mostly symbolic since Prime Minister Stephen Harper has refused to issue an official apology. In fact, he sent Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice out to say such an act could be years away. There is a word for the government's action, it's "disgraceful."

There are still 80,000 natives alive to whom it applies.

The Harper government continues to stall on what is an abomination. It sits on its hands despite the fact the Chretien government admitted in 1998 that native students had been badly treated, and in 2005 a compensation offer of $2 billion was introduced for surviving students. But in the meantime, a sneaky band of Tories has decided that a special investigative commission will travel across Canada before any apology is issued. This is a stubborn, hard-hearted stance, and the prime minister should be ashamed of himself.

Canada's decision to withdraw support for the United Nations Declaration on the Right of Indigenous Peoples coincided with a visit to Ottawa by Prime Minister John Howard of Australia -- a country that strongly opposes the declaration.

Shortly after Mr. Howard's meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper in May, 2006, Mr. Harper called Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice to tell him to review Canada's position of support, government sources said yesterday.

Although previous Liberal governments had difficulty with the declaration that had taken more than two decades to craft, by 2005 Canada was fully supportive and actively encouraging other countries to sign on.

But the United States and Australia remained staunchly opposed. And Mr. Harper walked away from his meeting with Mr. Howard believing the declaration would be problematic, the sources said.

"It was very much the Prime Minister [Harper] directing Prentice to relook at this thing," a source said.

Mr. Prentice has since said there are concerns that the declaration is unconstitutional, that it could prevent military activities on aboriginal land and that it could harm existing land deals.

SEE:

Mike Harris and State Terrorism

Tories Crush Whistleblower

Land claim

Alcoholism Is Colonialism

Bev Oda Minister of Aboriginal Affairs

Hewers of Wood

Cardston Home of Bigots

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Really Corrupt Mounted Police

Gee it's hard to be a law and order government when the official state police force is riddled with corruption, cronyism and fraud.

Those who uphold the law once again act as if they are above the law.

Which suits the Harpocrites just fine since they are acting the same way.

a parliamentary committee reviews allegations of pension-fund fraud, cronyism, and three years of expense reports of former RCMP commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli that were either swapped out or disappeared by his underlings, his successor, Bev Busson retires today. The planned departure comes only hours after the report of lawyer and Bay Street minence grise David Brown delivered a report on the force's corruption to Public Safety minister Stockwell Day. The RCMP, Mr. Brown declared, is "horribly broken."

Like other political police forces; the FBI and KGB for instance the RCMP have maintained their traditional para-military structure through political blackmail.

"I've worked with Liberals and Tories, and nobody wants to tangle with the RCMP," said Shirley Heafey, the former chair of the force's commission of public complaints.

"They have a lot of information on a lot of people ... It causes a chill. They have long memories in the RCMP."

And so do we on the left. We remember their infiltration of the left, their penchant for protecting strikebreakers and shooting strikers, their attack on the On to Ottawa Trekkers, their role in the Liberals attempt to discredit their opponents in particular the Quebec nationalists, their systemic refusal to deal with members of the force who abuse natives and prisoners, their role in the Arar affair and the Air India debacle, the list could go on and on.

After all the RCMP Motto is Maintain the Right.

The solution to the problem of the RCMP is three fold; implementation of the recommendations of thirty year old Macdonald Commission including; a non RCMP Commissioner, civilian control and oversight and allowing the rank and file to unionize.

Others call on Ottawa to break up the RCMP's mandate, which they believe is unwieldy. While it has many federal responsibilities whose powers range from protecting the borders against drug-smuggling, enforcing stock markets against fraud and investigating politicians, the RCMP's bread-and-butter is the contracts it has with provincial and municipal governments.

These contractual arrangements harken back to the RCMP's roots as a guns-for-hire protection and enforcement group, said Paul Palango, investigative reporter and author of The Last Guardians, a book on problems within the RCMP, calling them essentially a paramilitary force working at the behest of their hosts.

The force, he said, has turned into a hybrid organization that is both a business and a national institution.

Articles referenced;

RCMP Terror

New Math

Why The Tories Want Tory Judges

More Foreign Affairs Incompetency

Statist Anti-Terrorism Act

Paranoia and the Security State

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Drumheller Bell Weather

As I wrote here urbanization and the transformation of rural cities into suburban metropolis vs. the rural roots of the P.C.'s was exposed in the bell weather by-election Tuesday.

Drumheller voted solidly Liberal despite the rest of the rural riding voting Conservative.

The Conservatives comfortably held onto Drumheller-Stettler, the rural former riding of Shirley McClellan, who retired after having served in senior cabinet jobs like finance minister and deputy premier. However, the Liberals finished second there. In 2004, they didn't bother running a candidate against McClellan.

the Liberals winning Drumheller's city vote even as it lost the overall seat, clearly signals "that the Klein era is over," Taft said.

