Equalization Rage
It has been called the superglue of Canada’s Confederation. It is also, ironically, one of the things that keeps driving provinces apart. It is ridiculously complicated, made more so by [...]
Graham Thomson
Graham Thomson
Alberta’s Watchdogs
He might not be Alberta’s version of US Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who investigated President Trump. But he’ll do in a pinch. His name is Lorne Gibson and he’s Alberta’s new Election [...]
Whipsaw Change
If you think at times you’ve got a tough job, just be glad you’re not a member of Alberta’s civil service. These poor souls don’t know if they’re coming or going. They’ve spent the past four [...]
No Mutinies Here
When MLA Robyn Luff declared last November that she would boycott the Legislature because of a “culture of fear and intimidation” emanating from the premier’s office, she expected immediate [...]
Take Us to Your Leader
We were expecting a brawl. When Premier Rachel Notley and United Conservative Party leader Jason Kenney faced off for the first time in the legislature on March 12, 2018, we were ready for plenty [...]
A Minority Government?
As we head toward the upcoming Alberta election, two words give hope to political underdogs and strike fear into the hearts of the overdogs: minority government. Our province has never had a [...]
The 2019 Election
If all goes according to plan, Alberta will have a provincial election this spring. But what if it doesn’t go to plan? What if we don’t have an election this spring? Oh, I know we’re supposed to. [...]
Partisan Job, Public Pay
When Premier Rachel Notley presented her State of the Province address in Calgary last October, she did it in front of a hand-picked crowd of 700 supporters who applauded at all the right [...]
The Civil Service
For the swearing-in of the new NDP government last May 24, provincial Chief Justice Catherine Fraser performed the ceremony on the steps of the Alberta Legislature. Beside her was a grandfatherly [...]
Pipe Dream
Sometime later this year, a consortium of oil companies in Alberta will flip the switch on a first-of-its-kind climate change project in Canada. If it works, the Quest project will capture and [...]
MOST READ
MOST READ
The Plans to Strip-Mine Coal in the Mountains
It looks like spectacular wild country, but some see it more as a big money sandwich.
The top layer of that sandwich is comprised of alpine grasses, forget-me-nots and stonecrop, glacier lilies and ancient, brave pines whose branches have been gnarled and weathered by centuries of wind. In summer, solitaires and ...
Can Climate Change Be Reversed?
When NASA initiated the Mercury Project that would send the first American into space in 1958, one of the many questions facing scientists was what to do about the carbon dioxide emissions of their astronauts. Our bodies exude about a kilogram per day of the gas, which is lethal in ...
Der Indianer
The first thing John Blackbird learned when he was growing up on the Canadian prairies was that his people were no good. Indians were history’s losers: dethroned, displaced, rounded up and ghettoized on the reserves. Raised by a white family from the age of nine, Blackbird heard from friends and ...