The PC strategy: Avoid talking record/policy at all costs and smear the Wildrose.

The following YouTube video is 6 minutes and 30 seconds long and it is perhaps the best commentary available on the PC end game election strategy out there.



Excellent work.

The only thing that I think is missing is some content on why most of the PC's fear/smears are in reality non issues, which is our laws and our Charter of rights.

The law is the law people, no government in the land could pass the type of legislation that the PCs are claiming that the Wildrose party would bring in if elected and that is just simple fact. It cannot happen, due to our already existing laws/Charter! 
 
I have had this discussion many times with the Wildrose haters on Twitter and have stopped them all in the tracks with the following question:

Be specific. Which 'conscience right' or 'legislation' would allow the government or a government employee, to ever violate Section 15.1 of the Charter of Rights and freedoms?

The answer is simple: there is none. It is impossible as the law is the law and anyone who claims to tell you otherwise is just trying to scare you.

And one would think, or at least hope, that a human right lawyer like Alison Redford would be fully aware of what our laws are and how they would apply. Perhaps she is too busy running that clean campaign that she promised numerous times to know that this has become an issue in the election, but somehow I really doubt that to be the case. She is fully aware of what is going on but is choosing to try and scare Albertans instead.

And that I do find to be scary.



Speaking of scary: The PC record.

The "Real Wildrose" Attack site: Is it the work of Sandra Jansen's campaign manager?

Politics in Alberta has taken a nasty turn of late as the floundering Progressive Conservatives led by Alison Redford having collapsed in polls lash out at Danielle Smith and the Wildrose; this after numerous claims by Redford, both before and during the election, that the PC's were going to take the high road and run a clean campaign.

It has become a campaign of smear and fear mongering with the target being the Wildrose, the only party that stands in the way of a another PC victory in Alberta, and numerous 'sock puppet' twitter accounts have appeared which have no purpose other than to lie, smear, spread fear, and even libel the Wildrose. One such twitter account is called "WiltedRose" and the average tweet reads similiar to the following made April 12 at 4:31

"@drryancarter @heather4mla she took a bribe (http://realwildrose.wordpress.com/2012/04/11/paid-to-cross-the-floor/) & lied about it (http://realwildrose.wordpress.com/2012/04/12/anderson-and-forsyth-lying/). #wrp can not be trusted. #abvote"

Pure BS, probably libelous, and is just one of many tweets of similiar nature that have been posted from this account.

The profile page of "WiltedRose" provides no real information as to its author other than a link to a WordPress blog called "Real Wild Rose" which is much of the same fear mongering as the twitter account but providing the author more than 140 characters to do so.  Again there is no information openly listed on the blog as to its author, political affiliations (if any), or anything else of an identifiable nature.

Did you notice that I wrote the words "openly listed"?

Sandra Janson, she of CTV Newsnet fame, is running for the PC's in the riding of Calgary-North-West in what is sure to be a tough race if the polls are anywhere near accurate. Her campaign manager is a fellow named Piotr Pilarski, who already has quite the twitter presence of his own, and is well known in Alberta political circles having been part of both Redford's and Doug Griffiths' campaign for the PC leadership.

From the WordPress Blog "Real Wild Rose" / "The Party" / "WRP Weapons of war"/ comes a link to a Power Point file = http://realwildrose.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/wrp-weapons-of-war.ppt  

Click on properties and what do you see...

Different browser, from page 1 of same PPT.

Could the ppilarski who "last modified" or "last saved" these pages be the same P Pilarski who manages Sandra Jansen's campaign? The one who Doug Griffiths said "really wanted a splashy campaign," when referring to his leadership run?

I don't know but  Pilarski did tweet on Thursday afternoon: "@TheInvisibleDan @Albertaardvark @wiltedroseparty not my blog guys, sorry. #abvote"  to a question asking if realwildrose.wordpress.com was his, but that was before the debate and before knowing that someone had found the name ppilarski attached to the attack site.

I guess I will have to ask him again, and also ask Sandra Jansen if she thinks these types of things are appropriate in a so called 'clean campaign.


Updated: Peter Pilarski responds in the comments:

Thanks Alberta Ardvark.

Like I’ve told you before, I can say with confidence that I did not create this blog. The document you question is something that was sent to me early in the year; I forwarded it to all the PCs I knew. After all, if you had your opponents strategy wouldn’t you do the same? The document I have sent has hit hundreds of inboxes since January (the date in which your screenshots show my “last modification”).

Also for anyone that has managed a provincial campaign and worked a full time job you know there is no way I would have time to put into a site like this one. There are not enough hours in my day.

And lastly for those of you that follow me on Twitter you know I say what is on my mind and don’t back down. If I were to do something like this you would know it was me. I don’t believe in hiding behind fake accounts or secret blogs. You all know my opinions and how I feel. I put it out there and I don’t apologize for it.

So no, this blog isn’t mine. Nice try though.

PP

How did Edmonton-McClung MLA David Xiao rack up so many kilometers driving to work in Edmonton?

Updated December 5th, 2012 (see bottom of page) with April 1, 2011 to March 31, 2012 figures.



Edmonton-McClung MLA David Xiao likes to drive. He likes to drive so much that we taxpayers have spent  $29,135 dollars on “kilometer reimbursement" to cover his driving costs for 2008-2010.


Xiao was elected to his first term as a Member of the Legislative Assembly for Edmonton-McClung on March 3, 2008. In addition to his role as an MLA, David serves as the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Transportation and is a member of the Cabinet Policy Committee on Finance.


In 2009-2010 Xiao billed the taxpayers for 35,182 kms and the year before that 31,796 kms. We still don’t know much he charged for 2010-2011 he won’t tell us and the Redford government won’t release the data.
But we do know that in those two years $29,135 of taxpayer money went to David for mileage (43.5 cents per Km).

