Albertan here. Love Alberta. Alarmed by Danielle Smith’s emphasis on separation and her history of party betrayal. Applause to the First Nations for their strong response to her misguided and divisive views. She’s beyond foolish. This is an urgent time for unity within our nation and she’s feeding the wrong fight.
Having also spent considerable time in Alberta, I appreciate the article. It reminds me of the reaction to daylight savings by rural Albertan’s and Saskatchewan. They were convinced it was another eastern plot to destroy them. They honestly believed that they were going to lose daylight and not have the same amount of time in the fields. There were actual debates on the radio about this. This kind of stupidity was rampant. Another issue and point of hate for easterners was the bankruptcies during the depression. The big banks were located in Eastern Canada and so…. The other factor that shouldn’t be glossed over is the importance of religion. Never mind the Social Credit and its ties to religion but a population that blindly follows what they are told. I can tell you that the racism and unflinching devotion to “Christian dogmatism” were palpable. And this is the attraction of the MAGA movement and the establishment of the Christian Nationalist cult in the US. The other issue is is the dismal response of Albertans who aren’t part of the separatist fringe of crazies. They stand by and watch, helpless to do anything. Why? Because they live in a lemming culture. They sit back and watch their premier in all her corruption continue to move from one scandal to the next. She can say and do anything she wants and the nutbars and silent majority watch and applaud.
Great read you offer. Grievances (real or not) are fuelled by dark money originating in part from right wing agencies such as Harper’s IDU. It means to destabilize the country until they can seat a right wing/conservative government (that’d be their puppet). We’re off with another round of CONvoy type activities for the coming years. Expect more instability that will require the Liberal government attention and that will draw away from the real topics (Defense, economy, health and public safety). The real existential threat to Canada is right wing money - the one that is globally organized. That’s what RCMP and CSIS should be investigating and fighting.
I too was born in Alberta but left after high school in 1978 for college and a lengthy military career that took me, literally, around the world twice. I still have family in Alberta with half seeing the light and the other half... I recall as a teenager one could buy a novelty Alberta passport, which I did. In the spot where your photo would go there was a cowboy hat above it. I recently commented to a friend on FB that a sovereign Alberta would require their own versions of the CAF, NavCanada, CSIS, CBSA, RCMP, Supreme Court, Parliament, CRA, etc. Not to mention Embassies throughout the world, UN membership. Could they stay within the Commonwealth? The reply was that with the $20B they 'save' on transfer payments they could afford all this.
A recent CBC News spot included one individual stating that, basically, they'd finally own their own pipelines. It was an rather simplistic view from a senior-citizen Maple MAGA. Sorry, but the only government-owned pipeline is the Trans-Mountain, which belongs to all of Canada. Every other pipeline is owned by a global conglomerate, likely not even based in Alberta. So, transshipping oil to Burnaby or Windsor would cross an international border. As would shipping any agricultural products. All we'd have to do is continue to Buy Canadian and where would they be? Can you spell tariffs?
Part of me hopes that this does come to a referendum, with the answer a resounding "no" then we can rightly say to Alberta to put Jack back in the box and nail the lid shut. Then, let's all sit down like rational, mature adults and sort out the regional issues, including those of Quebec.
Treaty’s mean more then is being made aware of here, crown land is also an issue.
To me the real reason she’s doing this is because she’s under investigation by the RCMP for a laundry list of things her supporters are to stupid to either believe or don’t care.
Yes, coming to Alberta as an immigrant on a family reunification permit in 1982, all I saw was the high wages for people in the oil patch who might not even have completed high school, and get their training paid or inservice on the job (although my new husband did get his grade 12 diploma). We could buy a nice home, as many others in Alberta could. We did well, generally speaking, were well off. When we moved to BC and I traveled around the country, I met the more liberal people although with less money to spend, and saw that Albertans in comparison are the richest. I didn't feel they had a lot to complain about.
The drawbacks why I wanted to leave that province when we had a chance, was/is the stark white supermacist character of many Albertans I met during my decade in Alberta's north, and the racist attitudes against the First Nations. Danielle Smith totally represents that attitude.
You wrote that when the anti-government movement was strongest, "Never mind that the Alberta economy was booming and that high school dropouts were able to buy $110,000+ Ford F-250 Harley Davidson trucks — the sense of grievance exploded."
It looked to me that many of the lower educated people with high incomes in Alberta might have a general low self-esteem that possibly is suppressed, or maybe some Albertans feel funny about that, because they cannot think it through and want to squash their uneasy feelings about being the highest wage earners without the education.
