It's Not A Leadership Race

Not since the ill fated Don Getty regime have the Tired Old Tories been in such a sorry state. Before Getty the Lougheed Team could do no wrong. After Getty the man of the people; King Ralph could do no wrong. The Tories would do well in the polls because of the Leader. The leaders polling numbers would often be stronger than the party's, and thus the party was buoyed by the popularity of its leader.

Now with wimpy Ed as leader the election comes down to hard fisted Realpolitiks. Despite polls saying Ed's Tired Old Tories are at 40% that is a serious crash in popularity, the direct result of Ed's mushy leadership.

The leadership debate showed that this is not a race about who will be premier, but rather which party will govern and which one is the opposition. While Taft and Stelmach vied for Premiership, Brian Mason showed himself as the leader of the Opposition.

And even then party politics and labels are not as important as the local campaigns. Because there is a lack of political process that involves us as citizens.

Election forums becoming a rare event in Alberta CBC.ca

Liberals have called for strategic voting, and Albertans will. But it won't necessarily be for the Liberals. Sure they will gain seats, as will the NDP.
Hinman and his right wing rump party are destined for the dustbin of history, splitting the vote on the right. Hinman is fighting for his political life just to retain his own seat.

Instead of venturing into Calgary, Wildrose Alliance Leader Paul Hinman campaigned in his home riding of Cardston-Taber-Warner, knocking on doors and attending a barbecue with supporters.

And who knows the Green Party may even have a chance, with their appeal to rural Tory voters disenchanted that Farmer Ed has become Alberta CEO and the mouthpiece for Big Oil.

Farmers join forces with 'tree huggers' to protest Tories' lax environmental record

Tomorrow there will be a sea change in Alberta. A record number of folks are voting in advanced polls. There are hundreds of thousands of new Albertans and consequently undecided voters. Conservative party supports will stay home in droves unsatisfied with Stelmach's regime.

Barely 5 per cent of the electorate could be bothered tuning in to the only leaders' debate of the campaign.

And voter turnout, which hit historic lows last time with a meagre 44-per-cent turnout, could well drop even lower on Monday.

“The turnout's going to be brutal,” says Arnie Hansen, an Onoway-area cattle rancher and oil driller who has come in to the fertilizer supplier this sunny afternoon.

“That's the way it works in Alberta. They stay home. They don't vote for someone else. They just stay home.”

All in all it looks like perhaps we will have a minority government. Or at least as close a semblance to a minority government after 76 years of the One Party State. Who will lead this new government is anybodies guess.

Polls have repeatedly projected an 11th consecutive Tory majority on Monday, but they also reveal a persistently large number of undecided voters - even this late in the campaign. Meanwhile, a surprising number of voters are calling for a change in government, are unhappy with Progressive Conservative Leader Ed Stelmach and are willing to switch their vote.

"There's definitely a lot of fluidity yet in the voter commitment," said Harold Jansen, a political scientist at the University of Lethbridge. "Voters are ready for a change. They're ready for something different, but none of the opposition parties have done a good job inspiring it."

The undecided segment has all parties - especially the Tories - in a knot.

But it ain't about leaders or party labels. It is about issues though. And voters will decide what issues are important and vote for their issues, which leaves Stelmach's Tired Old Tories in a very weak position.

And in the final analysis this election is about who has the hard slogging political machine in each riding. Who can get out the vote. It's the closest thing to real election this province has seen since 1971.

And I would remind folks who say the opposition parties are weak, that back in 1971 the Lougheed Team that came to power had only 6 sitting MLA's.

And when all is said and done its not just about who gets to govern but who is the opposition. That is the understated part of this election. And surprise, surprise guess which party looks good for that job.

During the campaign, Brian Mason's New Democrats have shown they have the policies and philosophy to provide effective and consistent opposition.

Neil Waugh, Edmonton Sun, Sunday March, 2, 2008

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Link Byfield Goes AA

No not Alcoholics Anonymous, the fledgling right wing rump of the PC's the Alberta Alliance. In his column in the Calgary Sun he whines;

"Not much attention was paid on Saturday to the election of Cardston MLA Paul Hinman to lead the Alberta Alliance Party."


