If Wall stays for this entire term, he eclipses past Saskatchewan premiers Allan Blakeney, Roy Romanow and Grant Devine to become the second-longest-serving premier, behind only Tommy Douglas.
I certainly can’t speak for Premier Wall and I’m certainly flush with the joy of victory, but in my opinion, there would be nothing, nothing better for a conservative Sask boy to do than matching Douglas’s record of election wins in Saskatchewan. Five majorities!
And this is how he’ll do it.
And this is how he’ll do it.
Yes, sometimes timidity has value…for the communists. 20 years, and not one of the major communist institutions changed. In fact, building to make some of them stronger.
Apparently, that’s being conservative nowadays…doesn’t even have the strength of character of that filth, tommy douglas. And that’s not saying much…
Thankfully, the pioneers and early settlers were never so timid. Had they been so timid as to be afraid of demonstrating what they believed, this country would have ended before it began.
The lukewarm are still coasting on what they built.
Internet Sports Phenom Scott Sterling
Soccer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F9jXYOH2c0
Volleyball
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oY2nVQNlUB8
My apologies. Twas meant for the tips thread.
“Thereafter until the death of the Liberal party in 1982 every single election was heavily influenced if not decided by the vote split on the right.”
~lance
Really? So you are familiar with the concept of vote splitting on the right.
How many elections did it take for Saskies to learn not to split the vote on the right and elect the Saskatchewan Party?
1991-2007(about 16 years) wasn’t it?
I think a study should be done on Saskabush voters to find out why they prefer truth, honesty, common-sense and smarts over, well, you know…McGuinty, Wynne, Notley, and last and least, turdo la doo.
So… the west should have stuck with the Brian Mulroney/ Kim Cambpell PC party instead of starting the Reform party? When the centrist right party becomes a milder version of the outright socialist party you sometimes have to try to stand athwart “history” and yell “stop!”
Agreed. Principles do matter.
What do you actually care about? Just the winning? Or is there some principle you hope to advance? Sask has solar net metering subsidies. Wind power subsidies. Brad Wall won, and we got Green party policy regardless. But keep celebrating by all means; it’s your guy who gave us all the Green/NDP/Liberal party policy. As long as the Sask party gives us the socialist utopia that is all that matters right?
“This generation seems smarter because
a) they don’t listen to people like Gord,
b) are willing to compromise on the hard edges of their ideology.”
So there are just 2 types of people. Those who have core values that they stand by and those who will compromise merely to gain political power.
We gots lots of the latter. Be refreshing to have a few more of the former.
“b) are willing to compromise on the hard edges of their ideology.”
Yeah, so lance, who has been criticizing Trump supporters, actually is cool with the idea that Trump supporters are willing to compromise on the hard edges of their ideology.
Wowser! Or, maybe, lance hasn’t thought some of this stuff through…
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/433554/donald-trump-art-seduction
I think what everyone forgets is that politicians are supposed to be representatives of the people. Why advocate for politicians to get elected on a moderate, centrist platform and then, after they’re elected, make a radical turn to the left or right. Voters are sick of lying politicians who say one thing and then do whatever they want if they get a majority.
Wall’s success is built on moderate conservatism with a dash of prairie populism. The reason it works is because he and his party are in tune what the people of Saskatchewan want. Voters have a strong attachment to the Crowns and public healthcare. They overwhelmingly do not support privatization of the main Crowns and will revolt if there’s even a credible rumor about selling them. I think getting private clinics of any kind has been a progress. He’s lowered taxes and attempted to blunt the most damaging impacts of the climate change hysteria/profiteering. As far as I can tell, the Sask government are not crooks, not beholden to special interest groups and have resisted pressure from the progressive scolds in the media and universities. Ours is one of the few provinces whose elected politicians put the interest of the citizens first. That too is unusual in today’s political culture.
The Sask Party does pretty much exactly what they promise. This builds trust between voters and politicians in a time where most people are disgusted by politics.
A Liberal and a Conservative in Canadian politics are virtually the same. They have a message for their base support and become chameleons once elected. They blend right in and one can’t differentiate between the two.
Chretien balanced the budget, ran surpluses, gave tax cuts. In my lifetime, no other Prime Minister before him accomplished that. Harper rode those coat tails. His main victories were the elimination of the Wheat Board monopoly and the gun registry. He did not change the search and seizure without warrant component in the gun control legislation. That was a great disappointment.
The only political movement that has core values that they impose once elected are the NDP. You know what you are going to get with them and they deliver.
Alan Blakney epitomized that with the land bank program and nationalizing the pulp and potash industries. The goal is, government owns everything and everyone works for the government. Roy Romano put their mark on the constitution by excluding property ownership rights noting that it limits the government’s ability to transfer wealth.