They didn't chose to spend years in educational pursuits while living on a low income, which is not easy either. The ability to balance information and think through one's situation is usually associated with extended experiences in educated circles. I am not saying the lives of Albertans without an education are easier, but they are well paid for the (rather dirty) work they do. Their grievances may be a distortion of feeling excluded from the centre, and unable to see the reason for it: the lack of a formal education. Even if one has a teacher's degree, one can become the PM, of course helped by the elite circles, which most Albertans do not have. Yes, envie and jalousie, and anger based on mostly irrationality. It makes them very vulnerable to MAGA conspirators.
And then there is Mark Carney born in Fort Smith NWT and growing up in Edmonton, Alberta, who chose to go beyond the oil patch and got himself an education an interesting life, and more.
My brother and his wife are well educated Torontonians. They chose to remain in Alberta when my brother retired as the C.O. of two Alberta military bases. They live in a multi-million dollar home in Canmore and have a second home in B.C.
I mention this because they aren't your typical Alberta economy booming, high school dropouts with a Ford F-150 Harley Davidson truck. But they are all in on the Alberta good, the rest of Canada (especially Ontario) bad, scenario and will happily vote for separation.
Thnks for the reply. Yes, of course, there are others. My best friend of many years still lives there, college educated, and a global traveler. But we can still talk about politics. She would not vote for separation and really, it's a nonsense proposition, unless the fate of a small republic that might make its income from landing tax-shelter-seeking companies after the oil patch is finished is attractive to Albertans, much like Lichtenstein. Or would they then vote to reunite with Canada? Anyway, what's in the ground does not belong to them, and the First Nations do also not agree with the plan. I've been there. It's a sort of enclave of the like-minded, and opposition is not well tolerated. I'm so happy I escaped, although I loved my neighbours and friends. PS my husband left Ontario after high school as the only one of his 7 siblings (all with university degrees) and chose to go west to work in the oil patch—the frontier kind of guy.
I discovered most of the malcontents (so called Albertans) fled west from the east to work the oil patch and industries related to it.
The reason being, with nothing more than a high school education, riches were to be had.
When visiting family back in Barrhead, I marvelled at the collection of trucks, ATVs, planes, and fifth wheel trailers people had.
Where did all that money come from and why was I, with two post secondary degrees, not able to do as well while living in Ontario?
Meanwhile, no one talks about the water missing from the sloughs, rivers and creeks in Swan Hills and the receding shorelines of the provinces many shallow, now, salty lakes.
Separate? These so called “Albertans” would soon flee back east rather than stick around and live in the results of their dumbfuckery.
I desperately want a united Canada but I have little tolerance for the hate that is coming from Alberta. Nor do I have any tolerance for racism, homophobia, misogyny or narcissism. If Albertans want to be listened to, perhaps they should elect people with humanity. For the record, PP does not fit that description.
I’m so very tired of 50 years of Alberta’s animosity to Ottawa in general and the Trudeau brand in particular.
Liberals brought Canada into the modern age, coaxing us from Mother England’s apron strings to build a modern capital spanning English and French sides of the Ottawa River, a flag and a constitution we could call our own with pride, and a country to this day saved harmless from the very real threat of Quebec separatism, through Pierre Trudeau’s effort to ensure Quebecers could see they had a place at the table.
The NEP was Pierre Trudeau’s programme in an OPEC-troubled time to establish energy independence especially from the US for all of Canada, not just that corner of the country that sits on the oil. The filthy, planet-killing oil that MAGA-funding US oil companies are doing everything possible to wrest from Canada when it’s well past the time to begin phasing it out.
And where’s Alberta’s money to face that bright future? It’s misspent funding legions of “Fuck Trudeau” truck drivers along with the support of US-based MAGA groups to make life for the citizens of Ottawa a living hell. It’s misspent enriching Danielle Smith and her corporate cronies through corrupt mismanagement of Alberta’s rapidly-shrinking public health system.
Denmark has sagely squirrelled away their oil billions to invest in a future without oil. Instead Danielle Smith chooses to piss away Alberta’s funds on quixotic crusades and on personal enrichment. After having more than 50 years to build a sovereign wealth fund, Alberta’s cupboards are bare but much easier to blame Ottawa, or anyone named Trudeau.
Danielle Smith follows on a long line of Alberta conservatives who decry “those eastern bastards” and any narrative of Canadian unity as reason for her unwillingness to provide the responsible governance and the rich endowment Albertans deserve.
She may want easterners to freeze in the dark, but it’s Albertans who have been blinded and cannot see the light.
