Although it happened nearly 12 years ago, the loss of the Canada Unity Council still deeply pains me.

Working at the Centre for Research and Information on Canada would have been a dream come true for me. Analyzing different aspects of federalism, identity, participating in in-depth discussions, analyzing data from the Portraits of Canada polls, and being involved in workshops is what I always wish I could do with my life...and when I lost that opportunity, it hurt.

Bad.

Along with that, though, I worry about the lack of more in-depth papers on a lot of these types of subjects, about questions that I am not convinced that we have solved, the annual in-depth review of what Canadians are thinking on specific topics, the multiple activities that it sponsored to introduce Canadians to one another, things like that.

Groups like Historica and the Association for Canadian Studies do some of these things, and they do excellent work, they really do. But the Unity Council acted on all these things at once, on everything from female involvement in politics to Indigenous relations with Canadian society. Where else could you find Alan Cairns and Patricia Monture-Angus in the same room discussing Canadian citizenship and its values?

Sure, I know a lot of people might not think this sort of thing is relevant anymore, but I do.

And I'd love nothing more than to have that kind of activity going again, and to be able to participate in it myself.

   

I used to care a lot more about this sort of thing when I was younger. Right now I just consider these things a bunch of talk by policy wonks, more of a hobby than anything else. No offense intended. It's just that if we couldn't even agree on something as simple as a triple-E senate to make the country more fair then talking about other important systemic changes that just aren't going to happen is a waste of time, at least in the short-term where a separation threat or a constitutional crisis aren't brewing up.

   

The problem, though, is that you never know when those types of crises might come up. It's not as though many Anglophone Canadians were expecting the rise of separatism in the '60s.

That said, I get where you're coming from...and it's not like we have much reason to be hopeful right now.

   

I'll call it now. If/when Jason Kenney wins the government in Alberta it'll be Ottawa's worst nightmare, and probably the country's next secession crisis. People are pissed out here, especially over Energy East. I doubt that Alberta will be quiet anymore over the transfer payment scheme anymore, not when we're still providing the bulk of the transfers for people who clearly despise us. Don't expect Kenney to back down when the feds try to intimidate him. Gonna be interesting.

   

FTFY.

If Kenney is good at one thing, it's bullshitting. People here won't know what they've elected, until they are deep in the entitlement nightmare.

   

It's already started. His first bit of red meat to the social conservatives was to allow angry parents to interfere in the GSA's at school. Apparently the "big tent" doesn't quite believe that sometimes the ones the gay kids need protection from the most are their own gay-hating parents, which is why not informing the parents to begin was the entire point of the idea.

Sigh. I'm torn about Kenney. On one hand I believe he really would stick it as hard as he could to BC and Quebec for what they've done to Alberta. On the other hand odds are great he'll end up being a repeat of the Klein austerity disaster with a big dollop of American social conservatism added in, all served up on a platter of quasi-MAGA dirty tricks in the next election. Kind of a no-win scenario for those of us who are absolutely sick and tired of this incessant shit.

   

Ah yes, the Harper 'secret agenda' coming again with a new name.

   

That's one thing he's out of touch with, that Albertans' feel strongly about.



He has no more say in the affairs of other Provinces than Notley does. Which is, none. We can work together in common interests, but in the end all it is empty showmanship.



Guaran-fucking-teed. All through the leadership race, they were spouting all sorts of austerity BS. They don't have a clue.

For example, many duplicate services are being eliminated through a restructuring of Government Corporate Governance. Ministries are being combined, positions eliminated. Entire departments in four or five ministries are folding into one, with 30% - 50% jobs losses.

But Kenney talks about cutting the public sector! He's clueless that the no-hire and no-raise policies that Redford implemented are still in place. All of the government employees I work with have had no raises for 5 years, and although a number of people have retired or moved to other jobs, they have not been replaced. And through another initiative called EIE, redundant IT services are being amalgamated under Service Alberta, also resulting in 5% - 10% job losses in many ministries.

And Kenney talks about cutting public sector jobs, when the public sector has been hard at work doing that themselves!

   

Not much doubt that the Kenney generation of conservatives are firm believers in cut-to-prosperity and trickle-down. They have the freedom to be believers in that tripe because it's not like any of them are in the job demographics that ever lose their employment to that sort of economic idiocy.

Anyhoo, this one is non-government, but here's some probably Kenney supporters who found a way to make all of us look like stupid merely from living in the same jurisdiction as them. I might have jumped the gun on any of my previous "this is Alberta, not Alabama" statements because there seems to be a considerable faction around this province that probably looks at Alabama's social arrangement as something we should be aspiring to.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/c ... -1.4392300

Sigh.

   

Hehe, yea, I heard that on the radio this morning. I wonder why they think it's OK to pay for religious material that isn't in the education curriculum with public money?