And why should we? This is another sorry reincarnation of the Old Socred Party, no not the original party the recent revisionist party under the leadership of Randy Thorsteinson which failed to mobilize any wins in several recent elections.
Thorsteinson was deposed as Leader of the Socreds for his Mormon ties, and went on the create the AA.

The AA got its first seat when the PC MLA for Norwood declared himself an independent after his party eliminated his riding before the last election He joined the AA and became their first member. Paul Hinman won a seat in the last election in Mormon dominated Cardston home of the old Western Canada Concept and the Western Seperatist notion. This southern bible belt community identifies its politics as Republican, not Canadian so Hinmans win is a no brainer. It was a rural right wing reation to the the big city politics of the Party of Calgary and their culture of urban entitlement under King Ralph.

Will they be a threat, will they go anywhere, will they become as whiny Byfield hopes the new party on the right. Well history says no, they are a flash in the pan. Just like the WCC was.

Hinman though could use Byfield to help with his sound bites. He got quoted the other day about Klein's prediction that the Liberals would win a minority government by saying Klein should shut up come home and take a vacation.
Excuse me???!! The Legislature is currently sitting so King Ralphs place is in the house. However considering the last sitting thats exactly what Klein did in the final days.

A Tip o the Blog to AlbertaAvenue for this story. He rightly points out the Liberals and NDP gained seats in the last election and gained in popular support farmore than the AA despite Byfields statements to the contrary in his column.

Byfield's wishful thinking may be some sort of hallucininatory revelation from hanging out with his right wing friends for too long, listening to his father (no not Jehovah but Ted) or perhaps something he smoked. In any case his prognosis is of a ground swell of political popularity for the AA is a shining example of the thinking of the lunatic right.

Viewpoint: Renewable energy is a terrifying word to people who don't care

Theresa Hinman

The Oklahoman
Sun, December 5, 2021

Theresa Hinman

Although the population of Native Americans, as a whole, has risen in Oklahoma, self-actualization has maintained the irony of moving fast by running and boasting of how far you ran.

Old Native men would tell you, "you didn't run anywhere, kiddo, your treadmill stayed in place." Your reply: "No grandfather, this computer readout says I just ran three miles in place so it's the same as running three miles." Then, the grandfather says, "You can lie and still accomplish the truth? ... There is no truth to going three miles in place, but there is truth in moving your body like it went three miles in place."

This is the story of statistics. The practical application of statistics sounds good, but application is greater. We, in America, shun the very idea of communism and socialism. That is exactly what our tribes practiced and lived by 1,000 years before the "invasion." The old school tribes never had global warming ... for 1,000 years. We looked out for our fellow animals and the Earth and shared evenly.

The fossil fuel profiteers left oil drills and debris all over the land as they skipped to the bank. Once an area was spent, the oil companies just walked away from the mess they created. They didn't care. They had money to spend, and there was no respect for the Earth. We, tribal people, shared everything and counted the wildlife and Earth as our family. We used only what we needed and never became greedy of overuse. Renewable energy is a terrifying word to the people who don't care. The fossil fuel profiteers take, take until there is nothing left to take.

We can now accomplish running around the world on our treadmill by applying the ever available renewable energy the Earth provides. As a bonus, we can rid ourselves of reliance on the profiteers and be excellent stewards to what we are blessed to have on our tribal lands. The U.S. government thought they gave us useless land. We are Native Americans, and no land is useless because we are privileged to be on any of it.

Theresa Hinman is a member of the Ponca Nation.

Native Americans can apply the ever available renewable energy the Earth provides and be good stewards of the land.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Viewpoint: Renewable energy is terrifying word to people who don't care

Two-thirds of Albertans feel Kenney deserves a leadership review, poll suggests

A new poll suggests large public support for Premier Jason Kenney’s leadership review, and even his resignation, while his party is trailing the NDP if a vote were held today.

Author of the article:Ashley Joannou
Publishing date:Dec 14, 2021 • 

Premier Jason Kenney. 

PHOTO BY DARREN MAKOWICHUK /Postmedia file

The latest Leger poll, conducted on behalf of Postmedia, suggests 66 per cent of Albertans polled think Kenney deserves a leadership review and 60 per cent think he should resign.

