Brian Jean drops a bomb on the Alberta NDP. Game changer.
There is no more uncertainty. There is no more discussion of the Wildrose and the PCs soldiering on their own against Notley’s NDP in 2019.
There is no thought of the two parties co-operating in the 2019 election but remaining separate.
Jean is now foursquare behind one united conservative party if Jason Kenney becomes leader of the Progressive Conservatives in March and comes knocking on Wildrose’s door.
Over to you, PC party prez…..
Dark day in Alberta. I don’t want anything to do with the PC Party and I don’t want to merge. I don’t want the PC cronies to come within 100 miles of the legislature ever again.
Kenney is backed by Jonathan “Sharia Creep” Denis who urged people on the doorstep to vote NDP. Ellis got his nomination through the Calgary West Masjid mosque
All Brian Jean is doing is cucking out and handing things back to the PC cronies who were taking us in the same direction that the NDP did anyways. The Stelmach PC’s the Redford PC’s were slightly less transparent about their socialist goals than the Notely NDP.
We only had ONE semi conservative party and that was the Wildrose. The PC’s are a red tory rump and that floppy eared dumbass who let Notely burn down his house has just given the legacy red tories an invitation to come back in.
Alberta won’t improve and they won’t have learned anything. We’ve wasted 15 years building up the Wildrose party. I feel sorry for anyone who donated their money only to be sold out by the Jean team.
I’ll never vote for a “progressive” party again. Stelmach, Redford and Prentis define the PC party IMHO.
Agree completely. Why is this idiot Brian Jean even in Wildrose, let alone leader?
Why does Jean think Wildrose even exists in the first place, and why is Alberta going through this pain now, if we’re going to have progressives in a new party?
WTF!?
Of all the stupidest things to say to Rick Bell or anyone else, Wildrose merging with the PCs is tops.
NO NO NO, Jean has got to Go.(dump him, not just from leadership, but from the party)
A name change ought to be the very first order of business. I never liked it when the federal Tories called themselves “Progressive Conservative” – they really set themselves up for ridicule and oxymoron-based sneers with that moniker. So it is with the provincial parties.
How about just Conservative Party of Alberta or the like?
The second order of business should be: you’re a conservative party. Act like one.
I’m not an Albertan but I lived through the seemingly endless NDP reign in Saskatchewan. In my opinion, Notley is far more dangerous and clueless than the likes of Blakeney, Romanow and Calvert who were certainly no prizes.
It seems to me that an amalgamation between the Wildrose and the unsavoury PC’s is by far the lesser of two evils. If Notley and her crew of miscreants gets another term, I’m afraid that Alberta will be toast.
Take out the “progressive” and most of the rats will scurry to the Dippers where they belong. There may be a few hardcore socialists left, but they will be outnumbered. For a while, anyway.
I believe that this was Kenney’s plan all along. He wasn’t just angling to be the new leader, but to arrange for all the socialists to be first purged from the PCs, then have the cleansed party merged with the now-compatible Wildrose. If the PCs hadn’t been taken over by socialists, the Wildrose would never have formed to begin with.
The socialists infesting the PCs have been grumbling, quitting (Sandra Jansen), and playing dirty pool to try to keep Kenney and his actual conservatives from kicking out the fakers. Those who remain may find themselves losing delegate support. Hopefully a clean slate of actual conservatives run together in the next election and trounce the commies.
Brian Jean has been a pussy from day 1 as his first act as “leader” was to throw one of his own under the bus at the first hint of the media playing the bigotopobist card.
Progressives ruin everything they touch – and insist on touching everything. There is little room for Conservatives in Progville. The name PROGRESSIVE conservative is an idiotic oxymoron. There is a reason why recent leaders have all been proggy in nature. They are tyrannical and never give up in their quest for power. Grow a pair and dump the Progressive label and maybe Ill go back to supporting them. Otherwise Ill vote for an Independence party.
