"I'm a Liberal. And I'm a PC..."
Bottom line - they're clever and funny, which is what you want in a viral ad campaign.
Labels: Ads, Stephane Dion
Disenfranchised Young Tories
In 2004 a group of young Albertans decided to contribute to the betterment of PC Alberta, by joining the Party’s youth wing (at the time refer to exclusively as the PC Youth, now referred to as the Young PC’s or YAPCA).
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In early 2005 the Young PC’s had a website, pcya.ca. Unfortunately, PC Alberta controlled the site, in an attempt to control the messages going out. This forced the newly minted executive to created their own website and try to attract new members – www.yapca.com.
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It is however strange, that it was reported in the Calgary Herald (May 29, 2007) that PC Alberta in fact does not have any legal opinion but is “… seeking legal opinion as to whether the new youth executive elected this past weekend in Calgary is legitimate and can remain in place, she added. A decision is expected in a few weeks.” According to acting Executive Director of PC Alberta, Pat Godkin.
Clearly, the Young PC’s have reason to be concerned. An illegal election (in our opinion) may have been forced on the membership on May 26, 2007. PC Alberta has attempted to silence the Young PC’s through strong-arm tactics. Tactics, which some members of the Executive fear will only escalate. This in conjunction with $9,000 of funding being withheld, a Party Brass bent on controlling young PC’s, and a lack a of leadership within PC Alberta have left us with no choice, but to take our position to the court of public opinion.
PC Alberta members deserve to know that like the City of Calgary, no funds will come to YAPCA without strings attached so that the puppet masters can have Young PC’s do their bidding.
Labels: Ed Stelmach
Uh-huh. Yeah right. I'm pretty sure the guy is gonna blink on this one.
Labels: Jean Charest, Quebec election
Labels: PEI election
Labels: Alberta Independence
Labels: Jean Charest, Mario Dumont, Quebec election
Labels: electoral reform, Ontario Election
Labels: Gary Doer, Manitoba Election
Labels: Calgary Elbow Byelection
The recent rent debacle is just the latest example of the price we all pay for a government that refuses to plan beyond winning the next election. And even when it gets a plan, in this case a Committee Report, it sacrifices the plan on the Darwinian alter of survival of the fittest and a vague notion of the market adjusting itself.
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With foresight, Peter Lougheed anticipated that famous bumper sticker we all saw in the 80’s: “Lord, please give me another boom, I promise not to waste it away again.” Or something close to that – “waste” might not be quite be the word that was used.
Today, the famous “rainy day” fund has only $15 billion dollars in it. It has wasted away and been abandoned by successive Tory governments.
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Every time our children come home from school with another chocolate bar fundraising drive or magazine sales drive, we are reminded that something isn’t working.
Every time an Alberta family sits around the kitchen table and tries to figure out how they are going to pay the rising tuition costs at our universities, colleges and technical institutes we are reminded that something isn’t working.
Every time we wait for hours for emergency services at our hospitals; or read that most family doctors in Edmonton won’t take new patients, even as our city grows. Or drive through towns with signs advertising for a doctor, we know that something isn’t working.
Or recently, when we learned that there is a critical shortage of experienced Crown Prosecutors, which is compromising the safety and security of all Albertans, we know that something isn’t working.
Every time we drive on our roads and feel the failing infrastructure under our tires, we know that something isn’t working.
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What all of these examples highlight is that the Tory regime has become so arrogant in power, so complacent in their right to govern, that they no longer consider themselves responsible to any of us.
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36 years ago, Peter Lougheed went to Albertans with a simple proposition. He argued that Albertans should receive a fair royalty return for our oil and gas.
He said that Albertans deserved a competent government which could manage the complexities of the economy of that time and plan for the future.
The Social Credit government had been power for 36 years and was complacent and out of touch.
Lougheed’s slogan then was simply “Now.”
36 years later we find ourselves at a similar juncture in Alberta’s history. Peter Lougheed’s criticisms of the Socred government can be applied with equal justice to the Tory government.
The parallels between 1971 and now are striking. The choice between the Parties is clear and the stakes could not be higher.
Over the next few months I plan to door knock in Edmonton Manning. For the first time, in a long time, there is a real opportunity for change. The riding of Edmonton Manning will be closely contested in the next election, and I need your help.
Albertans want a responsible and competent government. After 36 years its time for a change and I’m ready. NOW.
Labels: Alberta Election, Alberta Liberal Party, Sandeep Dhir
OTTAWA — The Conservative government says it is taking action to keeping foreign strippers out of Canada.