The numbers show the NDP continues to lead with 43 per cent of decided or leaning voters saying they are prepared to vote for Rachel Notley and the NDP compared to 32 per cent for Kenney’s UCP government.

The poll of 1,249 Albertans was conducted from Dec. 2 to 5, just prior to the United Conservative Party executive announcing that Kenney would face a leadership review in Red Deer on April 9, but not earlier as was called for by 22 dissenting constituency associations.

Leger’s executive vice president Ian Large said he thinks the polling results could influence the scheduled leadership review even though the vast majority of those polled aren’t the same people who will make the final decision.

“(Kenney) has to convince the party that despite these very low numbers, and this dissatisfaction, that he is re-electable. But when you’ve got six in 10 Albertans that think he should resign? That’s a tough row to hoe,” he said.

Half of those who intend to vote UCP want a leadership review of Kenney. Of those who intend to vote NDP, eight in 10 want Kenney to resign, the polling says.

While the NDP continues to lead, the gap between the two major parties is narrowing slightly, Large said, but that’s not necessarily because the UCP is gaining ground.

Polling from May showed the NDP with 46 per cent of the vote compared to the UCP’s 33 per cent. In March 2021 those numbers sat at 51 per cent and 30 per cent respectively.

While the UCP’s share of the vote has stayed relatively stable, in the December polling Paul Hinman’s Wildrose Independence Party showed up on the playing field with 10 per cent of decided voters. In previous polling the party was grouped in the “some other party” category.

“Those aren’t NDP voters … So what I’m thinking is there may be kind of a trickle from the NDP, back to the (United) Conservatives but at the same time, there’s some bleeding from the (United) Conservatives to the Wildrose Independence,” Large said.

Large said the Wildrose Independence Party is doing particularly well in rural Alberta and it will be important to understand why those voters are dissatisfied with the current government if the UCP wants to plot a path to remain in government come 2023.

“This time of the election cycle, it’s really easy to tell your pollster, I’m going to I’m going to show how angry I am by picking this virtually non existent party with no seats,” he said.

Hinman will be running in an upcoming byelection in Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche, he announced on Twitter last week.

Kenney has faced criticism of his leadership throughout the pandemic. Large said, but with oil prices climbing and job numbers improving that could benefit the government.

“All the things that the UCP promised are coming to fruition. And so do they come to fruition fast enough before either the April vote or the 2023 election?” he said.

Online polls cannot be assigned a margin of error because they do not randomly sample the population. If the data were collected through a random sample, the margin of error would be plus or minus 2.8 per cent, 19 times out of 20.

ajoannou@postmedia.com

0+0=0

The right wing rump parties which really are political zeros in Alberta, except in their own minds, have declared their intention to merge. These parties have no real base, and in fact the only reason the Alberta Alliance has even a modicum of publicity is that it's leader Paul Hinman is an one seat wonder as the only AA MLA (see comments below). AA get it. Its the seven step program for Alberta's wannabe Republicans.

The question is will the new party, tentatively to be called the Wild Rose Alliance, be offering a home to Craig Chandler? If so this collections of zero's could end up as less than zero; -1.

Alberta Alliance Party & Wildrose Party to Unite

Two Alberta right-wing parties propose merger for anticipated spring vote

Wildrose, Alliance parties seek merger

SEE:

Wild Rose Party In and Out Scheme

Rent A Crowd

More Shills For Big Oil

Link Byfield's New Party

Link Byfield Goes AA

Where's The NDP?

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Alberta Election Debate

Watching the leaders debate tonight ...Mason hits Taft with a zinger over the issue of capping greenhouse gas, the NDP brought a motion into the legislature that would cap greenhouse gases but both the Liberals and PC's voted against it. Zingo, bang, direct hit. Taft stumbles backtracks doesn't answer the question. Mason hits back and says the legislature is where laws are made not election campaigns. So Kevin why did you and the Liberals not support the NDP motion on greenhouse caps. Waiting Waiting.

The debate formate is counter productive, far to short a time for answers. CBC is doing online polling of viewers and it is not realistic at all. The whole format is counter productive.

Watching CBC, though this is a joint CBC, CTV, CPAC, Global production, it is amtuer hour.