While having the word ‘progressive’ in the name is clearly an invitation to Leftists, I think the real answer is for the party to adopt common sense conservative political planks that no Leftist could possibly swallow.
That is the only way to keep ‘progressives’ from infiltrating a party and pulling it’s policies, increment by increment, toward socialism.
You want to be a party candidate or even member?
Then sign a contract that you agree with the party’s purpose and basic political planks before you get a membership card.
Name the consolidated party the Wild Conservatives.
I know partisans, including many reading this blog, won’t like it but the average Albertan is breathing a massive sigh of relief.
This is a simple recognition that going into the next election with two right of centre parties has the real possibility of dooming this province for a generation. A lot of businesses are hanging in there trying to wait out a NDP first term but they won’t wait around for a second one to end. Our quality of life will be substantially and permanently lowered by a second NDP term. The NDP have to be beaten and that’s the message that the Tory and WR power brokers have heard.
Are there risks? Of course. But nothing is riskier than handing Notley the keys for another 4-5 years….
Average Albertans are PC voters who thought the NDP might have been a good idea and they thought Nenshi and Mandel was a good idea.
Set a real conservative philosophy and then produce a platform that reflects that. Use your philosophy to vet your riding leadership and then your candidates. This should keep your progressives out or at the very least red flag them. As a rule conservatives have been so desperate to get elected that they were willing to ignore ‘sweet’ talking progressives.
Oz: IMO the Party has to be more proactive and actually ‘out’ the progressives who try to infiltrate. Back in Reform days we had a ‘recall’ policy that would have forced accountability to the Riding. Again, IMHO, if the Party has no way of cleansing itself of these elements there is little hope.
If the Party can be confident in its philosophy and that members are on board then it can begin to attack those elements in education, media and bureaucracy that progressives control. Accountability is fundamental and progressives absolutely fear it as their strength is subjective BS.
“Brian Jean drops a bomb on the Alberta NDP. Game changer.”
~lance
What he did was drop a bomb on the hard working loyal party Wildrose constituent voter base.
If Jean is planning on joining with the Progs, he is planning on making all of our hard work just a game.
This kind of crap not only makes all of our work a waste, but it makes having the current NDP government our fault for rejecting Prog rule instead of it being the PC throwback Prog voter’s fault.
It makes the 8 traitors who crossed the floor to the PCs in December 2014 right and the Wildrose loyalists wrong.
It makes the people who built Wildrose quitters.
It makes the dream of having good government in Alberta a fantasy.
Right now the Alberta PCs have 3rd party status after ruling Alberta for over 40 years.
They have one foot on a banana peal and the other on the verge. All Wildrose needs is a strong loyal leader.
Brian Jean looks to be viewing the Wildrose Party as merely a vehicle for his own personal ambition.
The similarity between Jean and Prentice look vanishingly small.
p.s. slaw, the PCs are not a right of center party. They are Progs, Left of center.
This is why Wildrose exists. They are the only right-of-center party in Alberta that has a chance to form the government.
Very good post. Agree.
“Name the consolidated party the Wild Conservatives.”
Heh. More likely the Progressive Roses, methinks.
I was about to suggest this same moniker when I saw your post. The Wild Conservatives, how Trumpian. Can you just imagine the campaign ads?
I wonder if this isn’t a reverse takeover of the PC Party, arranged in advance by Kenney’s team and the Wildrose leadership. They have been very cordial with each other from Day 1.
It would make sense that strategic planning would have had to occur early on if merger talks were in the works. There are far too many Albertans who reflexively vote PC based largely on the delusion that the PCs are actually conservative. Meanwhile the Wildrose have been so demonized by the socialists in the media to make them poisonous to the mushy middle.
The other hurdle is to keep the support from either party should a merger occur. Danielle Smith, who was never conservative to begin with, found out quickly that her supporters weren’t blind followers, and that they had principles. As such, she was likely surprised that they weren’t wedded to her supposed magnetic personality or imagined charisma.
