Canadian Politics Today

You are falling into the common trap of looking at who won a particular riding and making a blanket statement about who lives in that riding, even though all the ridings have a mix of voting preference.

Yes, there is a rural/urban divide, but I don't think it's as large as you claim.   Many urbanites voted for the CPC.

1 of 5 voters in Vancouver Centre voted for CPC... 

And 2 in 5 people voted Liberal/NDP/Green in the supposedly ultra-conservative wanna-join-Alberta-separatists Cariboo-Prince George.

The urban/rural "huge divide" as you call it, is mostly fictional.



 

Ya I know. The typical Liberal, what's ours is ours and what's yours, should have been ours.

Trudeau-hating average Albertans are even stupider for falling for their nonsense.

With an attitude like that, you shouldn't be surprised if the contempt is mutual. Feel better?

So where do we go from here?

It's not just about blaming the powerful vs powerless...  The far right blames "Jews" or "immigrants", the far left blames "white people" or "rich people".

Do you read what you write?

Albertans who think they need to separate from the country ARE rubes. They live in a fantasy world. The reality is that the federal government over the last several years have done a ton for them from disaster relief for the wildfires to buying pipelines to try to save jobs. The ones who don't recognize that can get bent.

Like I said, this country is ****. Full of people who just want to shout instead of listen.

You guys are a big disappointment, liberals my ass.

Sounds to me like Peter Downing is doing most of the shouting, especially at his meetings complete with Confederate flags being waved. Maybe he should quiet down and take some advice from lucien Bouchard.

As an outside observer I thought Notley was the best Alberta PM since Lougheed. She tried to play nice with the RoC but where did it get her.

Nothing will make the oil sands anything other than a boom/bust industry.   I don't remember a single thing Notley said or did...   She probably had her head down working on alleviating the damage done by successive Conservative governments.

You call Albertans rubes for electing someone like Kenny ...

No, never did that actually.  I wasn't surprised in the least.  Kenney is a continuation of what Albertans usually vote for, with Notley being the one blip in decades.

but it is attitudes like yours that have to carry at least some of the responsibility.

No.  Albertans always vote for Conservatives who give away the farm to oil companies.  Has nothing to do with any attitudes anywhere else.

...electing Kenny was a giant middle finger to the rest of Canada.

No...   it was Albertans electing the same thing over and over for decades with a 4 year break in there.  I'm not sure where you get the idea that Alberta is any different now than it was 5, 10, 20 years ago.  The only difference is that they seem to get more publicity.

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It is true that the federal government does provide some benefits to Alberta. But, Alberta also contributes to the Canadian economy; in effect the Federal government is doing stuff for Alberta with money they collected from Alberta in the first place.

Now, I do think the idea of separation is foolish, mostly because so much of Alberta's economy is based on the oil sector, and oil is a finite resource. It will run out (or the world's economy will eventually move away from fossil fuel). But I do think Alberta has valid complaints about how it is treated in confederation, and pointing out a few crumbs that get tossed their way doesn't negate all the problems they have

Alberta doesn't get treated any differently than any other part of the country.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/ches-crosbie-pc-equalization-referendum-1.5339224

First of all, I am not really sure why the one event (the linked-to article) manages to prove Alberta is "not treated differently".

Secondly, lets look at some of the things Albertans might be miffed about:

- The National Energy Program (yes, its a long time ago, but it was perhaps the most blatant example), which saw billions of dollars of potential revenue transferred to other parts of the country

- Equalization payments which punish oil producing provinces but benefit those with hydro electricy

From: https://nationalpost.com/opinion/peter-holle-artificially-cheap-hydro-power-your-equalization-dollars-at-work
...a quirk in the equalization formula excludes the true value of hydro electric energy produced by Manitoba and Quebec, which sell their hydropower in local markets for below-market prices without penalty....The formula is correct to deduct the market price of oil...The same logic should apply to Quebec and Manitoba’s hydro revenues under the equalization rules — but doesn’t.

- Alberta has the worst per-capita representation in the house of commons (number of voters per riding)

Alberta is a net contributor to federal finances, and have been for decades, yet they see Quebec continue to be a 'have not' province, collecting more than they 'pay in' to the system in terms of both equalization payments and other government programs. Successive federal governments seem to bend over backwards to keep Quebec appeased, while at the same time other provinces often take actions that oppose Alberta's best interests (such as Quebec opposing the Energy East pipeline and B.C. opposing Transmountain.)   

Alberta doesn't get treated any differently than any other part of the country.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/ches-crosbie-pc-equalization-referendum-1.5339224

NFLD is prime example of how they are treated differently.

Even though both are considered "have" provinces and get the same per capita transfer as all the "have" provinces,  in 2017 Albertans sent just under 12k per capita to Ottawa and received 6K of federal expenditures in return. Newfoundlanders sent 9K to Ottawa and received just under 12 K in return.