The Media running this are acting like they have never moderated or organized an election debate before. Paul McGloughlin pundit extrodinare just said there was no defining moment, but again I would say Masons counter attack on Taft over greenhouse gases was just such a defining moment. He praised Paul Hinman of the Wild Rose Party as doing a good job. As what a discombobulated disorganized rambling babbler? Hinman did the worst job.He wandered was unprepared and never made any other point except that he was the voice of Big Oil interests in the province and the PC's weren't.

The CBC ran an online poll, which was skewed by the fact that it had all of three people responding to it.

Over all it was amateur hour, not for the leaders but the media who sponsored this whole debacle. By keeping it to short answers they failed the public in allowing for any substantial debate. They had an hour and a half, and they decided that the whole thing should be run as if it was a WWE closed ring match for two minutes a round.

If the debate was supposed to be the event that would decide this election, it failed miserably. Better to have changed channels and watched the Obama Clinton debate.


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Careful Of What You Ask For

Some Liberal bloggers in Alberta are wondering why there will only be one leaders debate during the upcoming election.Because this is Alberta and the Legislature only has one 'official' sitting.

They should be careful of what they ask for. The charismatically challenged leaders; Hinman, Taft, and Stelmach will bore viewers into a slumber only to be awakened by the quick wit and sharp retorts of the bus driver who leads the NDP.

And a sleeping voter is safer than an awakened one.





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Strom's Curse

Others are now commenting on the Curse. Ed Stelmach being Alberta's 13th Premier will he inherit the Strom Curse? I have said so pundits from the right including his opponent Ted Morton have said so. And now the MSM are speculating.

Stelmach confronts ghost of Harry Strom
Albertans ask if new Premier will suffer fate of Socred boss's 1971 loss to Lougheed

The worst criticism of Stelmach during the campaign was that he was dull and unimaginative. More than once, particularly in the last week, he was referred to unfavourably as the ''next Harry Strom,'' the last Social Credit premier in that party's 36-year reign.

But even if he can suture his party's wounds, another question is being whispered in Tory circles: is Stelmach the next Harry Strom? Strom was the province's last farmer turned premier. He was elected leader of the Social Credit party in 1968, then lost the next general election to Peter Lougheed's Progressive Conservatives in 1971.

Alliance Party Leader Paul Hinman said Stelmach's "good guy" persona is reminiscent of Socred Harry Strom, who turned over the reins of power to the Tories in 1971. "He's working on healing the party and talking to the grassroots," said Hinman. "I think it's a little too late and that this is the beginning of the end of the Tories."

Strom and Stelmach share something else. They are Alberta's 'rural' Premiers. Sharing the roles of Minister of Agriculture and now the Minister of Everything.

Mr. Stelmach's victory was due in large part to the thousands of rural voters who turned out to support him across northern Alberta, compared with the hundreds who voted for his rivals in each of the province's urban and southern ridings. "People wanted somebody they could believe in and trust," said Luke Ouellette, a rural Tory backbencher who supported Mr. Stelmach's bid.

It's the curse. Not that Strom was a bad Premier he was just a lame duck Premier in a province about to burst forth in a decade long boom. Hmmm sounds familiar.

He Had good ideas and put public education and post secondary education at the top of his agenda. The Socreds opened the U of L as one of few truly experimental open liberal arts universities in North America.

All in all Strom's short term in office was good for Alberta. It just was the party, it had staled and now rather than being a beer bash was really suffering a thrity years hangover, and the blahs. Like a bad guest you discover has stayed behind, after the last partier left, still wearing a lampshade because he thought it was funny before he passed out.

The party was stale, out of ideas, marking time, pacing in one place, in other words it sounds like the Tories of today. Is there really a Strom Curse?

Is 13 really unlucky? And what will it mean for Alberta's 13th Premier?

The origin of Unlucky 13


Or does it signify ultimate change, as in the 13th card in the Tarot.

XIII

Death

13. Death.--Death, Change, Transformation, Alteration for the worse; R. Death just escaped, Partial change, Alteration for the better.