If the PC sheeple are left with the impression that the PCs have swallowed up the Wildrose, they will stay. If the Wildrose are given the leadership of the merged party, and the socialists are purged, the right has indeed been united with the required mushy middle not bolting to the Liberals or Dippers.
In time, like with Harper, the “Progressive” can be quietly dropped from the new united party and the deed is done.
A little surprised he announced anything but not at all surprised that he thinks that way. The writing has been on the wall almost since Kenney announced he was running for leader and it became a certainty when Stephen Harper endorsed it.
Here’s a timeline I have been espousing since early fall:
Kenney wins (easily) in March. He quickly ‘sues for peace’. Negotiations of the merger are very quickly completed and announced in June. The wildrose constitution is almost a carbon copy of the cpc constitution (with one significant difference being the ‘Mackay rule’). After all it is based on it just as the cpc constitution is based on the reform party constitution.
In June it will be announced that there will be a founding convention in June where the primary task will be the creation of a policy book. And it too will be 95% wildrose policies – the PC party policy book is a joke and wildrose attendees will far outnumber the PCs. And of course the new party will be named the Conservative Party of alberta.
At the convention the leadership selection process will be finalized with a vote likely either late march or April.
And it will be a Conservative party just about as much as the wildrose.
The liberal and alberta parties will get some ‘defections’ of the progressives but no where near enough to make a difference.
And in. 2019 the ACP will win north of seventy seats. The ndp – fewer than ten and they could get as few as five.
Remember when leaders had principles? Yeah, good times.
Get ready for Notley’s second term. Oz nailed it with his post.
This is also the reason conservativism needs to and is on the way to dying.
this sounds great, I hope Pescott Manning runs and becomes the leader, and also takes the portfolio of minister of carbon tax, he could use the church as his champagne office!!!!
I think that, as a Wildrose supporter, it depends on who ends up driving the bus. The PC’s know that their brand is tainted, both with the mismanagement of the past 40 years and the most recent politicking from Prentice (is it too soon?) and Danielle Smith the Wodrose traitor. In order to kick the NDP out (FIRST order of business) the two parties sadly, do need to merge. There are enough PC hangers on that think the PC should be given a second chance. Alberta will simply NOT stand four more years of NDP mismanagement and spending. This is the only way to drive the stake in to their evil hearts.
The Wildrose constitution must drive the new party. The PC constitution will only give them added hope.
The new party cannot be called the Progessive Conservative party, which is a stupid, stupid name.
Although it hurts to think that a merger means Danielle was right, please remember that what must be done is the elimination of the NDP. Then the cutting of the red tories (hopefully that has been going on, but I doubt it.) A merger with the Wildrose might prove distasteful enough to the red tories that they will bail to the Liberal party or possibly the NDP, although that brand is objectionable to many soft conservatives.
“And in. 2019 the ACP will win north of seventy seats. The ndp – fewer than ten and they could get as few as five.”
Pretending for the sake of discussion that it was a good idea(I disagree) for Harper to unite with the federal PCs, it should be remembered that the LPC called an early election which the newly minted CPC lost.
You would make the likely winner of the 2019 Alberta general election, Wildrose Party, into the new kid on the block(new party) and expect them to win the next election?(called any time at the pleasure of Notley)
And don’t expect the new party to have another party to conspire with to engineer another election against an NDP minority as the CPC did with the Federal NDP to overthrow the LPC, because it would be winner-take-all in Alberta.
As it stands Wildrose would be the likely winner in the next general as they are currently the Official Opposition, not the NDP.
It is a good move and a start to the unity that JK has promoted. Jean knew this was coming and there are only 28 months til May 2019.
This needs to be done within one year. Old PCs need to suck this up and leave arrogance, egos and inflexible old-school opinions at the door. The old PCs are so rigid and arrogant. Get over it for God’s sake. The old PC name is dead as a Norwegian Blue parrot. Gone.