So now 4 more years of Brad Wall. After $2B of taxpayer money into the carbon capture (that isn’t really working), promises to increase solar and wind power, what exactly sets these people apart from Trudeau or Wynne?
I’m glad the NDP aren’t governing but I have no real expectation of positive change anytime soon.
As far as I can tell, the Sask government are not crooks, not beholden to special interest groups…
Really, what about the Crowns and the communist health care? That’s a pretty big ‘beholding’.
More fascism doesn’t equal less communism, no matter how you spin it.
All the voter can do is vote as far right as possible and hope for the best. But the best isn’t much better than the worst nowadays.
You missed these parts:
“… politicians are supposed to be representatives of the people.”
“…he and his party are in tune what the people of Saskatchewan want.”
There’s lots of libertarian ideas I’d like implemented but I understand that most Sask voters right now would reject my preferences. If you’re against progressives imposing their ideology without consent via politicians then be intellectually consistent and don’t advocate for the same “to the victor goes the spoils” style.
Tuesday April 05, 2016
Brad Wall’s third majority win signals a changed Saskatchewan
http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-april-5-2016-1.3521055/brad-wall-s-third-majority-win-signals-a-changed-saskatchewan-1.3521060
[…]
And while the results of the vote came as a bit of a yawn to residents of The Wheat Province, Canadians outside Saskatchewan might be surprised by the stamp the small “c” conservative premier is making across the prairies and beyond.
With the federal Conservative Party in transition, many see Premier Wall as a leading voice for the struggling movement.
Guests in this segment:
Raymond Blake, professor at the University of Regina.
Janice MacKinnon, former Saskatchewan NDP finance minister and professor of fiscal policy at the University of Saskatchewan.
Jason Markusoff, Alberta correspondent for Maclean’s.
The Current did request an interview with Brad Wall. We’re hoping to talk to him in the near future.
+
Listen 19:45
http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/brad-wall-s-third-majority-win-signals-a-changed-saskatchewan-1.3521228?autoplay=true
“… politicians are supposed to be representatives of the people.”
“…he and his party are in tune what the people of Saskatchewan want.”
Exactly, Sask is still just as socialist as it ever was. The only thing changed is the pretense of conservatism. Even tommy douglas didn’t pretend to be what he wasn’t.
Nice to notice that the Slimerals and the Progressive Cs were in the bottom of the toilet where they belong, electing a total of “0” between the 2 of them.
Well done, Saskatchewan.
You are now the leaders of our country. For reference and proof look at Ontario and Ontario wannabees Alberta.
Am I right?
Good comments.
When you knock doors during an election campaign you recognize a couple of things right off. The people at the door have zero ideology but they recognize some of the things that help them and some of the things that don’t.
Where in the world today is that perfect government so many here seem to desire?
Take the USA for example. Most of the government debt piling up down there originates with entitlement spending. Trump may talk a big game, but should he win the white house, any attempt to curtail some of that spending will result in full-scale revolt.
Yes, Saskatchewan is not an anti-socialist paradise that explicitly follows free-market principles and maximum freedom of choice for the individual. Then again it’s also not a corrupt, debt-ridden Quebec or Ontario style socialist/progressive hell-hole either. Saskatchewan is not even that similar to Scandinavian socialism anymore. Like I said, it’s an odd blend of conservationism, socialism and populism that is fairly well balanced but endlessly frustrating to partisans who insist on conformity to one ideology or another.
Modern “conservatives” are an essentially fatally conflicted coalition where success is measured by electing a party that slows down the paving project on the road to serfdom. Hey, it’s better than the alternative and it does represent the culture of the day. The institutional toxicity will continue to degrade the culture while the war on prosperity (green theocracy) will consist of token gestures as opposed to Ontario-like grand schemes.
The lesson is for Alberta where the 60% non-NDP electorate need to unite under a similar banner incorporating that same fatally conflicted mob. BC and Saskatchewan have shown the way. As for principled political direction, that’s a different animal and one more influenced by culture than politics.
Like I said, it’s an odd blend of conservationism, socialism and populism that is fairly well balanced…
Balance implies equal weight on both sides. Considering socialism/communism drags down, and conservatism builds up, Sask would be perfectly accurate by changing it’s name to I Lean…
conservationism should be conservatism, of course.
I agree strongly with all of your remarks in this thread, LC. I think you’ve put your finger precisely on a very large part of Wall’s success.
Balanced can be defined more than one way. Rigidly balanced like the legs of a chair or balancing on a chaotically moving surface like water. Politics is chaotic.
A bit of socialism has its merits but too much and, yes, it drowns out the economy. Same for populism and conservatism – too much causes problems. Conservatives can resist and fear change too strongly and fail to adapt. Too much populism results in really bad policies that punish the “other”, whomever that other may be.