How did he do it? Thanks to Google maps we will see if we can figure out how an Edmonton MLA managed to rack up so many kilometers.

His house is less than 3km from his constituency office, and his constituency office is less than 14 kms from the Legislature. So if David drove from home to his constituency office and then to the Legislature and back every day he would do just under 34Km per day.

Unfortunately 34 goes into 31796 over 930 times and there are less than 260 work days in a year.

Hmmm.


Maybe David went home for lunch every day…


and 2 coffee breaks…


every single working day of the year.


So 260 days times 3 trips times 34Kms is only 26,520km…


Hmm David must have taken the scenic route, after all Edmonton is such a lovely city.


We will ignore that he really only needs to go to the Legislature maybe 100 days a year and assume that he went there every day – 3 times.


Now, I know what you’re thinking… SO he fudged a bit on his mileage…


I mean the government only gives him 43.5 cents a kilometer and gas is expensive. This isn’t too too excessive.


There is just one problem…


You see David buys his premium gas using a government credit card. That’s right. He gets 40cents a km on top of FREE gas. The 66000 kms using premium gas cost the taxpayer --and not David-- another approximately $14,000 in those two years.


Oh, did I mention that the government also pays for his windshield washer fluid and oil changes…



It is time to stop the PC gravy train. It is time to vote Wildrose.

-----

Update: David Xiao for April 1, 2011 to March 31, 2012 billed $34,390 to the taxpayer for mileage. link
 As far as I am aware the Alberta Legislature has not moved locations and remains in his riding.
  

The Alberta Liberal Party is "firmly opposed to the concept" of a Charter Right!

 Updated.

Yes you read that correctly. The Alberta Liberal Party is "firmly opposed" to the concept of a specific charter right. In this case section 2.a of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms which reads:

2. Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms:

(a) freedom of conscience and religion;

(b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;

(c) freedom of peaceful assembly; and

(d) freedom of association.   

The official Alberta Liberal Party press release on the subject:

"The Alberta Liberals are firmly opposed to the concept of conscience rights, and are deeply disturbed by the Wildrose Party's suggestion that there is a place for such a repugnant and antiquated notion in contemporary Alberta."


This is not about certain instances of an individual expressing their freedom of conscience, and I do not want to even get into that here, this is about not just being opposed, but firmly opposed to the concept of an existing Charter right. 

Now who are supposed to be the scary ones again?



Are they really opposed to the idea of it? I don't think so, it seems they are more likely to be the victim of a very poorly worded press release than actually against the concept of a charter right, but it did provide for some interesting discussion on the entire issue over the weekend.

Including a guest appearance from Justin Trudeau, whose father Pierre was instrumental in giving us our Constitution and Charter of Rights, and the weird part was that I was in agreement with him on both the Charter and the law.

The bottom line on all of this is that our Charter and our existing laws make all those claims that the Wildrose will somehow be able to take rights away due to conscience rights total BS. It hasn't happened in Alberta where someone has been denied a government service that they were entitled to and it will never happen because can't happen thanks to already existing laws.

Namely Section 15.1 of the Charter, and the law is very clear on this when it comes to individuals working on behalf of the government; they cannot discriminate.

And yes, that does include those that perform civil marriages. Because that is ALREADY the law of Canada and any law that is written that tries to change that will never survive a Charter challenge.


This is such a non issue I can't believe that sane people are buying the BS. It just will not happen.


Glad to go at it in the comments if you disagree but fair warning; the charter, the law and Justin Trudeau are on my side. ;-)

The PCAA: The biggest, baddest politcal machine in Alberta

In spite of what Redford and the PC's may want all of us to believe, it is wise for everyone to remember that the Alberta Progressive Conservatives are hardly the underdog or are somehow disadvantaged in this election. They are easily the largest, best funded, most organized and best connected political machine that this province has ever seen. Their resources dwarf any other party and probably all of them combined, and considering that they are also the current government, that advantage is multiplied even further as they are able to use the resources of the government for their own purposes, even though they should not be doing so.

We had the $100,000+ pre-election "cabinet tour" in back in January, the weekend retreat to Jasper in February where the PC caucus met up with the unelected PCAA candidates, commercials on the budget long before it was passed, and the ability to summon the media at will for a photo op or announcement of any kind and they took full advantage of all of it and all our our our dime.

And they are still at it!

I received this at a parent council meeting at our local school Apr 2, one week into the election campaign.

 
It is an outline of what the what the Alberta government (read PC's) are spending on education and includes the latest information from the 2012 budget, which bring up the obvious question: When was this printed?
The budget passed late on March 21st (BTW Redford was not in attendance and did not vote on her OWN budget) and the election call was on March 26th, with them being distributed and handed out only 1 week later!

Did the PCs again use government resources for free election advertising?  I think the answer is a definitive yes, the PC machine is more than willing to use not only their own ample resources to try to get themselves elected, but also tax payer dollars as well.


It is going to be an interesting few weeks as election day nears and PC election machine gets rolling and spends their money. The PCs have already gone negative ( pre-election attack ad, anonymous robo-calls pretending to be polls, election advertising claiming Danielle Smith is "not worth the risk") and if the last few days are any indication it is going to get nastier as the reality of the poll numbers start to sink in and have started to lash out like a cornered animal resorting to fear mongering and baseless smears as I called a few weeks back.


One more thing: Can we now ALL admit, given the ample evidence to the contrary, that Redford's oft repeated promises that the PCs will run a clean campaign are simply nothing but BS?  I think we are all getting tired of being lied to to our faces about this delusion.

More policy on the fly from Redford: Family Care Clinics

Updated: see bottom of post!

Today Premier Redford announced if she is elected that 140 family care clinics will be created in Alberta over the next 3 yrs.  Sounds wonderful but it looks like a desperation move and policy on the fly on her part for a number of reasons.