The Stelmach government is relying upon their rural base to hold up their tired old party. In fact they even went as far as to sic their California Golden Boy Republican rabid right whingnut Ted Morton on the urban complainers.

Sustainable Resource Development Minister Ted Morton spoke to municipal leaders in Banff -- an address the mayor says included a deliberate slight at Calgary.

According to Morton's speaking notes, he said: "Calgary by itself is a good, but not a great, city. What makes Calgary a great city -- the best in Canada as far as I'm concerned -- is what surrounds it. The working farms and ranches, the Foothills, mountains and rivers."

While there was no tape of the speech, Morton provided a copy of his speaking notes

With no apology or remonstration from Stelmach, Morton supplied his notes to the media day's before the by-election. This from a government with a fetish for secrecy.

Morton like Stelmach relied upon the rural vote for his run for Party Leader. Morton's base came from the south where a strong American/Republican tradition exist's in the Mormon population and among other big ranchers and farmers who are evangelical Christians.

With a boom in the province, rapid development of bedroom communities, urban sprawl in Fort McMurray, and the million person populations in Edmonton and Calgary spill over into rural communities making them the new suburbs.

Thus the fall of Calgary Elbow, Ralph's old seat, to the new Alberta Voter.

"It's not the byelection I would put as much stock into. It's the trend line," said Duane Bratt, a political scientist at Calgary's Mount Royal College. "There's been a series of little steps, all going down."

After losing three Calgary ridings to the Liberals in 2004's election, Tory fortunes in Calgary took a turn for the worse in December's leadership race. The city's pick, former treasurer Jim Dinning, sewed up every riding in town but lost the race to Ed Stelmach, a farmer from up north and the last choice of Calgary voters. And according to some rural Stelmach supporters - who gloated afterward that they had properly stuck a thumb in the eye of the big city - that was exactly the point.

Then came Mr. Stelmach's Cabinet choices - dominantly rural, with just three Calgarians of 18 (even though the city represents a third of the province's population).

Stelmach and Morton and their rural PC base see this as a threat to their vision of "Conservative" Alberta. That rural base was originally Social Credit, and transfered its loyalty to the PC's after the Lougheed era. Ralph Kleins victory as Leader was the result of the dissident rural Social Credit base voting PC and Calgary voting PC merging in a campaign opposing the candidate, Nancy Betkowski, from Edmonton.

The old riding of Buffalo-Stettler was also the exiled home of former Premier Don Getty when he lost his Edmonton Whitemud riding to Liberal Percy Wickman. Having the Premier as your MLA meant as usual lots of government largess.

And as a result Stettler has become another urbanized suburb, complete with a Burger Baron and nice paved highways. The Burger Baron phenomena in Northern Alberta, reflects the integration of immigrants, in this case the chain is owned by Lebanese Canadians,into Alberta's white Christian rural culture.

Stettler remains a solidly Tory stronghold, as it was once a Socred stronghold. But it also suffered a low voter turn out which does not show the real intention of voters.

But the sea change in Drumheller shows that come the next provincial election, the split in the province will be between the urban centres and the rural hinterland.

And like the regime of Harry Strom, the last time that scenario was played out the Socreds went down to defeat in 1971 to the Lougheed PC's.

In 1968, Earnest Manning stepped down as leader of the Social Credit party after winning a massive majority on a very small popular vote, and he was replaced as leader and premiere by Strom in that same year. The following year, in 1969, the seat Manning had held for decades, Calgary Strathcona, fell to Progressive Conservative William Yurko.

While Ralph Klein’s history is quite different from Manning, the progress of events since he stepped down as leader is eerily familiar. In 2004, Klein won a large majority on a fairly shaky popular vote (under 50% when he’d won nearly 70% in the 2001 election). He then announced his retirement, and by the end of 2006, had stepped down in favour of his replacement, Ed Stelmach. The following year (that would be 2007, this year), Klein’s old seat in Calgary-Elbow fell to Liberal representative Craig Cheffins (in the by-election this past Tuesday).

Albertans almost defeated the lame duck PC's in 1993, Ralph's first term as premier was a race between him and Laurence Decore of the Liberals. Hindered by the lame duck premiership of Don Getty, the party was soundly thrashed at the polls, but still won. Like the defeat of the Socreds before them, they saw the 1993 election as a warning.

Today we have another lame duck premier, and one whose charisma and leadership screams Harry Strom. Lucky for him the Liberals also suffer from the same lame duck leadership.

SEE

• Stelmach Blames Eastern Bums
• Terrror In Tory Town
• Calgary Elbow Goes Liberal
• It's A Sweep
• Alberta Election Results
• Where's The NDP?
• Election Day In Alberta

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Stelmach Blames Eastern Bums

For the loss of Calgary Elbow, the riding which was home to Ralph Klein and held by the Tories for 36 years. No really. It's not his fault. Its all dem Eastern Bums and creeps that ruined it for the Tories. You remember them they are the folks that Ralph his-self denounced back in the eighties. Well they are back.