Thanks
Heh, kinda handy when you can make up your own daffynitions.
Odd, I’ve never experienced the ‘merits’ of forced socialism. Mostly rationing and incompetence.
Seriously, the only true way for a government to change drastically is if a civil war was to ensue and all levels of government cease to exist. The victors of that war would literally have to start from basic principles (assuming the “small government maximum liberty” side won). If you think government employees would willingly vote for a party that will down-size them, just have a look at what happened in Ontario’s last election. Logically, would any beneficiary of government largesse (welfare recipients, anyone receiving a government pension–including every military veteran, retired police officer, etc) vote for a party that talked about cutting their benefits in order to pay off the debt? Last but not least, the carnage that would ensue to get to the point where government was being re-built from the ground up would be unprecedented in Canadian history. Realistically, conservatives have been renowned for not doing anything to scare the politicos–they don’t “storm city hall”, they don’t fight with the cops, they don’t kill cops, they don’t kill off less conservative politicians, their families or their acolytes. The other side–they do all these things (I’m talking world-wide)…So, these conservative blogs are essentially “self-licking lollipops”–akin to the radio talk shows of yesteryear where the constituency could vent for a couple of minutes and then go back to working in order to pay taxes to their overlords whilst their freedoms are incrementally taken away. Needless to say, civil war would be devastating: the former Yugoslavia (10 yrs), Afghanistan (40+ yrs).
I think Wall’s success stems from Saskatchewan being a province where there are 2 party choices and Saskie voters are largely done with the NDP.
“A bit of socialism has its merits but too much and, yes, it drowns out the economy. Same for populism and conservatism – too much causes problems…”
That’s like saying a bit of theft has its merits and too much virtue is a bad thing. Would you suggest that compromising with a rapist or mixing dog shit with a milkshake is a way of finding balance? A mixed economy is a dying economy. A culture of compromise of principles is the slow and painful surrendering of virtue to evil. It isn’t a winning strategy but instead, slow defeatism.
The perfect government does not exist in the world today. Unfortunately though we’ve resigned ourselves to the place where this is as good as it gets.
I suspect those that think socialism is 100% evil have the same mentality as environmentalists who think fossil fuels are 100% evil. Those who cannot come up with pros and cons to to any issue haven’t researched the issue very thoroughly. The inability to see things from multiple perspectives also ensures you never have to confront your own bias. That doesn’t mean you have to agree 100% with those perspectives or support them but at least acknowledge that there are other points of view and that they have some valid arguments.
Congrats to the Mr. Wall he won the politics of politics and now he needs to advance conservatism and cut back on populism.
Note: If you’re response is but what about pedophiles and murders…go away. I have no interest in debating or responding to logical fallacies like Reductio ad Absurdum or appeal to extremes.
“Those who cannot come up with pros and cons to any issue haven’t researched the issue very thoroughly.”
Why don’t you tell me some of the pros that socialism has?
“Modern “conservatives” are an essentially fatally conflicted coalition where success is measured by electing a party that slows down the paving project on the road to serfdom.”
“A culture of compromise of principles is the slow and painful surrendering of virtue to evil. It isn’t a winning strategy but instead, slow defeatism.”
You perfectly described the drift of our culture. We are slowly becoming what the Soviet Union was before the collapse. Witness the propagation of that culture in our educational system and the results in many of our elections. PM Harper only marked time in that “paving project”, and Premier Wall is doing much the same in Saskatchewan. This Marxism by degrees will continue until the people, like the Russian people, wake up to the false utopia.
Premier Wall now has four years to show if he can roll back some more of the socialist cancer in Saskatchewan without too much shock. Private liquor stores and more private medical services are a good start.
It is as good as it gets and about to get worse very soon.
Well…yes. It’s not just Ontario’s last election. It’s Ontario’s last four elections, not to mention the last federal election, the last Newfoundland election, the last Nova Scotia election, the last New Brunswick election, the last Alberta election. In all cases, if there was an ideologically conservative program on offer to the voters it was rejected. If there was an ideologically left program on offer, it was rejected, as in BC, Ontario, Quebec.
It should be evident from all these elections that Canadians in general don’t like strong ideologies of any type, left or right. Hence the rigid conservatives here are doomed to a lifetime of political disappointment, just as the doctrinaire communists have been doomed to political disappointment since the Winnipeg General Strike.
What they like is pragmatism, and it’s no accident that Brad Wall is the most popular premier in Canada today and has been so for some time. Very much reminiscent of Bill Davis without the same degree of slipperiness.
Let’s analyze this.
In Alberta, the socialists won by default. OK they won.
The Wild Rose and the Progressives combined got most votes in every riding save the socialist run Edmonton.
