Conservatives responsible for current mess in Alberta
By Letter to the Editor on December 1, 2018.
From 1935 to 2015 Albertans overwhelmingly and unfailingly chose conservative governments for their legislature. And they consistently sent conservatives of one flavour or another to Ottawa, with only a few exceptions. One could be forgiven, then, if one were to conclude that Alberta was immutably conservative.
Clearly, based on the election of 2015, this is not necessarily true anymore. Conservatives under Jim Prentice woke up the morning after the election aghast and confused. We lost? The province now has an NDP government? Blood pressures rose, hands were wrung, dogs were kicked. For some the sky seemed to fall.
Some say, however, that this last election was just a fluke. The voters merely wanted to give the ruling party a slap on the cheeks for being arrogant, unresponsive, and incompetent. But things went too far and ushered in an NDP government, unprepared to govern, some said.
They were wrong. Yes there were rookie mistakes and rookie misspeaks and rookie discipline breakdowns in the first months. But the leadership was strong. And the ‘inexperienced’ government of Rachel Notley, clear-headed, pragmatic, and energized, went to work to deal with the mess left behind by of 44 years of short-sightedness, mismanagement, self-congratulatory arrogance, and arguably one of the most “tone-deaf” governments ever to be tasked with preparing for an unknown future.
From that very first big gusher in 1947, Alberta tied its fortunes to the assumed long-term future of oil. Alarm bells should have gone off right from the beginning. Volatility should have favoured savings policies designed to shelter Albertans during oil price disruptions.
The OPEC crisis struck in 1973. In response then-premier Lougheed established the Heritage Trust Fund in 1976. It had two goals: Provide an umbrella for the bad times, and prepare for the inevitable and (in his mind) short reign of petroleum (by supporting alternative energy sources.) His advice, and the fund, was largely ignored after 1980. Instead, oil revenues funneled into general expenditures, in effect, bribing voters with lower taxes and no sales tax.
Then came the Iranian Revolution, 1979, The Gulf War, 1990, and the oil glut of 2010, which continues into the present — a roller-coaster ride of boom and bust. Should never have happened.
Norway started its own fund in the 1990s. Oil revenue went directly into the fund, and by law, only four per cent of the fund could be used to meet budget shortfalls or projects. Today Norway’s Fund stands at $1.1 trillion,60 times more than Alberta’s Fund at $17.6 billion. Economic good sense trumped politics, but not in Alberta.
Forty-four years of conservative policies have given us our present crisis. Conservatives must be held accountable. Give someone else a chance, someone less doctrinaire.
Peter Mueller
Medicine Hat
Actually it is because of all political leaders and the way they think and manipulate people and issues to fit there agenda. Basic psychology and the understanding of a persons personality. There are actually documentaries that I have watch so that I may understand these type of people and to personally protect my self from the actions of these psychologically abusive people, as my own father was like that with myself and my brother. I grew up with a dangerous mentality as a caregiver leader, and I would rather blow my fucking head off than to be manipulated by people like that.
In 1906 the various unions in Alberta did a name change from American to Canadian and were taken over by the US Republicans.
This gelled out to the United Farmers Co-Op in 1908 and was ushered in by LDS of the day and became the first “Conservative” government in Canada. Later they went Federal, still under the palm of the US Republicans. That, until Peter Lougheed who broke with the Republicans calling his party the Progressive Conservatives and Brought in the NEP for the purpose of increasing Canadian ownership in the oil industry. Then a world Recession came and those who had the money made the news. The story was spun out it was all the fault of the NEP.
Ralph Klein took over from Lougheed and, doubled down with the Republicans. He capped the Heritage Fund at 5% profit-taking 760 billion dollars from it to sponsor his 10% tax the majority of which went to the oil industry in the US. We were back to Conservatives.
Harper and Kenny were thrown out of every trade meeting they went to, defaulting to the US.
Now, the US is oil self-sufficient. They do not want nor do they need our oil. Alaska are shipping 530,000 bbls per day down the west coast the environmentalists don’t care about. The US has dropped out oil to 24.00/bbl which won’t buy rail cars! We should stop production immediately as Lougheed did. The US are financing the West Coast environmental movement!
Article on US oil self-sufficiences and integration with Environmental groups.
https://wordpress.com/post/cyberclark.me/210
The Conservatives are losing support, their fortunes are waning. Scheer’s program of misinformation was laid bare by the CBC Politics program. On the playground at the official residence some 6 grand spent. This was paid for by Trudeau out of his own money, the 350 dollars to install it was paid for by the DPW as it was illegal for Trudeau to install it.
Scheer asked for an investigation into it and questioned it in the house. Then went around the country painting it as a shady deal.
At the same time, a pair of sunglasses was given to Trudeau by a life-long friend, the Shaw. Again Scheer went to the authority asking for an investigation, then, asked about it in the house.
After this, he and his crew went around the country telling people in the most disparaging way this was a shady deal. This was laid bare and his rating started to fall.