There is ONLY one goal here and all of the naysayers need to get a grip: unite the right and make sure this “NDP up the middle” never EVAH happens again. Too goddamn bad if a few egos and toes are stepped on. Some folks will have to bend a bit. Better then bending all the way over and taking up the rear by the NDP for four more years after 2019.
Strictly speaking semantics vs political philosophy, I like the name, “Alberta Party” … but it is taken. Not sure what the current Alberta Party political philosophy is. I do not like Wildrose and Progressive is no good. Conservative really has baggage. “Alberta Party” from the ground up will work as it did in SK, as in Sask Party.
Last week I wrote a friend, “Kenny and Jean need to have coffee. Invite the leader of the Alberta Party for a ménage à trois and buy out the party name: Alberta Party. ” ☺☺
I’d be fine with either Kenny or Jean as premier and the other deputy.
I wonder if Rona is interested in coming into provincial politics? Just wondering.
Remember: May 2019.
“I wonder if Rona is interested in coming into provincial politics?”
God help us. Another freakin Red Tory.
I agree, the PC’s need a new name and a new attitude, they need toss all the Red’s in the party, they need to stop acting like Liberal lites. Its time to stop chasing the votes they are not going to get, like the hipster crowd, the ones at the U of C Trudeau townhall who voted Liberal because they wanted “change” even thou Harper was good at looking after the economy. Pure idiots, all they want are handouts, legal drugs, and somebody else to pay their student loans.
Conservatives need to start acting like conservatives!
HA HA! Ya think?
I hope you are right. Neither party is particularly coherent in principles but they have to unite to beat the NDP. Slowing the decline is the best a Canadian can hope for these days.
Agree that the right needs to be united, and it cannot be under the PC banner. This is what happened in Sask. If true conservatives end up in leadership (and that means mainly Wildrose people) it could be a viable alternative. (Heck, the residents of the local SPCA would be a viable alternative to Notley.) The difference between the last attempt at amalgamation under Smith is that at that time, the PC’s would have been absorbing the Wildrose. It would be the other way now. But they need a new name, and they need a clearly conservative platform, and to purge any who espouse “reaching out” to the left end of the spectrum. Brexit and Trump showed us that true, honest conservative platforms can win. No need to worry what the prog media calls you – just be what so many of the people have been longing for, and what the economy needs.
But we cannot take another 4 years. Word on the street here is that citizens will vote for ANYTHING that smacks of honesty, to get rid of Notley & co. So all they have to do is get their crap together and quite trying to appeal to some imagined middle ground.
Unfortunately, that elusive “middle of the road” platform is only defined by media pundits. As the left moves further and further into utter whack job territory, the middle point between them and common sense (socially and economically) shifts to the left, too. Witness the federal Liberal party, who attempt to brand themselves as middle ground. They are further to the left than the NDP was 20 years ago.
Forget them all! Forget trying to look good to the socialist media. Be what you need to be – honest about true conservative, realistic policies. Let the snowflake heads explode – they will hate you anyway. Remember Farage and Trump!
A purely conservative party can’t get elected, it needs to be center-conservative. Sorry that all you of conservative philosophy don’t like that fact, but it is a fact. I agree, a truly conservative government would be best by far, but that just won’t happen.
When right of center parties drift too far to the left, conservatives voters get disgusted and refuse to vote for them and conservative party members break away. Think Reform federally and Wildrose. And as long as they stay split, the left will be in power. In Alberta, the NDP will remain in power until the two are reunited, so you have to decide which is the lesser of two evils.
That’s just the way it is.
>Dirtman wrote:
>A purely conservative party can’t get elected, it needs to be center-conservative. Sorry that all you of conservative philosophy don’t >like that fact, but it is a fact. I agree, a truly conservative government would be best by far, but that just won’t happen.
>When right of center parties drift too far to the left, conservatives voters get disgusted and refuse to vote for them and conservative >party members break away. Think Reform federally and Wildrose. And as long as they stay split, the left will be in power. In Alberta, the >NDP will remain in power until the two are reunited, so you have to decide which is the lesser of two evils.