A very good and balanced article on the history of grievances and separatism in Alberta. It helped me understand the "mood" there now. Being a (dastardly) Quebecer who has "survived" two referendums, believe me, the promises of a better era for Albertans if they separate aren't real! BTW, they aren't being "ripped off" by the rest of the country in transfer payments; Ontario is the main payer. I even remember a time where Alberta benefited from the equation, before the oil boom! The transfer payments are a "social contract" between provinces who agreed to redistribute wealth given that different regions have different resources and realities.
I too believe that the dangers of a separated Alberta for national security are real. This would be another victory for the Russians or the CPP (and maybe the US now), driving a wedge into our nation, by stoking dissent and hatred.
Great article! I, too, was raised in Alberta—Calgary. I was also posted to Cold Lake twice and Edmonton twice. My Dad was a lawyer for BA, then Gulf Oil, then Petro-can. My brother was a CMA for another big oil company. And yet Dad didn’t see oil as the be-all and end-all. He was often frustrated in his later years by the province and its “let those eastern bastards freeze in the dark” (remember that?) attitudes.
I am sad for what has happened to Alberta—I no longer recognise it. Albertans voted a “maple MAGA” into office, and their choice could have devastating consequences for the province. Smith is a lying grifter pulling a lot of the same shit as those Trumpians in the States. I am so glad the Indigenous leaders are calling her out and standing firm.
I understand their feelings of alienation but don’t understand why they think they are going to survive on oil and gas alone. Currently oil and gas is 21% of their gdp and employs only 6% of the workforce.
Good to have the perspective of someone with a solid understanding of Alberta's current stance. As a former anglo Quebecker, I understand the emotional appeal of independence when a particular group has a grievances. However, I also understand the impractical and costly flirtation with separation and what will be, ultimately, time and energy wasted on a pointless and futile gesture. Sure, it can be a manipulative bargaining chip, but this doesn't appear to be the case with Danielle Smith. In her case it is superficial politicking and probably a diversion from the realities that she (and many Albertans) should be confronting instead of running away from. And, as many Quebeckers have figured out, there really isn't a logical fall back position. In both cases, they get painted into a corner.
Albertan here. Love Alberta. Alarmed by Danielle Smith’s emphasis on separation and her history of party betrayal. Applause to the First Nations for their strong response to her misguided and divisive views. She’s beyond foolish. This is an urgent time for unity within our nation and she’s feeding the wrong fight.
Excellent balanced
review which helped me understand Alberta’s alienation.
Having also spent considerable time in Alberta, I appreciate the article. It reminds me of the reaction to daylight savings by rural Albertan’s and Saskatchewan. They were convinced it was another eastern plot to destroy them. They honestly believed that they were going to lose daylight and not have the same amount of time in the fields. There were actual debates on the radio about this. This kind of stupidity was rampant. Another issue and point of hate for easterners was the bankruptcies during the depression. The big banks were located in Eastern Canada and so…. The other factor that shouldn’t be glossed over is the importance of religion. Never mind the Social Credit and its ties to religion but a population that blindly follows what they are told. I can tell you that the racism and unflinching devotion to “Christian dogmatism” were palpable. And this is the attraction of the MAGA movement and the establishment of the Christian Nationalist cult in the US. The other issue is is the dismal response of Albertans who aren’t part of the separatist fringe of crazies. They stand by and watch, helpless to do anything. Why? Because they live in a lemming culture. They sit back and watch their premier in all her corruption continue to move from one scandal to the next. She can say and do anything she wants and the nutbars and silent majority watch and applaud.
No different than America unfortunately
Great read you offer. Grievances (real or not) are fuelled by dark money originating in part from right wing agencies such as Harper’s IDU. It means to destabilize the country until they can seat a right wing/conservative government (that’d be their puppet). We’re off with another round of CONvoy type activities for the coming years. Expect more instability that will require the Liberal government attention and that will draw away from the real topics (Defense, economy, health and public safety). The real existential threat to Canada is right wing money - the one that is globally organized. That’s what RCMP and CSIS should be investigating and fighting.
I like your comment about right wing money.
I too was born in Alberta but left after high school in 1978 for college and a lengthy military career that took me, literally, around the world twice. I still have family in Alberta with half seeing the light and the other half... I recall as a teenager one could buy a novelty Alberta passport, which I did. In the spot where your photo would go there was a cowboy hat above it. I recently commented to a friend on FB that a sovereign Alberta would require their own versions of the CAF, NavCanada, CSIS, CBSA, RCMP, Supreme Court, Parliament, CRA, etc. Not to mention Embassies throughout the world, UN membership. Could they stay within the Commonwealth? The reply was that with the $20B they 'save' on transfer payments they could afford all this.