Stelmach says the Liberals won the Calgary-Elbow seat in a byelection Tuesday because the city's voters are grumpy over growth pressures caused by a huge influx of new residents. The premier says it's unfortunate that 36,000 people have moved into Alberta over the last five months, driving up rents and creating a greater need for new roads, schools and health facilities.

Right-o, blame 'immigrants' to Alberta for the problems, even if they are fellow internally migrating Canadians from the East. At the same time claiming to need foreign workers to make up for the labour shortages in the province. But at least they are temporary you don't need to feed and house slave labour, no wait you do.

Stelmach was in cabinet before he was Premier at like the rest of the tired Tories he refuses to take responsibility for losing the byelection or the lack of planning for the boom,or the choking off of infrastructure funding for a decade. And he even has the temerity to blame them for the lack of apartments and rent gouging by Real Estate Income Trusts (REIT).

Ed sounds just like good old Ralph and a lot like Jacques Parizeau after he lost the Referendum.

Calgary Elbow was a referendum on Stelmach and his stay the course gang. He lost a solid blue seat that was held by his predecessor.

But the loss of Calgary-Elbow should concern the premier, said University of Calgary political scientist David Taras.

"This was the premier's riding - this is a riding that was rock solid, and now it's fallen," he said.

"The argument is, if Elbow can fall, what Tory seat is safe in Calgary?"

It's the first time the Liberals have ever had four seats in Calgary. The Tories hold the remaining 19.

"What a slap in the face for the Conservatives," said Keith Brownsey, who teaches political science at Calgary's Mount Royal College. "It's been Conservative since its inception. It should've been a cakewalk."

Tuesday's result in Calgary appeared to echo recent polls suggesting that Tory efforts to handle Alberta's hyper-inflated economy have not found favour.

A Leger Marketing poll of more than 900 Albertans in late May suggested support for the Tories has slipped well under 50 per cent and in Calgary has dropped 27 points to 40 per cent. Those findings mirrored the results of a Cameron Strategy poll of more than 900 Albertans over roughly the same period.

Even King Ralph was almost struck speechless; "I never lost an election," said Klein, winner of three municipal races in his days as Calgary mayor and four straight majority romps as premier.

Ouch.


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Premier Taft?

Picture this; Kevin Taft,



Alberta's Next Premier

Werner doesn't think so, and it appears neither do some other Liberals now that they see their chance at grabbing the brass ring. Though with leadership like his perhaps it is time for a change.

"Have (Calgary voters) stampeded to the Alberta Liberals? "No, they haven't, but a change is beginning to open up," said Taft.

And a careful read of voting patterns show that long-time Tories haven't switched wholesale to the Alberta Liberals (who suffer their own growing rump of doubters in the abilities of leader Kevin Taft) as much as they have simply stayed home.

Rod Love, former chief of staff to Klein and once nicknamed "Ralph's brain," offered some other context.

"Lest your viewers think the Liberals are about to sweep the province, the Liberal vote in Calgary Elbow went down by 100 votes," he told MDL. "The story is the Conservative vote went down 3,000 votes. It's a good thing they didn't go across the street, as we say, or Mr. Taft would have been a much happier guy."

The Tories now hold 61 of the legislature's 83 seats. The Liberals are second with 16. The NDP have four and the Alliance had one. There is one Independent.

Love noted the Liberals won 32 seats to the Tories' 51 in the 1993 provincial election, Klein's first as leader. "To us, that was an earthquake, and we won."

That was the Liberals under former Redmonton Mayor Laurence Decore and Taft ain't no Decore.

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Pinocchio Harper

Lies & Secrets Redux

Is his nose growing yet?

War widow asks PM: 'why have you lied?'
Not willing to take "maybe some day" for an answer, the widow of a Nova Scotia World War II soldier accused Prime Minister Stephen Harper face-to-face yesterday of breaking his promise to help elderly veterans and their spouses.

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Terrror In Tory Town

The Party of Calgary is kaput. As the by-election in Ralph Kleins riding of Calgary Elbow shows.

said one senior Tory strategist. "Here's the [former] premier's riding and nobody wanted to run."

So instead their candidate ran as a Liberal.

And once on the hustings, things were evidently hostile enough that local reporters observed Mr. Heninger on one doorstep remarking that he would personally like to "choke" Mr. Stelmach for crimes against Calgary.

With even their own candidate unable to defend the government record, several Tories admitted ahead of the byelection that the bigger surprise would be if Mr. Heninger somehow managed to prevail.

Why vote for a disgruntled Tory when you can vote for a real Liberal.

Having dominated the province under King Ralph, the Party of Calgary saw a political sea change with the loss of the leadership race by Jim Dinning, the 'liberal' Calgary candidate.

Now the next election portends a Liberal sweep in Calgary and an Opposition sweep in Edmonton between them and the NDP.

Leaving the PC's with the rural ridings. Just like what happened to Harry Strom.




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