It was only a couple of weeks ago, March 22nd, that she announced 3 family care clinics that were to be built as a "pilot" project.  What happened in 2 weeks to turn a small pilot project of 3 into 140?

The cost for the 3 was to be 15 million dollars, making the cost of 140 ( if you believe the gov't numbers which are almost ALWAYS wrong) to be 700 million dollars. 700 million dollars that were NOT in the budget and which will make Redford's promises on a surplus next year all but impossible to keep. ( Don't forget that pre-election spending spree of at least $182 million un-budgeted dollars as well)

Also, how does 700 billion in new spending fit into Bill 1, the 'results based' budgeting bill where all money spend was to be evaluated based on results? This was entirely possible with the 3 'pilot' clinics, but to jump to 140 without knowing if the results does not exactly fit with what Redford passed as law in Alberta.


And lastly and perhaps the most important of all: Where will all the doctors, nurses and other staff come from to staff these 140 clinics?  We already have a known doctor shortage in this province and now with the gov't deciding to open 140 clinics, where will these doctors come from? Will they decide to close their private offices to work in a government run clinic, creating other problems? The same can be said about nurses, who currently find themselves often working short due to staff shortages in our existing hospitals and it is already creating undue stresses on the staff and the system. Where are we planning to get enough nurses to not only fix the existing shortages but also staff 140 new clinics?


It's more policy on the fly from a premier scrambling to stem the bad poll numbers with only 2 weeks to go before the election and the possible end of a 41 year political dynasty.

Update: Redford claims that the new clinics can be funded with existing money from AHS and will not cost any additional money.  How is that even possible? You would have to reduce money going somewhere else and the PCs never cut anything so where would it come from, and that does not even get into the issue of staffing the new clinics unless of course they plan to move existing staff out of hospitals and into the clinics!!!
To put it nicely the claim that this will not cost any additional cash is BS.

Alberta Medical Association president Dr. Linda Slocombe: Tory party campaign promise also goes against the Health Quality Council of Alberta recommendation earlier this year that the government undertake no further major re-structuring of the health-care system without a clear rationale, a transition plan and consultation. 



Wildrose press release on the issue.

The Globe and Mail forced to change a headline... again.

Now you see it.

 Now you don't.

For the second time in less than a week, the Globe and Mail has had to change a headline on a story due to public outcry. The first was on March 29th when the headline read "Wildrose would nix funding for costly Oilers arena if elected, Smith says"

With "Wildrose wouldn't fund costly Oilers arena if elected, Smith says" as the first one was factually wrong as NO party has ever agreed to fund the arena and which makes it impossible to "nix" something that doesn't even exist; but both headlines claim that is what "Smith says".  Odd that and even stranger that they made both changes without even acknowledging they did so.

And it happened again last night when the Globe removed the loaded word "childless" from their headline on the Gary Mason column, which itself is a total mess that starts off factually wrong in the very first paragraph by calling Amanda Wilkie a "party worker" ( see BC Blue for all you need to know on that and how either Redford or Stephen Carter were not telling the truth) and then makes the audacious claim that the tweet would not have been a story if Daniel Smith had not issued the press release: "Huh? There was no story until she made it one." which also happens to be the premise of Mason column and also happens to be dead wrong.

It was a story; I saw the tweet as soon as it was posted and I also saw the immediate response; both being re-tweeted by many PC supporters and the backlash by the majority, and when it became clear that this was a staff member from Premier Redford's office it became more than just another smear on twitter, it became a story, it became NEWS. I even blogged about here.


While facts and reality are not much in abundance in Mason's column, irony certainly is.
-Like Twitter busting the Globe and Mail about the headline on a story written about a tweet.
-Or a story that goes into 'gender politics' and asks if Smith were a man would we be even talking about this, itself uses 'childless' in the headline.
-Or that the author of a story about a tweet doesn't understand twitter ( if he did he would know why this became a story).
-Or that a story which says that the issue was kept alive and driven by politics is now keeping the issue alive by the story and has become news itself!
-Or that a story about Alberta politics is listed under British Columbia. Okay, that last one wasn't irony. Incompetence yes, irony no.

And speaking of irony: I love it when people use the word 'huh?' to try and express some kind of mental superiority and end up looking not so superior when they turn out to be totally wrong.

That is our professional media for you. I think Ill stick with the blogs.



Related:

The Globe and Mail headline the day Redford became Premier: "Alberta steps into the present"

A copy of the now deleted twitter account of Amanda Wilkie. Please note that this was not the first tweet that was suspect as there are a few doozies in there including:

- Wildrose supporters are  

- “ignorant rednecks” 

- “Bipolar Tories”

- “ethics & integrity aren’t part of @ElectDanielle character”

The facts on Alberta, the PC Party and electricity.

Seen your power bill lately?  Wondering about why the PCs plan on spending billions of dollars, which WILL increase your power bill in the future, on new power lines? Interested in knowing the real facts on electricity in Alberta?

If you are interested, and even if your not, I suggest that you take some time, sit back and watch the following videos of a recent presentation from Joe Anglin on the subject. The 6 videos total about 1&1/2 hr in length ; watch them all at once or one at a time, but they are definitely worth watching and will open up your eyes to what is really going on here in Alberta. This is important and it does effect every person and business on Alberta.

1 (if you are having problems watching the videos here try this link)



2


3


4


5


6




Bonus video. Minister of Transportation, Luke Ouellette, and Minister of Sustainable Resource Development actually flew down to southern Alberta on tax dollars to bully their way onto the stage of one of Joe Anglin's presentations on electricity!








A must read on the subject. RETA: Responsible Electricity Transmission for Albertans.

Could 1 single tweet be the final nail into the Alberta PC coffin?