A recent CBC News spot included one individual stating that, basically, they'd finally own their own pipelines. It was an rather simplistic view from a senior-citizen Maple MAGA. Sorry, but the only government-owned pipeline is the Trans-Mountain, which belongs to all of Canada. Every other pipeline is owned by a global conglomerate, likely not even based in Alberta. So, transshipping oil to Burnaby or Windsor would cross an international border. As would shipping any agricultural products. All we'd have to do is continue to Buy Canadian and where would they be? Can you spell tariffs?
Part of me hopes that this does come to a referendum, with the answer a resounding "no" then we can rightly say to Alberta to put Jack back in the box and nail the lid shut. Then, let's all sit down like rational, mature adults and sort out the regional issues, including those of Quebec.
Good to have this along with the transfer payments tome that was posted. Lots to consider.
Absolutely. The transfer payments article was excellent.
Whose article? I would like to read it.
It might be Don Lamont’s Substack article?
Thank you. I’ll check him out.
Treaty’s mean more then is being made aware of here, crown land is also an issue.
To me the real reason she’s doing this is because she’s under investigation by the RCMP for a laundry list of things her supporters are to stupid to either believe or don’t care.
My Dad was born in Viking. I was born in Edmonton. Now living in Ontario, I still feel like the west is part of me. “My Canada includes Alberta”
My dad was born in Viking too…!
Yes, coming to Alberta as an immigrant on a family reunification permit in 1982, all I saw was the high wages for people in the oil patch who might not even have completed high school, and get their training paid or inservice on the job (although my new husband did get his grade 12 diploma). We could buy a nice home, as many others in Alberta could. We did well, generally speaking, were well off. When we moved to BC and I traveled around the country, I met the more liberal people although with less money to spend, and saw that Albertans in comparison are the richest. I didn't feel they had a lot to complain about.
The drawbacks why I wanted to leave that province when we had a chance, was/is the stark white supermacist character of many Albertans I met during my decade in Alberta's north, and the racist attitudes against the First Nations. Danielle Smith totally represents that attitude.
You wrote that when the anti-government movement was strongest, "Never mind that the Alberta economy was booming and that high school dropouts were able to buy $110,000+ Ford F-250 Harley Davidson trucks — the sense of grievance exploded."
It looked to me that many of the lower educated people with high incomes in Alberta might have a general low self-esteem that possibly is suppressed, or maybe some Albertans feel funny about that, because they cannot think it through and want to squash their uneasy feelings about being the highest wage earners without the education.
They didn't chose to spend years in educational pursuits while living on a low income, which is not easy either. The ability to balance information and think through one's situation is usually associated with extended experiences in educated circles. I am not saying the lives of Albertans without an education are easier, but they are well paid for the (rather dirty) work they do. Their grievances may be a distortion of feeling excluded from the centre, and unable to see the reason for it: the lack of a formal education. Even if one has a teacher's degree, one can become the PM, of course helped by the elite circles, which most Albertans do not have. Yes, envie and jalousie, and anger based on mostly irrationality. It makes them very vulnerable to MAGA conspirators.
And then there is Mark Carney born in Fort Smith NWT and growing up in Edmonton, Alberta, who chose to go beyond the oil patch and got himself an education an interesting life, and more.
My brother and his wife are well educated Torontonians. They chose to remain in Alberta when my brother retired as the C.O. of two Alberta military bases. They live in a multi-million dollar home in Canmore and have a second home in B.C.
I mention this because they aren't your typical Alberta economy booming, high school dropouts with a Ford F-150 Harley Davidson truck. But they are all in on the Alberta good, the rest of Canada (especially Ontario) bad, scenario and will happily vote for separation.
Thnks for the reply. Yes, of course, there are others. My best friend of many years still lives there, college educated, and a global traveler. But we can still talk about politics. She would not vote for separation and really, it's a nonsense proposition, unless the fate of a small republic that might make its income from landing tax-shelter-seeking companies after the oil patch is finished is attractive to Albertans, much like Lichtenstein. Or would they then vote to reunite with Canada? Anyway, what's in the ground does not belong to them, and the First Nations do also not agree with the plan. I've been there. It's a sort of enclave of the like-minded, and opposition is not well tolerated. I'm so happy I escaped, although I loved my neighbours and friends. PS my husband left Ontario after high school as the only one of his 7 siblings (all with university degrees) and chose to go west to work in the oil patch—the frontier kind of guy.
I discovered most of the malcontents (so called Albertans) fled west from the east to work the oil patch and industries related to it.
The reason being, with nothing more than a high school education, riches were to be had.
