Alberta Tories in Panic mode?
From http://www.nationalpost.com/most_popular/story.html?id=344476
Panic creeps into Alberta Tory ranks as election nears
Don Martin, Canwest News Service Published: Saturday, March 01, 2008
OTTAWA -- After picking up bad Conservative vibes from his political heartland, Prime Minister Stephen Harper summoned several southern Alberta MPs to his office for a reality check.
The mighty Alberta Progressive Conservative dynasty in trouble? Implausible, if not impossible.
But the confided consensus of MPs was that Premier Ed Stelmach is about to lose a bunch of seats in Monday's provincial election and, if the large undecided vote shifts to the opposition or stays home, perhaps lurch into the nightmare scenario of becoming Alberta's first-ever minority government.
Panic has crept into Conservative ranks, but the fret is most intensely felt in Calgary where the party's 37-year reign is facing its most dangerous electoral test in, well, 37 years.
The Ed Effect has gone toxic in the heart of the oilpatch, a doorstep rejection of Stelmach's folksy low-coherence sincerity as the sign of someone well over their head politically and out of touch with urban Alberta personally.
"We have to work hard for the win this time," confides a veteran Conservative strategist. "That's not something we're used to doing in this party. Usually we sit back and wait for the polls to close to claim victory."
Calgary MLAs are bracing to lose seats that had come with a lifetime Tory guarantee until the writ was dropped last month by the unlikely rookie who replaced Ralph Klein.
The reaction to Stelmach has been so negative, there are already speculative rumbles of who would replace him after he gets savaged in the mandatory review of his leadership in two years.
Sustainable Resources Minister Ted Morton is seen as an early contender. And if there was a draft of sufficient depth to bring on a coronation, former treasurer Jim Dinning might be convinced to take another run at the top.
But to even whisper Conservative leadership change on the eve of an election defies all logic in a province where the economy is roaring and loyalty to political parties runs unfathomably deep.
Consider the short history of long reigns by Alberta parties:
Liberal: 1905-1921
United Farmers of Alberta: 1921-1935
Social Credit: 1935-1971
Progressive Conservative: 1971-200?
Even if, as expected, the Conservatives survive to control the legislature, the spectre of a party-changing rollover in four years is in ascendancy.
The right-wing Wildrose Alliance, a smidgen of a party now, and leader Paul Hinman are suddenly viewed with considerable alarm by Conservatives.
If that party can toehold a handful of seats in this election, keep itself from drifting into ideological extremes and face off against Stelmach in four years, well, that might be the set-up scenario that ushered the Conservatives to power under Peter Lougheed in 1971.
Beyond the sound of the Alberta balloon hissing economic air and the premier's controversial decision on a new royalty regime Stelmach is also facing a demographic sea change in Alberta. The influx of new voters from across Canada who weren't issued a Conservative membership for a birth certificate have few if any recollections of the psyche-scarring National Energy Program. They are not afraid to gamble on party alternatives.
If the Conservatives escape election night only down a single-digit count of seats, they should send a massive bouquet of flowers to Liberal leader Kevin Taft.
The salvation of any weak government is always a weaker opposition -- and while Taft is often unfairly scorned for falling between bland and boring, he does not appear to have the royal jelly for premier consideration.
That's why a quarter of the voters were still in limbo during the final week of the campaign -- they want to flip Stelmach the electoral finger, but can't bring themselves to embrace such a flaccid alternative.
That's why nobody can realistically predict an election outcome with so much whimsical decision-making still at play. The result could be anything from a modest seat loss to a wholesale government defeat.
But that ensures something very new will be on the ballot when the one-party state of Alberta goes to the polls on Monday -- doubt about the outcome.
Panic creeps into Alberta Tory ranks as election nears
Don Martin, Canwest News Service Published: Saturday, March 01, 2008
OTTAWA -- After picking up bad Conservative vibes from his political heartland, Prime Minister Stephen Harper summoned several southern Alberta MPs to his office for a reality check.
The mighty Alberta Progressive Conservative dynasty in trouble? Implausible, if not impossible.
But the confided consensus of MPs was that Premier Ed Stelmach is about to lose a bunch of seats in Monday's provincial election and, if the large undecided vote shifts to the opposition or stays home, perhaps lurch into the nightmare scenario of becoming Alberta's first-ever minority government.
Panic has crept into Conservative ranks, but the fret is most intensely felt in Calgary where the party's 37-year reign is facing its most dangerous electoral test in, well, 37 years.
The Ed Effect has gone toxic in the heart of the oilpatch, a doorstep rejection of Stelmach's folksy low-coherence sincerity as the sign of someone well over their head politically and out of touch with urban Alberta personally.
"We have to work hard for the win this time," confides a veteran Conservative strategist. "That's not something we're used to doing in this party. Usually we sit back and wait for the polls to close to claim victory."
Calgary MLAs are bracing to lose seats that had come with a lifetime Tory guarantee until the writ was dropped last month by the unlikely rookie who replaced Ralph Klein.
The reaction to Stelmach has been so negative, there are already speculative rumbles of who would replace him after he gets savaged in the mandatory review of his leadership in two years.
Sustainable Resources Minister Ted Morton is seen as an early contender. And if there was a draft of sufficient depth to bring on a coronation, former treasurer Jim Dinning might be convinced to take another run at the top.
But to even whisper Conservative leadership change on the eve of an election defies all logic in a province where the economy is roaring and loyalty to political parties runs unfathomably deep.
Consider the short history of long reigns by Alberta parties:
Liberal: 1905-1921
United Farmers of Alberta: 1921-1935
Social Credit: 1935-1971
Progressive Conservative: 1971-200?
Even if, as expected, the Conservatives survive to control the legislature, the spectre of a party-changing rollover in four years is in ascendancy.
The right-wing Wildrose Alliance, a smidgen of a party now, and leader Paul Hinman are suddenly viewed with considerable alarm by Conservatives.
If that party can toehold a handful of seats in this election, keep itself from drifting into ideological extremes and face off against Stelmach in four years, well, that might be the set-up scenario that ushered the Conservatives to power under Peter Lougheed in 1971.
Beyond the sound of the Alberta balloon hissing economic air and the premier's controversial decision on a new royalty regime Stelmach is also facing a demographic sea change in Alberta. The influx of new voters from across Canada who weren't issued a Conservative membership for a birth certificate have few if any recollections of the psyche-scarring National Energy Program. They are not afraid to gamble on party alternatives.
If the Conservatives escape election night only down a single-digit count of seats, they should send a massive bouquet of flowers to Liberal leader Kevin Taft.
The salvation of any weak government is always a weaker opposition -- and while Taft is often unfairly scorned for falling between bland and boring, he does not appear to have the royal jelly for premier consideration.
That's why a quarter of the voters were still in limbo during the final week of the campaign -- they want to flip Stelmach the electoral finger, but can't bring themselves to embrace such a flaccid alternative.
That's why nobody can realistically predict an election outcome with so much whimsical decision-making still at play. The result could be anything from a modest seat loss to a wholesale government defeat.
But that ensures something very new will be on the ballot when the one-party state of Alberta goes to the polls on Monday -- doubt about the outcome.
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