Click to enlarge color image The veil or mask of life is perpetuated in change, transformation and passage from lower to higher, and this is more fitly represented in the rectified Tarot by one of the apocalyptic visions than by the crude notion of the reaping skeleton. Behind it lies the whole world of ascent in the spirit. The mysterious horseman moves slowly, bearing a black banner emblazoned with the Mystic Rose, which signifies life. Between two pillars on the verge of the horizon there shines the sun of immortality. The horseman carries no visible weapon, but king and child and maiden fall before him, while a prelate with clasped hands awaits his end. Death (La Mort) The Child of the Great Transformers; The Lord of the Gate of Death Card Number: 13 Key Number: 24 Rulership: Scorpio Hebrew Letter: Nun Translation: Fish Numerical Value: 12

Divinatory meaning Upright - The beginning of a new life. As a result of underlying circumstances transformation and change. Major changes. The end of a phase in life which has served its purpose. Abrupt and complete change of circumstances, way of life and patterns of behaviour due to past events and actions. Alterations. Ill Dignified or Reversed - Change that is both painful and unpleasant. A refusal to face the fear of change or change itself. Agonising periods of transition. Inertia. Lethargy. Mental, physical or emotional exhaustion. The Symbolism of the Tarot by P. D. Ouspensky [1913] Fatigued by the flashing of the Wheel of Life, I sank to earth and shut my eyes. But it seemed to me that the Wheel kept turning before me and that the four creatures continued sitting in the clouds and reading their books. Suddenly, on opening my eyes, I saw a gigantic rider on a white horse, dressed in black armour, with a black helmet and black plume. A skeleton's face looked out from under the helmet. One bony hand held a large, black, slowly-waving banner, and the other held a black bridle ornamented with skulls and bones. And, wherever the white horse passed, night and death followed; flowers withered, leaves drooped, the earth covered itself with a white shroud; graveyards appeared; towers, castles and cities were destroyed. Kings in the full splendour of their fame and their power; beautiful women loved and loving; high priests invested by power from God; innocent children--when they saw the white horse all fell on their knees before him, stretched out their hands in terror and despair, and fell down to rise no more. Afar, behind two towers, the sun sank. A deadly cold enveloped me. The heavy hoofs of the horse seemed to step on my breast, and I felt the world sink into an abyss. But all at once something familiar, but faintly seen and heard, seemed to come from the measured step of the horse. A moment more and I heard in his steps the movement of the Wheel of Life! An illumination entered me, and, looking at the receding rider and the descending sun, I understood that the Path of Life consists of the steps of the horse of Death. The sun sinks at one point and rises at another. Each moment of its motion is a descent at one point and an ascent at another. I understood that it rises while sinking and sinks while rising, and that life, in coming to birth, dies, and in dying, comes to birth. "Yes," said the voice. The sun does not think of its going down and coming up. What does it know of earth, of the going and coming observed by men? It goes its own way, over its own orbit, round an unknown Centre. Life, death, rising and falling--do you not know that all these things are thoughts and dreams and fears of the Fool"?

Which means the death of the Tories under Ed just as it was the trouble with Harry for the Socreds.

And in Canadian politics 13 has been unlucky.

13th Prime Minister

John Diefenbaker (Progressive Conservative)

Harry Corwin Nixon

13th Premier of Ontario

In office May 18, 1943 – August 17, 1943

13th PM of Quebec

Félix-Gabriel Marchand

As premier, Marchand attempted to create a Ministry of Education in 1898. At the time, education was entirely in the hands of the clergy of the Roman Catholic Church in the province. His legislation was passed by the Legislative Assembly (the lower chamber of Quebec's legislature), but was defeated in the Legislative Council (the upper house). It was not until 1964 that a Ministry of Education was finally created in Quebec.

As it has in American politics

Millard Fillmore
13th President of the United States
In office July 9, 1850 – March 4, 1853
Vice President(s)	none
Preceded by	Zachary Taylor
Succeeded by	Franklin Pierce
12th Vice President of the United States
In office March 4, 1849 – July 9, 1850
President	Zachary Taylor
Preceded by	George M. Dallas
Succeeded by	William R. King
Born	January 7, 1800 Summerhill, New York
Died	March 8, 1874 Buffalo, New York
Political party	Whig
Spouse	Abigail Powers Fillmore (1st wife) Mrs. Caroline Carmichael McIntosh (2nd wife)
Religion	Unitarian
Signature

Millard Fillmore (January 7, 1800 – March 8, 1874) was the thirteenth President of the United States, serving from 1850 until 1853, and the last member of the Whig Party to hold that office. He succeeded from the Vice Presidency on the death of President Zachary Taylor, who died of acute gastroenteritis, becoming the second U.S. President to assume the office in this manner. Fillmore was never elected President in his own right; after serving out Taylor's term he was not nominated for the Presidency by the Whigs in the 1852 Presidential election, and in 1856 he again failed to win election as President as the Know Nothing Party candidate.