The tweet: “If @ElectDanielle likes young and growing families so much, why doesn’t she have children of her own?  #wrp family pack = insincere” – Amanda Wilkie, "Executive Assistant to the Executive Director of the Office of the Premier (Southern Alberta Office)". March 30, 2012 (via Twitter).

The response:

March 31, 2012 (Calgary, AB): Today Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith issued the following statement in response to comments made by a Staffer in Premier Redford’s Calgary office regarding the Wildrose Family Pack.
“In the last day the question has been raised about why I don’t have children of my own.  When David and I married in 2006 we intended to have children together. After a few years we sought help from the Calgary Regional Fertility Clinic. I appreciated the support and assistance of the caring staff as we went through tests and treatments, but in the end we were not successful.
“I consider myself very fortunate to have a terrific stepson, Jonathan, David’s son from a previous marriage.  I am also blessed to have grown up in a large family with four siblings who have given me the opportunity to be the auntie of 5 terrific nieces and nephews: Emily, Sam, Chloe, Seyenna and Logan.
“Family is very important to me and I consider this to be a very personal matter. I will not be commenting on it further.”



                                                               -----------

Say goodbye to the positive campaign: Redford:“We’re working really hard to make it a positive campaign & we’re going to keep doing that." as there is no spinning that one anymore and the PCs might want to think twice about the "scary" "angry" Wildrose meme they are using as well.

After the poor last few weeks the PCs had and now this, which will be covered by ALL the media, there will be no recovery.

It's over.

Redford flip flops again. Desperation on committee pay issue boils over.

Premier Redford has flip flopped again on the committee pay issue as she announced today that PC MLAs on the infamous no-meet committee MUST pay back all the money they were paid.

A sad history of Redford's so called "real life leadership" on the issue:

Story breaks March 8th and Redford claims she that she was unaware of the situation: "I did not know," she said  “This, to me, is a ridiculous situation. It isn’t the way Albertans want politicians to be paid."  "It is not right"


March 9th: The truth comes out and she gets caught in a lie when we learn that she sat on that very same committee from Oct 09 until Feb 2010.

March 11th: Avoiding any leadership, Redford says that it is up to each individual member of her caucus to give back money they were paid for being on a committee that failed to meet for 39 months. “It’s a personal decision,”  She will NOT make anyone pay the money back.


March 12th: The first big flip flop as Redford changes her mind and announces that it is no longer is a personal decision and  that pay for committee work has been suspended for Tory members.

Also worth noting is that Redford called opposition MLAs giving the money back a "stunt"   "I find it terribly interesting that a number of people in this house, who today have come up with a convenient stunt to try and polarize an issue, are people who were fully aware of what they were receiving for payment and did nothing about it until today, we will do exactly what I've committed to doing, which is to have an independent commission make a recommendation to not only how government members are paid, but all members in the legislature.


March 20th: Under pressure PC MLAs ( but not all of them) announce that they will be giving back pay from no-meet committee, but only 6 months worth, the time which Redford was Premier. On which Redford said "I can't revisit the past,"


March 26th: Writ dropped and election called. PC use smear poll to find out why they are losing voters by the thousands.

March 27th: Redford goes all revisionist history and says that: "And I say again, I was the first person to identify (the committee) as an issue, and as soon as I became leader I took steps to correct it."  This in spite of her not knowing a thing about the committee back on the 9th.

March 29th: Redford flip flops on her flip flop and orders her MLA's to return the money. Forgetting that there are PC MLAs from that committee who will not ever pay back a single penny. (Snelgrove and Prins anyone?) and that she really does not have the authority to make these changes.  Its a Hail Mary but I believe the public won't buy it and will see it for the desperate political stunt that it is. 

March 30th: Dissension in the ranks. Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills MLA Richard Marz is not too happy with the way the Premier has handled this and questions why she should pay back some of the 30% (34% actually) that Redford voted to give herself in 2008.

Which brings up the question: If Redford's cabinet gets $3,500/month in lieu of committee pay, why shouldn't they return some of it?




Previously:

PC MLA Genia Leskiw on the no-meet committee:




Previous posts on the no-meet committee can be found here and here.

Redford's PC's, illegal donations, the culture of corruption and the rules written to hide it all.

I have written before on a couple of specific incidences of the Alberta Progressive Conservatives being on the receiving end of illegal donations and how Redford tried to spin it by blaming the donors rather than her own party for cashing the cheques, but with new revelations this past week and with Elections Alberta revealing that they had found 23 instances of illegal donations and have opened 73 files on the matter, it is time to revisit the issue again and shine more light onto the culture of corruption created by the ruling PCs and the rules which they wrote to hide it all from YOU.

The latest from Elections Alberta: 'Alberta’s chief electoral officer has found 23 cases where improper donations to political parties and constituency associations were made by municipalities and other public bodies.'
'Elections Alberta also reported a significant jump in cases that have been reviewed or are under review. There are now 73 files, compared to 53 cases two weeks ago.'
'All public cases known to have been referred to Elections Alberta for investigation have involved the ruling Progressive Conservatives.'


This type of thing has been going on for years in Alberta politics. It is a symptom of a one party state and is what happens when ANY party has unlimited majority power for over 40 years with the PC's being the beneficiary of the culture of corruption they have created by instilling the idea that in order to get provincial grants/money one has to play the game and contribute to the long ruling PCAA. Think I am kidding or going over the top on this?  Well perhaps you might want to read about what happened openly at a political forum in Rimbey Alberta back in October 2010 before passing judgement:

Mayor Dale Barr and his incumbent councillors had to answer at an election forum Oct. 6 for attending Progressive Conservative party functions with taxpayer’s dollars.  “I would like to know how you would have thought, for one second, that it was okay to take money out of my pocket and support the political party of your choice?” Levi Blackmore asked. 