When visiting family back in Barrhead, I marvelled at the collection of trucks, ATVs, planes, and fifth wheel trailers people had.
Where did all that money come from and why was I, with two post secondary degrees, not able to do as well while living in Ontario?
Meanwhile, no one talks about the water missing from the sloughs, rivers and creeks in Swan Hills and the receding shorelines of the provinces many shallow, now, salty lakes.
Separate? These so called “Albertans” would soon flee back east rather than stick around and live in the results of their dumbfuckery.
I desperately want a united Canada but I have little tolerance for the hate that is coming from Alberta. Nor do I have any tolerance for racism, homophobia, misogyny or narcissism. If Albertans want to be listened to, perhaps they should elect people with humanity. For the record, PP does not fit that description.
I’m so very tired of 50 years of Alberta’s animosity to Ottawa in general and the Trudeau brand in particular.
Liberals brought Canada into the modern age, coaxing us from Mother England’s apron strings to build a modern capital spanning English and French sides of the Ottawa River, a flag and a constitution we could call our own with pride, and a country to this day saved harmless from the very real threat of Quebec separatism, through Pierre Trudeau’s effort to ensure Quebecers could see they had a place at the table.
The NEP was Pierre Trudeau’s programme in an OPEC-troubled time to establish energy independence especially from the US for all of Canada, not just that corner of the country that sits on the oil. The filthy, planet-killing oil that MAGA-funding US oil companies are doing everything possible to wrest from Canada when it’s well past the time to begin phasing it out.
And where’s Alberta’s money to face that bright future? It’s misspent funding legions of “Fuck Trudeau” truck drivers along with the support of US-based MAGA groups to make life for the citizens of Ottawa a living hell. It’s misspent enriching Danielle Smith and her corporate cronies through corrupt mismanagement of Alberta’s rapidly-shrinking public health system.
Denmark has sagely squirrelled away their oil billions to invest in a future without oil. Instead Danielle Smith chooses to piss away Alberta’s funds on quixotic crusades and on personal enrichment. After having more than 50 years to build a sovereign wealth fund, Alberta’s cupboards are bare but much easier to blame Ottawa, or anyone named Trudeau.
Danielle Smith follows on a long line of Alberta conservatives who decry “those eastern bastards” and any narrative of Canadian unity as reason for her unwillingness to provide the responsible governance and the rich endowment Albertans deserve.
She may want easterners to freeze in the dark, but it’s Albertans who have been blinded and cannot see the light.
A very good and balanced article on the history of grievances and separatism in Alberta. It helped me understand the "mood" there now. Being a (dastardly) Quebecer who has "survived" two referendums, believe me, the promises of a better era for Albertans if they separate aren't real! BTW, they aren't being "ripped off" by the rest of the country in transfer payments; Ontario is the main payer. I even remember a time where Alberta benefited from the equation, before the oil boom! The transfer payments are a "social contract" between provinces who agreed to redistribute wealth given that different regions have different resources and realities.
I too believe that the dangers of a separated Alberta for national security are real. This would be another victory for the Russians or the CPP (and maybe the US now), driving a wedge into our nation, by stoking dissent and hatred.
Great article! I, too, was raised in Alberta—Calgary. I was also posted to Cold Lake twice and Edmonton twice. My Dad was a lawyer for BA, then Gulf Oil, then Petro-can. My brother was a CMA for another big oil company. And yet Dad didn’t see oil as the be-all and end-all. He was often frustrated in his later years by the province and its “let those eastern bastards freeze in the dark” (remember that?) attitudes.
I am sad for what has happened to Alberta—I no longer recognise it. Albertans voted a “maple MAGA” into office, and their choice could have devastating consequences for the province. Smith is a lying grifter pulling a lot of the same shit as those Trumpians in the States. I am so glad the Indigenous leaders are calling her out and standing firm.
I understand their feelings of alienation but don’t understand why they think they are going to survive on oil and gas alone. Currently oil and gas is 21% of their gdp and employs only 6% of the workforce.
Good to have the perspective of someone with a solid understanding of Alberta's current stance. As a former anglo Quebecker, I understand the emotional appeal of independence when a particular group has a grievances. However, I also understand the impractical and costly flirtation with separation and what will be, ultimately, time and energy wasted on a pointless and futile gesture. Sure, it can be a manipulative bargaining chip, but this doesn't appear to be the case with Danielle Smith. In her case it is superficial politicking and probably a diversion from the realities that she (and many Albertans) should be confronting instead of running away from. And, as many Quebeckers have figured out, there really isn't a logical fall back position. In both cases, they get painted into a corner.