After all when it comes to the irrational, politics and the occult share a common psychology.

See

Conservative Leadership Race

Harry Strom

Socreds

Ed Stemach

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Cardston Home of Bigots

Cardston Crazies Still At It They want to ban same sex marriage in their town.

Cardston was the first Mormon settlement in Alberta. The irony being that while Cardston today opposes Same Sex Marriage, it's original settlers were polygamists.

While no longer polygamist, Mormon Cardston continues it's white only seperatist culture.


The Mormon Way
By Bruce Serafin
How wonderful it must be, I thought, to grow up Mormon and blonde in Cardston! A similar idea came to me the next day when I went to eat my lunch in Cardston's municipal park. Four Mormon families (each of the young women in long skirts, tight around their hips and rear ends) were sitting at the park's tables; a Native family sat far from them at at the edge of the park. People go where they’re comfortable; and in Cardston, Mormons and Natives didn't mix.

The Alberta Temple, located in Cardston, in southern Alberta, and dedicated in 1923, was the first LDS temple built outside the United States and its territories. Constructed of handhewn white marble from British Columbia, it won architectural acclaim.

Mormonism is a political as well as relgious movement, as a political movement it is Republican and socially conservative.

LDS lobbying efforts in several states against the ERA in the 1970s threatened to reawaken major apprehensions of priesthood influence on LDS voters.

In Canada that means it is the base for the Reform/Alliance/Conservative party federally and the Tories provincially.

Cardston is represented by the Alberta Alliance, a right wing rump party that was created by Randy Thorsteinson.

Former Social Credit Party of Alberta leader Randy Thorsteinson was selected as the first leader of the party. Thorsteinson, a devout Latter-day Saint, had quit the Social Credit Party in April 1999 in protest of an internal party proposal to limit the involvement of Mormons.

Th AA Party Leader and MLA for Cardston, Paul Hinman supports Republican Ted Morton for leader of the P.C.'s. Morton is famous for his bill C-208 which would have done what Cardston wants but for the whole of the province. Morton is also notoriously anti-native. He would feel right at home in Cardston.


A tip o' the blog to A Slap Upside The Head for this.

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What Debate?

So is there going to be a debate on the Third Way which is still a mote in Ralphs eye?

Medicare advocates stage protest at legislature
Opponents of Alberta's proposed 'third way' health care system protested on the steps of the legislature Thursday on the first working day of the spring session. Even before the protest got underway, health minister Iris Evans was confronted by demonstrators who grilled her about the 'third way.' Klein has declined to release any details of his proposed health reforms, though he has indicated it will involve a role for private and public medicine. Evans ensured the protestors that the government isn't planning to do away with public medicine. "I want you to just hear that at the start but then come and we will talk."

Talk about what? There is no bill there is no legislation. And Evans maternal patting of protestors on the head is disingenuous.

Evans sees private health services within a year

Pay for faster health access, Evans says

Yeah let's talk about that Iris. As I said here the Third Way will not be debated in public, in the legislature. It will be snuck in the back way through orders in Cabinet.

EDITORIAL: Lots of questions
Edmonton Sun, Canada - 9 Feb 2006
Near the end of her editorial board meeting with the Sun yesterday, Health Minister Iris Evans was asked about the timeline for implementing the government's so-called Third Way health-care reforms. Evans said she hoped the changes would be in place within a year.

I have to agree with this guy about the whole Third Way legislation discussion which isn't happening.

We need more medical doctors and fewer spin doctors when it comes to health reform.
– Paul Hinman is Alberta Alliance leader and MLA for Cardston-Taber-Warner

I know, I know frightening when even the right wing rump party challenges the PC's, Party of Calgary, about its intentions.



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