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National Observer
22-05-2025
- Politics
- National Observer
Pierre Poilievre needs to fight for Canada
As a conspicuously educated and literate man, former Alberta premier Jason Kenney is surely familiar with Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. And yet, it still didn't stop him from creating his own political monster in the United Conservative Party, a sewn-together beast that is now wreaking havoc on both his province and country by empowering and amplifying Alberta's separatist movement. 'This is playing with fire,' Kenney told the media at ATCO 's recent annual general meeting. 'And if Albertans doubt that, look at a real historical example of what happened in Quebec's economy as a result of merely the election of a PQ government.' He wasn't the only Conservative warning about the economic risks associated with the Alberta government's de-facto surrender to the province's separatists. "I think the separatist discussion is very unhelpful and not constructive to Alberta," ATCO CEO (and longtime Conservative) Nancy Southern said. It's worth pointing out that the fire Kenney's warning Albertans about wouldn't be nearly as easy for Danielle Smith to start he hadn't brought the fringe elements of Alberta's Conservative movement into the province's political mainstream. It hasn't helped that Conservative politicians, pundits and business leaders have spent the last decade telling Albertans that their economic woes were the direct result of a hostile and malicious federal government. Those arguments may have helped them win elections, attract donations and otherwise keep their supporters properly lathered. Now, they're the kindling that's actively fueling the separatist fire. This fire won't get extinguished by fact-wielding progressives, much as they — and I — will try. Instead, it will have to be fought primarily by Conservatives like Jason Kenney. As former NDP advisor and podcaster Zain Velji said on a recent episode of The Strategists, 'you want to be really careful about who forms the opposition here. In some ways, if this could be a battle of Conservatism, that is actually what leads to potential success.' That means folks like former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, former CPC interim Leader Rona Ambrose, and high-profile members of parliament like Michelle Rempel-Garner ought to step forward and defend their country. It also means that Pierre Poilievre's impending by-election in Battle River-Crowfoot, where the CPC candidate won 82 per cent of the vote in April, suddenly takes on even more importance. That's because it offers Poilievre an important opportunity to stand up for Canada and help advance the fight against the very same separatist Alberta Conservatives that he has courted in the past. As columnist Chantal Hebert said on a recent episode of Good Talk, 'no future prime minister can be grey on the issue of national unity.' That's especially true for a politician running in a province where the idea of separating from Canada is being actively debated. In some respects, he may have chosen the worst possible riding in which to do that. A recent poll found that 70 per cent of federal Conservative voters in Alberta support separating from Canada, and that figure is probably even higher in Poilievre's chosen riding given its rural (and deeply Conservative) nature. Coming out strongly against the idea of Alberta independence would guarantee a backlash from many of the voters who marked a ballot for his party in April. Pierre Poilievre avoided a fight by picking the safest Conservative riding in Canada for his byelection. Now, with Alberta's separatists on the march, he has one on his hands anyways. How he responds to it will determine his political future. If Poilievre wants to win the next federal election, he should welcome that backlash. It would help put some distance between him and the fringier elements of his political base, and show Canadians in the rest of the country where his loyalties really lie. It would almost certainly win him support in places like British Columbia, Ontario, and the Maritimes, where the idea of Alberta separating from Canada is seen as irresponsible and reckless nonsense. And it would give him the chance to reinvent himself as the person who protected Canada rather than the one who relished describing it as broken and stupid. This won't be easy for Poilievre. He would have to abandon the story he's told Canadians — and especially Albertans — for years now, one in which the Liberal government is the architect of all their pain and suffering. He would have to show Albertans they're better off as part of a united Canada than on their own, and in so doing renounce some of the lies they now treat as gospel. Canada isn't trying to kill their oil and gas industry — far from it, in fact. And Carney isn't the biggest threat to their prosperity. That would be Donald Trump. Hardest of all, perhaps, he'd have to at least implicitly acknowledge the damage his particular brand of politics has done to the fabric of our country. It's easy to get people to blame someone else for their misfortunes, and easier still to make them angry at some politically convenient scapegoat. That's especially true when you have access to the tools of social media, which Poilievre has wielded more effectively than any politician in Canada. Getting people to calm down and see reason after they've been fed a steady diet of partisan fearmongering and falsehoods is a much more daunting challenge. But if Poilievre actually wants to change the reputation he's earned over his long career in politics, he'll have to do more than just embark on yet another image makeover. Using his forthcoming byelection as an opportunity to renounce and rebuke Alberta's separatist movement, and the politicians enabling it, would be a good start.
Calgary Herald
24-04-2025
- Politics
- Calgary Herald
Calgary Confederation: Spectre of vote-splitting raised in hotly contested race
Article content It was 12:06 p.m. on a Friday in late March when Corey Hogan received an unexpected call from the Alberta election readiness chair for the Liberal Party of Canada. Article content Article content 'She says, 'Keeper's out. It's going to be public in about an hour,' ' Hogan recalls. Article content The previously announced Liberal candidate in Calgary Confederation, Thomas Keeper, had been dropped and the party needed a replacement. Hogan had been in earlier conversations about a potential run but had made it clear he would only consider running in Confederation — his home riding — which already had a candidate at the time. Article content Article content Hogan is vice-president of communications and community engagement at the University of Calgary and is known for his political punditry, also for co-hosting The Strategists podcast. He previously led communications for both former Alberta premiers Rachel Notley and Jason Kenney. But this is his first time on the ballot. Article content He flips through photos of his wife and three children, who went ahead with a family trip to Japan without him. Hogan stayed behind, and would spend hours of the day campaigning around his own neighbourhood of Crescent Heights, where bus stop benches lining Edmonton Trail, Kensington Road and elsewhere are still plastered with Keeper's face. Article content Article content Calgary Confederation has been one of the most closely watched ridings in Calgary this election, considered by political analysts to be one of the few Alberta constituencies where a Liberal win is within reach. Article content Article content Since forming ahead of the 2015 federal election, the riding has been held by Conservative Len Webber. In 2015, the Liberals came within about 2.4 percentage points of taking the seat. But in the past two elections, the Conservatives have strengthened their hold on the riding, securing just over 45 per cent of the vote in 2021, while Liberal support hovered just below 28 per cent. Article content Article content This year, polling and seat forecasts suggest the race is neck-and-neck between Liberals and Conservatives. The latest 338Canada projections show the Liberals holding a narrow lead in Calgary Confederation, with 45 per cent support compared to 44 per cent for the Conservatives. The NDP trails at six per cent. Article content Calgary Confederation includes diverse neighbourhoods like Crescent Heights, Dalhousie and Highland Park, and is home to three post-secondary institutions. It's also a hot spot of concerns about progressive vote splitting. Article content 'It's a very close race,' says Hogan. 'If (voters) are thinking about voting NDP, I'd ask them to consider me as a candidate because this could be a real opportunity to give different representation in Calgary Confederation, which is probably the least conservative part of the city.'