Barr explained the town has to spend money to make money. Attending these functions benefited the town; and Rimbey attended them because other municipalities were also attending the Premier’s Dinners and golf tournaments to become friendly with government members." 

“In the last three years Rimbey has gotten approximately $15 million in additional funding that wasn’t coming our way. You figure it out from the dollars that were spent on theses functions, it works out to .05 per cent. That’s a fifth of one per cent was spent to get over $15 million worth,” added incumbent Wayne Clark.

Unbelievable. A mayor and a councillor publicly say that using tax dollar to attend partisan PC functions is an investment because that is how it is done in Alberta!  If that isn't the smoking gun to prove a culture of corruption exists in our one party state, I don't know what would be.   (But just in case here are a couple of links to recent events of the PC's putting their foot down on those that dare question the PC party:  AUMA Fiasco, Holy Family Catholic School Division, and do I really need to bring up intimidation of our doctors and nurses?)


The rules on political donations are clear so there is no need to go over them again but here is something that I bet few Albertans are aware of: Elections Alberta is explicitly forbidden by legislation from revealing any details about these investigations including who made the donation, which party received the money, who was found at fault and how much they’ve been penalized for breaking the rules. In other words, the legislation written by the PC's and which is now protecting the PC's from public scrutiny, prevents you, the public, from finding out who broke the rules, and the worst part is that Premier Redford is 100% in support of this nonsense! Redford said the laws are about “maintaining the integrity and independence” of the Chief Electoral Officer, What a load of tripe from Redford!  I can understand why it is not a good idea for Elections Alberta to discuss unproven allegations or even investigations in progress but there is no reason, other than to protect politicians, that the results of these investigations should ever be kept secret from Albertans, the ones that all of government, including Elections Alberta are here to serve. Sorry Premier, but hiding the facts from Albertans is not real life leadership, not even close. 

Before I wrap this up I would like to touch on one last thing and that is Redford's spin on this entire matter. As I wrote back in January, Redford and the PCs have taken to blaming the donor rather than her party, who happily took the money and cashed the cheques, in a sad attempt to deflect and make themselves look better.

Redford: "and we are going to have no part in any kind of practice or procedure that would suggest that that was acceptable." and "Municipal leaders, who are also elected by their communities, have a responsibility to follow the rules. There is no doubt that auditors who are in place understand the rules, and I fully expect that everyone who is elected and fully engaged in auditing should understand the rules well enough to make sure that these things aren’t happening."

All sounds well and good but how can she explain it when PC party members Steve Christie, the current PC candidate for Lacombe-Ponoka who also happens to be the Mayor of Lacombe as well as past(?) president of their local PCAA board, and Carol Lund, president of the Athabasca-Redwater Conservative riding association and Athabasca University’s University Secretary, responsible for its policies, including conflict of interest, both were responsible for illegal donations making their way to the PC party.

Christie: (claimed $500 for a Progressive Conservative fundraiser as a municipal expense) “As past president of the Lacombe-Ponoka PC association, I definitely knew the rules,” he said. “It’s definitely there in black and white and my signature is on it.”

Lund: (personally signed off on several requisitions for Tory fundraisers, including for the Athabasca-Redwater riding association. Lund also actively recruited university executives to attend these functions.)
BTW: CBC has done a great job following the money from Athabasca University to the PC's and it is well worth the time to check out the actual paper work here. 

Now what was it Redford said again about elected officials and those responsible for auditing knowing the rules and the PC's not having any part in anything that would suggest that this type of thing was acceptable?



For all of our sakes this tired party and the culture of corruption which it sowed and reaped the benefits of  has to go, and go soon. Albertans deserve so much better than this.

Fun and games in Alberta politics leads to some serious questions ...

As Education Minister Thomas Lukaszuk tweeted early this morning: "We are such an interesting province for politics." in reference to the Rob Anderson parking lot incident that seemed to not only consume the PC cheerleaders who are desperate for anything at all to talk about, but for our media as well who were all over the story and it was fun and games in Alberta politics. But when the dust settled some serious questions emerged. 


Who tipped off the media?

Recreating the timeline from media reports here is what we know:

The incident occurred Tuesday night at approx 7:30 PM in the parking lot at the Alberta Legislature.

On Wednesday the incident was known to the press who then spoke with Anderson about it.

But who tipped off the press?

This from The Edmonton Sun: "Solicitor-General Jonathan Denis said Wednesday he was aware there had been a parking issue. "I had heard outside that Mr. Anderson had an issue with parking in the premier's parking spot,"

This from the CBC: 'Solicitor General Jonathan Denis says Anderson was the aggressor in this case, according to the report filed by the sheriff.'   


This from the Edmonton Journal: 'Solicitor General Jonathan Denis informed media Wednesday morning about the incident,...'

Now isn't that interesting. Our Solicitor General, Jonathan Denis who is in charge of our Alberta's Sheriffs, apparently was the one who informed the media. But why would he do so? What made this event so special that it was even brought to the attention of the Solicitor General in the first place, considering no charges were laid or fines issued, and even if it was brought to his attention was it appropriate or common practice to tip off the media about details which IMHO should have been confidential?

While I doubt that I we will get any answers to those questions, as it appears to be just some of those Alberta political games being played where someone has a gotcha moment over an opponent, buried in the Journal story is this very interesting line that calls for more than just a simple answer:

'... the sheriff said in her incident report, obtained by the Journal.'

Yes, you read that right. The Sheriffs incident report, that we know from media reports that the Solicitor General had himself read, was somehow obtained by the Journal from someone within the building which not only houses the Alberta Legislature, but also the offices of the Solicitor General who has ministerial responsibility over our Alberta Sheriffs.

So now a more important question:

Minister Denis, are you planning to investigate who leaked the sheriffs incident report to the press and how such a leak occurred under your very nose from within the building in which you work?