Labels: Romanian Strippers
Labels: Alberta Election, Ed Stelmach, Kevin Taft
Labels: Gas prices
Labels: Liberal leadership race, Stephane Dion
Labels: Gilles Duceppe
- Smile occasionally.
- Get better at pretending you actually enjoy meeting people. Mr. Harper learned to fake it, so you can too. They have consultants who can help.
- Keep on avoiding a script during Question Period.
- Stop giving deputy leader Michael Ignatieff the best questions. You pick first.
- Find and stake your claim on any defining issue except the environment to freshen up the leadership image.
- Never EVER go to Kelekis in Winnipeg and eat one of the restaurant's world-famous hot dogs using a KNIFE and a FORK like you did last month.
- Get a cat to play with your dog called Kyoto and name it Charisma.
- Reach back to the highly successful Jean Chretien era for staff recruitment. They were, after all, the architects of three consecutive majorities. Instead your office is dominated by Paul Martin leftovers, those big brains who delivered a single minority win and thought up the constitutional amendment on the notwithstanding clause.
- Being decent, cerebral and cautious, you should hire staff who are ruthless, fearless and take no prisoner partisan. See Chretien aides above.
- Take Justin Trudeau on the road to boost the heart-throb factor, but skip over Alberta because his daddy's name is still an obscenity there. Let Trudeau be seen. Letting junior be heard before he's received a history lesson or two has proven to be risky.
- Consider doing what the political textbooks call a "Preston" after former Reform leader Manning or a "Peterson" after former Ontario premier David. We're talking the full meal deal - glasses gone, hair style changed, upgraded suits and perhaps a voice coach to amp up those low-projection chords a bit
Labels: Stephane Dion
Labels: Book Reviews, Quebec Politics
Labels: Tony Blair
Labels: Environment, Justin Trudeau, News
Labels: Andre Boisclair, Gilles Duceppe
Bring pro hockey back to Winnipeg: Manitoba Tories
WINNIPEG — Manitoba's provincial election campaign has turned its attention to hockey with the Conservatives promising to bring the NHL back to Winnipeg.
Standing alongside former Winnipeg Jet Thomas Steen, Tory Leader Hugh McFadyen said he'll work with the private sector to bring back the team, who left Manitoba a decade ago.
Labels: hockey, Manitoba Election
Tories express Anti-Calgary sentiment
Alberta divide appears to be growing
EDMONTON - A ripple of anti-Calgary sentiment seemed to permeate the Progressive Conservative convention Saturday in Edmonton, with samples coming in both noise and numbers.
Mayor Dave Bronconnier's political tactics were the target of rowdy party members, then Calgary candidate Joe Lougheed -- son of former premier Peter Lougheed -- was rejected in his run for Tory party president against Edmonton-area candidate Marg Mrazek.
But the most palpable moment came when a crowd of more than 1,000 Tories gave Premier Ed Stelmach a raucous 40-second standing ovation, after he attacked Bronconnier -- who wasn't in attendance -- over the mayor's claims a lack of provincial dollars are delaying LRT expansion.
Labels: Andre Boisclair, Ed Stelmach, News
Bigfoot, the legendary hairy man-like beast said to roam the wildernesses of North America, is not shy, merely so rare it risks extinction and should be protected as an endangered species.
So says Canadian MP Mike Lake who has called for Bigfoot to be protected under Canada's species at risk act, alongside Whooping Cranes, Blue Whales, and Red Mulberry trees.
"The debate over their (Bigfoot's) existence is moot in the circumstance of their tenuous hold on merely existing," reads a petition presented by Lake to parliament in March and due to be discussed next week.
"Therefore, the petitioners request the House of Commons to establish immediate, comprehensive legislation to affect immediate protection of Bigfoot," says the petition signed by almost 500 of Lake's constituents in Edmonton, Alberta.
Labels: Mike Lake
Labels: Afghanistan, Gordon O'Connor
"Well, we certainly would have never made any such comparison," he said. "I think it's very unfortunate and certainly not something that we consider to be wise or appropriate."
"Mr. Speaker, enough is enough. We have been hearing those kinds of comments from the Prime Minister for 16 years since he began promising to clean up the air for Canadians and instead we have worse pollution than ever. He makes Neville Chamberlain look like a stalwart in standing up to a crisis. Smog is sending people to emergency wards at unprecedented levels. The prairies are drying up. We have forest fires like we have never had before. All we get are promises of plans to be brought forward some day. Will he bring forward a plan, yes or no?"
Labels: Elizabeth May, Jack Layton, News
Labels: (should be) Off Topic