The people were fed up with the Progressives, their corruption and sense of arrogance and can’t loose. The Progressives are 55% socialists, they ruled the party thorough teachers union and the nurses union. You may remember if you care, they, the two unions made steady Eddy and Redford. They, as all socialist do, want power for the sake of power, not necessarily for the benefit of the population.
The 45% of that party were conservatives. They just coasted without comment, being fed up with the Progressives.
As it always is, you have to have a good argument against the socialist demagogues.
The motherhood and apple pie sentiments the Progressives run on is completely stupid to an ordinary person with any sense of where the people are.
Hell, you can point to so many things about what is wrong with socialism. As Ken said above, socialism is a cancer on society. Over time it degenerates the initiative, sense of entrepreneurship, sense of decency, just about anything that makes civilization work and prosper.
The Europe is not really socialist, though today, its getting there faster every day as anybody who cares can observe.
The free enterprise still rules though it gets its life sucked out by the socialists.
Conservative ideas are good, there are not enough people to spread it around.
…And that general dislike of strong ideologies will be the eventual downfall of the Canadian society that you know…because it will (it is) being replaced by a society that is the epitome of doctrinaire and more than willing to aggressively impose their culture on us. While Canadians are barely replacing themselves, the Fifth Columnists masquerading as “refugees” are having five or six kids per woman all on our dime. When those kids come of age and start having kids of their own, the original population will be in the minority…and Shariah will be the law of the land…all done legally at the ballot box. And you folks will still be talking about being pragmatic.
Downfall? Well…no. This isn’t the first time this kind of thing has happened. Canada was opposed to a doctrinaire society in 1939. They lost. In time, like the fascists, the jihadis will lose also. Like in 1939, it will happen when the liberals and appeasers finally have their Munich moment in which their failure becomes obvious. The only question is how much suffering will be inflicted before the Louise Arbours of the world either understand their own failure or are rejected by those of us around them.
Election results as expected. I admire Brad Wall, and many of his MLA’s. The political machine is excellent.
Long and short, people were fearful of West, East, and National results. No one wants socialism here, ever again.
NDP, Libs, PS Sask all failed to connect, and, no one wanted split or Big Change.
I think SP has its hands full in current economy, and National Gov. We are land locked and trading and resource economy.
As to rural, i don’t think anything will change. Same old, same old, but…..I guess stability and status quo.
Rural folks, I hope you had a nice visit with your MLA, if you saw him on doorstep, likely won’t see till next election.
Provincial concerns, priorities, whats best for core of Sask, that WILL be focus.
Rural constituency roads, health, education, services, etc, will be same in 4 years.
Get a good car/truck, you’ll be travelling, simple fact…do not expect improvements or change.
Fiscal restraint, times are tough, etc, etc, you are used to it anyways…right.
Sad part is…Sask Party came from, and depended on rural to gain power…like the NDP of old.
Funny how fast they forget.
Sask Party IS best for Saskatchewan, unfortunate those who were there from the start (rural) will NOT benefit…now or ever.
Oh well, politics, government, it IS what it IS.
However, unlike the fascists who were centred in Germany and Italy…there are neighbourhoods full of Muslims all over Canada’s large cities who are out-procreating us by a factor of 2 or 3 (if not more). So, while you sit back and say “relax we’ve got time”–I say…we have less time than you think. Can you even tell the truth about Islam without a Human Rights Tribunal coming to your door? I notice that both Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn request their readers/supporters for money for the many law suits brought against them by Human Rights Tribunals based on complaints by Muslims…what would happen to you, a relative nobody when you ask for money? Why do the cops arrest people walking dogs around Muslims? It’s already begun and you’re still sitting back.
Politics is the art of the possible. That is why over 10 years of ‘conservative’ government in Ottawa only a couple of conservative promises were able to come about. The elimination of the long gun registry and the CWB. Very few accomplishments.
Once you are elected government you represent 100% of the people. They too have demands and wheels that squeak. Arguing political philosophy is what takes place in debating clubs, universities and on blogs. It has little place in the back rooms of government where pragmatism/favoritism rules.
Saskatchewan has evolved into two choices. Not much differentiates the two. Right now it is the Sask Party. In the future they will fall from favour and some other party will replace them. Probably the ndp.
In the Canadian parliamentary system elected officials are beholden to the party, not the electorate. Yes they are elected by the people and they represent a region of the country but they are part of the party and answer to the party.
One last point. Now that Brad Wall has won his 3rd term there is talk of a run at the leadership of the CPC. My advice – don’t do it. A guy like Wall will be systematically destroyed by Ottawa. The MSM and party apparatchiks will collude to take him out much like they did to Preston Manning. He can do more for the country by taking care of business in the most responsible way in SK.