This is not fun and games anymore.

Wildrose TV ad debuts

"It's time to put Albertans first."





Or you can watch it here or here.

Under pressure, Premier Redford orchestrates her own "stunt" on committee pay.

The Wildrose gets results!

In a total reversal of her previous position it was announced earlier today that that Premier Record would be forcing the PC MLAs who sat on the infamous no-meet committee, that Redford herself sat on but didn't even know, to pay back the money they were paid for being on the committee that has not met since November 17, 2008. But only for the last 6 months, which happens to be the same amount of time that Redford has been the PC leader; I guess taking 'money for nothing and the cheques for free' wasn't a problem before October.

While not the first flip flop on this issue for Redford this one is going to be much harder to spin due to her previous attempts at damage control, which have apparently failed badly.

When asked on March 11 if she was going to make her MLAs refund the money she stated that she would not and that "It's a personal decision." if they wanted to refund the money.


And in the Alberta Legislature she had these, now empty, words:  "I find it terribly interesting that a number of people in this house, who today have come up with a convenient stunt to try and polarize an issue, are people who were fully aware of what they were receiving for payment and did nothing about it until today, we will do exactly what I've committed to doing, which is to have an independent commission make a recommendation to not only how government members are paid, but all members in the legislature."


Wow. A total flip flop from the Premier who has said on many occasions that she is honest and stands by her word. Those internal polls must not be going exactly the way that Stephen Carter said they would.


Related: I wonder what PC MLA Karen Kleiss has to say now?

Previously from Kleiss:













Don Braid on the refund fiasco here.

Representatives of all 7200 Alberta doctors call for a proper health inquiry.

Representatives of all 7200 Alberta doctors call for a proper health inquiry.

"In a strongly worded statement that accuses the government of “stonewalling” and brushing over an “inconvenient truth” on the eve of an election, physician representatives of all 7,200 provincial doctors are calling on Albertans to bring in a “tsunami of change” and demand a public health inquiry into the issue of physician intimidation."

Having written the terms of  reference so narrow that it is all but impossible for an inquiry to even consider looking at bullying and intimidation in healthcare, it is clear that Premier Redford is trying to whitewash the entire thing.

Who are you going to believe? Redford or our physicians?

I know who I trust more.

Bring on the tsunami.


Update: Corbella: MLAs paid nearly 1 million dollars after 14 minutes of work.


'And yet Prins, who is paid $18,000 a year to chair the standing committee on privileges and elections, standing orders and printing, was quoted in Friday’s Herald saying: “I have done nothing wrong. Why would I give money back?”
It’s an outrageous statement and highlights his overblown sense of entitlement.'

Braid's latest on the mighty tsunami election battle.  (Love the picture of Redford they used)

PC supporters. Please tell me again why I should vote for them?

Redford's Healthcare inquiry: It's a whitewash.

The Terms of Reference are out for the planned healthcare inquiry and even though I am not a lawyer it is quite easy to see that in-spite of what the Premier promised and later tried to spin, the healthcare inquiry has been handcuffed into ONLY looking at queue jumping and ONLY queue jumping that "is occurring." (For all you other non lawyers please note the tense of the word occurring.)

Read the Terms of Reference your self here.

Pursuant to section 17 of the Health Quality Council of Alberta Act, the Lieutenant Governor in Council orders that a public inquiry be held concerning the possibility of improper preferential access being given to publicly funded health services and, specifically, the terms of reference for the inquiry shall be to consider:

1.  Whether improper preferential access to publicly funded health services is

    occurring;  and

                        2.   If there is evidence of improper preferential access to publicly funded health services
                            occurring, make recommendations to prevent improper access in the future.
 

Not even close to what Redford promised (link now dead but see bottom of this blog), not anywhere near the way she tried to spin it, and not what Albertans expected or deserve.

It's a whitewash. 

The judge has NO choice or leeway to expand or go beyond these instructions PERIOD, any claims that the judge can investigate anything other than what is listed in these terms is quite simply BS.

Our Premier is a lawyer and was also our justice minister; she not only knows exactly what the terms of reference mean, she also had a big hand in writing them and an even bigger hand in spinning them to the public.

And sadly most Albertans won't have figured it out until long after the election. Which was the PC plan all along.


Updated with the article linked to above. ( if media wouldn"t delete their articles there would be no need to reproduce them in full, which I now feel I have to do just to prove I am not making stuff up.)

What Alison Redford has said about need for a health-care inquiry

Calgary Herald

Published: Friday, March 02, 2012

- Redford leadership campaign news release on June 7, 2011:
Alison Redford, in light of growing accusations of political interference in the health-care system, has called for a judicial inquiry.
The inquiry will focus on charges of political interference into the provincial health system.

"Dr. Duckett, in his address on May 5th, stated outright that before his tenure as CEO of the AHS, people of the 'political class' were accustomed to being granted higher access in the system than those who were not as connected," stated Alison Redford, candidate for leader of the PC party.
"This statement, when combined with earlier allegations of a culture of intimidation, has provided an impetus to call for an independent inquiry."
"My call for an inquiry is about finding out the truth and putting a stop to practises that go against my personal and political values ..."

- In the legislature Nov. 21, 2011, in response to a question about the alleged intimidation of one doctor concerned about a health-care facility closure in Calgary:
"Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to see that, in fact, if someone does have concerns with respect to doctor intimidation, they would be prepared to come to an inquiry. The legislation will be tabled in the house today to ensure that that can happen."

- Speaking to reporters in Calgary on Feb. 24, 2012:
Herald's Don Braid: "You said when you made your statement in the summer about the inquiry that it should - you're talking about political interference, I believe you refer to that and intimidation. Are you going to make both of those issues part of the inquiry?"
Redford: "It has to be."

- Redford at a March 1 news conference:
"I, in my heart, believe and know that the commitment that I made last June is the commitment that we honoured this week. I want to make sure that we've dealt with queue jumping in the health-care system and last summer, I made a commitment to have an independent judicial inquiry with respect to that....
"I have not backed down one bit from what I said that I would do."

© Calgary Herald 2012

 

----------------------

 *I would rate this article a 9 out of 10.

 

.

Alison Redford: Lawyer, former justice minister and now Premier of Alberta...

Alison Redford: Lawyer, former justice minister and now Premier of Alberta and she still didn't know that the Alberta ethics commissioner has no ability to investigate Gary Mar’s controversial fundraiser!

It was Redford who last Friday suspended Mar from his Asia job without pay, and then turned the matter over to the commissioner.

In a TV interview Tuesday morning, she patted herself on the back for acting in the proper matter.

By late afternoon Neil Wilkinson threw the mess back at her. The rules written for him by the PC majority do not let him peer into Mar’s fundraising event.

Ouch.


I am not Gary Mar's biggest fan, not by a long shot, but honestly I am not sure what Gary Mar actually did to bring down the wrath of Redford on him in such a public fashion.

I know that he held a fundraiser to help pay off his $260,000 debt from his leadership run, but don't all politicians do that? Fundraisers are as common in politics as politicians are so what was the big deal?

Whether or not the invitations named him as Alberta's Asia envoy doesn't seem like to big a deal to me because he IS Alberta's Asia envoy if it says so on the invitation or not, and I really don't see much of a difference between what he did and what Premier Redford has been doing with any of her Premiers Dinners that she has held.

I guess we will have to wait and see but one thing for certain is that Premier Redford has it out for Gary Mar.

Remember, she is a lawyer and EVERYTHING that she says is done is a very calculated manner. She has used 'lawyer speak' to weasel her way around her promises on a healthcare inquiry and a fixed election date, parsing her words very carefully every time she speaks, but with Mar she went before the cameras and basically called his actions wrong and sent the ethics commissioner after him ( which we now know has no authority to do) rather than deal with it it a calm reasonable manner and wait for some facts before flying off the handle and tossing Mar under the PC campaign bus.

Why she did so remains unknown but considering how she has downplayed almost everything that has looked bad for the PC's so far, her going public with the accusations against Mar suggests that she is gunning for him.


Update: April 19th 2012:  Dave Rutherford is saying that Gary Mar has been cleared of any and all allegations against him. It seems that this report has been on Premier Redford's desk for a number of days and has not been made public.  I wonder why.

Redford flounders on committee pay issue.

Thursday: News breaks on a committee that has not met since 2008 but yet pays MLAs $1000 per month. Redford responds that she was unaware of the situation: "I did not know," she said  “This, to me, is a ridiculous situation. It isn’t the way Albertans want politicians to be paid."  "It is not right"


Friday: We find out that Redford was not as unaware as she claimed when we learn that she sat on that very same committee from Oct 09 until Feb 2010.

Sunday: Redford said it is up to each individual member of her caucus to give back money they were paid for being on a committee that failed to meet for 39 months. “It’s a personal decision,”
 
Monday: It is no longer is a personal decision as Redford says that pay for committee work has been suspended for Tory members.

What a disaster this has been for the PC's. More of the entitlements that they voted for themselves get exposed to the light of day and a leader doing damage control who changes her story/position almost daily. And if the polls are any indication Alberta voters, who now are starting to pay more attention due to the upcoming election, are not finding the PC's and Redford's reactionary damage control very attractive.

Here is something to think about: The standing committee on privileges and elections was a category B ( MLAs paid per meeting) back in 2007 but the PCs changed that in 2008 making it category A ( meaning that MLAs get paid just because) Coincidentally 2008 was also the year that the Chair, PC MLA Ray Prins, last called the committee to meet.   Odd isn't it.


Want a good laugh. Read the minutes of the last time the standing committee on privileges and elections met back on November 17 2008  8:07AM.

Some highlights: 

Prins (Chair): Right. Following this motion, they’ll be approved by
the chair. If we didn’t do that, you wouldn’t be able to see them till
the next meeting, which could be 20 years from now.
Okay. All in favour of that motion?

Mr. Liepert: Well, I just want to get on the record that I find those
comments rather amusing considering the fact that this is as open
and transparent a way to discuss changes to the democratic process
– are you suggesting that we do it behind closed doors? I think this
is quite telling, Mr. Chairman.

Prins: Thank you.
If there are no further comments, I just want to add one more
comment myself, and that is that the final report back to the
Legislature from this committee will be tabled in the House as soon
as it can be put together, probably later this week, and we’ll look
forward to that.

We do have a motion to adjourn on the floor, so without further
comment all in favour?

Hon. Members: Agreed.

The Chair: Then we’re adjourned. Thank you very much.

.

The committee adjourned at 8:21 AM and has not met since. The pay cheques though continued.

Redford's misleading attack ad. Where did the PC's get their numbers from?

Have you heard the PC attack ad against Danielle Smith and the Wildrose yet?

BTW: It is the very first time in PCAA history that they have EVER named an opposition party or its leader in an ad. Take a listen:



Quite a piece of work isn't it. Pure fear mongering that not only is a total misrepresentation and fabrication of the Wildrose position on impaired driving (more on this later) but they also used a number that cannot be found in any research, study, academic work or from any government agency; 300.

"Since 1998 300 Albertans have been killed by drivers who blew 0.08 or less."

Putting aside for a moment the ludicrous wording that 300 deaths were caused by ANY driver who blew less than 0.08, including the vast majority who had absolutely NO measurable amount of alcohol in their system,which would make the number much higher, the 300 number it turns out is the work of one solitary journalist.

The ruling PC's who have the resources of an entire government at their disposal, as well as Transport Canada information and others, decided not to use any government statistics/research and instead decided to use those of a journalist who said of the 300 number "the estimate is my own". Yes, an estimate!  Since I don't want to turn this into a dueling numbers thing I will just leave it by saying what should be obvious; the PCs didn't like what they found looking at their own governments data and went number shopping instead to find what they were looking for to fit their political motives, in this case the attack ad. If you want to look more at some numbers that actually came from a reliable source, Alberta Transport, take a look at this recent blog post from Rob Harvie at Searching for Liberty.

But the story doesn't get better for the PC's. Their campaign chair, Susan Elliot of deleting Facebook posts fame, did an interview the other day in which as Dave Rutherford described it; "Susan Elliot in fact was not telling the truth in the interview.Torquing the story, cranking it up. And she is now the spokesperson for the PC party."  Dave was being kind. Speaking as the voice of the PCAA, Elliot flat out lied in order to mislead Albertans for political purposes and in defense of a bad law that was written to pander for votes after a tragedy on Alberta roads. And now these lies will taint every other claim that the PC's will make in the upcoming election because if they will lie about this, they will lie about anything and probably everything. WTG Campaign Chair!

You can listen to the interview here:



I don't know about yourself but I hate being lied to and we can see the PCs have already shown that they are more than happy to do just that so they can remain in power and have more time at the taxpayer funded trough.

This is going to backfire on the PC's big-time. A desperate attempt to mislead the very people that they claim to represent into again casting a ballot for their party made worse by the fact that they are treating us like idiots who can't see through the easily proven lies and spin.

It is like Redford and the PC's don't think we are worthy of the truth.

Enough is enough. Redford and the PCs have to go; Albertans deserve better than this.



h/t to Rob Breakenridge, Colby Cosh, Matt Solberg.


Related: This is not the first time that the PC's have lied about Bill 26.

Alison Redford "Real life Leadership" or not...

It is painted on the side of the PC Campaign bus in big letters along side a picture of Alison Redford and reads "Real life Leadership". It is the campaign slogan with which the PCAA are going to run on in the upcoming Alberta provincial election.

But what does it mean, and more importantly has Alison Redford's leadership decisions lived up to her lofty sounding slogan so far?  The first answer to the first part is a bit difficult. The answer to the second part though is not. Not even close.

Like most campaign slogans 'real life leadership' sounds meaningful but it's just vague enough that applying any solid definition to it is nearly impossible. It has the buzzword 'leadership' in it which sounds good to the ear and it has 'real life' in it as well, which is also sounds good because that is where we all happen to be at the moment, but it also becomes meaningless fluff for that same reason as there is no other alternative to 'real life'. Zombies and the afterlife excluded.  I guess it is better than the laughable 'change from within' that I still see added to twitter hashtags now and again but it in the end it remains just as meaningless. But lets leave out the fluff for a minute and concentrate more on the slogan buzz word, the one that is supposed to make us feel comfortable when ever we hear it, leadership.


Alison Redford has been our premier now for exactly 6 months / 5 days and has had to make many decisions in that role and her role for 4 yrs previous as a cabinet minister under Ed Stelmach. But so far I have not seen much in the way of what I would consider to be real leadership from Redford on many issues and on others her record clearly shows the opposite, a distinct lack of leadership.

During the Stelmach period it is clear that she was just another nodding head at the cabinet table, agreeing with everything her boss proposed, be it royalty reviews, power lines, property rights, as well as the mess that was made in healthcare. I won't dwell on this period as Redford was not the one who made the final call but now that she has decided to revisit many of these Stelmach decisions it is clear that she did not agree or had some doubts with them, and it is worth noting that she showed little leadership by not speaking out at the time while in her role at the cabinet table.

Redford's leadership record also has not been stellar during her short time in the big office as premier, and on some rather important issues a troubling trend has emerged as she seems to want to pass off the difficult decisions that she is expected to make onto others. Be it her decision to hold a limited inquiry into healthcare, that was promised would deeper into the systems problems rather than just limiting focus specifically on queue jumping, or MLA pay where she promised to accept the judges recommendations (including if a pay raise is recommended) rather than just making the call herself. There seems to be a pattern of passing the buck and now it seems Redford is going to be doing the same on committee pay.

I think that most people are aware about the situation with the 'standing committee on privileges and elections' which has not met since 2008 and where 21 government and opposition MLAs have been paid $1,000 a month to attend non existent meetings. It is a joke and it has upset a lot of Albertans who are tired of politicians at the trough forcing Redford to speak out on it in an effort at damage control.

Redford: “This, to me, is a ridiculous situation. It isn’t the way Albertans want politicians to be paid." she said; "It is not right" Adding that she was unaware of the situation with the standing committee on privileges and elections, "I did not know," she said Thursday, calling it "disappointing".

Sounded like she was going to step up doesn't it? Caught unaware of what was going on she came out and expressed her displeasure at the situation, but there is one small problem with that.

Redford herself was on that committee and collected that $1000/month for not doing anything at all.

Yes, the same committee that she claimed she had not known about on Thursday, was in fact a committee the Alison Redford was sitting on from Oct. 28, 2009 until February 2010!

Unbelievable is one word for it and I can think of a few other choice words as well, but I will tell you what does not come to mind after hearing Redford talk about this, and that is "leadership".  Sorry Alison but we expect our premier to be able to make not only the tough decisions but also the no-brainers as with this committee and we don't elect people to punt to others when the responsibility is their own and they have the ability and opportunity to do the correct thing now.
 

That is not leadership. Real life or otherwise.



                                                              ------------------------

Some other questionable Redford leadership: Loading up her cabinet with failed PC leadership contenders, questionable appointments to party positions and to the Alberta Asia Trade office, to name a few.

Photo: AMBER BRACKEN/EDMONTON SUN/QMI AGENCY