>That’s just the way it is.
This attitude is also why you never win.
Any sort of consortium of these parties should be able to beat the NDP, the question then becomes how conservative will the resulting provincial government actually be?
To the extent that this is known in advance by the nature of the platform of any merged alternative, the question shifts to how much can the voters trust the platform to become policy?
But any change away from the NDP is probably a net gain. We’ll see if it’s a counter-revolution or just a bit of spin.
“Think Reform federally and Wildrose.”
Neither represent your assertion that a truly conservative party can’t get elected in Alberta.
Reform was doing fine and even became the Official Opposition before it became the Alliance which was an initiative to form the CPC. Harper was just too much in a hurry to get to power and sacrificed principle to get to power.
The PC Party of Canada was deep in debt and soon to dissolve.
Wildrose is doing just fine(except for Jean) and not only increased it’s seat count last election, but it did so under the adverse conditions of not fielding candidates in every riding, an early election call, and 8 MLAs crossing the floor and telling constituents that Prentice was the savior that Wildrose voters were looking for.
Prentice resigned and his safe PC seat went to Wildrose in the byelection.
Alberta has a tradition that once a provincial party is tossed aside it is done for.
Like the Prentice seat, I think that most of the PC voters in other riding have finally gotten the message and won’t be splitting the vote next general.
No need to unite conservative voters. Albertans already have only one united conservative party to vote for, Wildrose.
The PCs are not and were not center Right. They are center Left.
They used to be the most ‘conservative’ party to vote for. Used to be. Alberta can and will do better.
The Wildrose doesn’t need to join the Tories, the Tories need to join the Wildrose. WR have been on the rise, despite the concerted efforts both from within and without to sabotage them. PC are losers, stick a fork in them already.
Smith tried to sell out to the Tories and their newly imported messiah, too, Brian. How’d that work out for her? What’s with WR leaders and surrendering to the already defeated? Where the hell do the PCs get off thinking THEY are the ones entitled to negotiate merger terms from a position of strength? Vae victis, bitchez
So long as a super majority of the leadership and cabinet positions of the combined right go to the WR, I can stomach it (and watch out for PC shenanigans to unseat and discard them; again, remember Smith and how they repaid her). The PCs getting the party leadership via Kenney is just barely tolerable, being an outsider, so long as he remembers its the WR that commands the lion’s share of the conservative electoral vote.
“In Alberta, the NDP will remain in power until the two are reunited, so you have to decide which is the lesser of two evils.”
People need to come to grip with what’s at stake in 2019. This isn’t a choice between eating green beans and broccoli – it’s a choice between eating broccoli and cyanide.
“No need to unite conservative voters. Albertans already have only one united conservative party to vote for, Wildrose”
True now, won’t be true in 6 months. Kenney will re-brand the Torys, lean on big donors and entice a bunch of conservatives to declare they will run under the Tory banner. Harper will back his old buddy publicly, tell conservatives to come home, and we’ll have all-out civil war in the ranks in the lead-up to the election.
I think the two parties could continue to exist and find a way to work together. Each party to nominate their candidate for ridings and let the combined party membership decide by vote who goes on the ballot. You would get Wildrose representing the rural conservative ridings and the PC party representing all the urban progressive ridings. NDP are toast and the PC’s and Wildrose have to work together to pass legislation.
Brian jean is a cuck.
Kenny is a cuck.
A merger is liberal light.
I am tired of the people on this blog settling for less.
I am tired of Albertans settling for less
I am tired of Canadians settling for less.
Will the real conservatives please stand up and put one of those fingers on each hand up .
still beating your dog???
The PC party is in tough financially. They’re having a leadership campaign and still can’t raise decent money. And there are rumours of off-the-books debts in the PC party, which at one time had more money than God.
Meanwhile the Wildrose is doing quite nicely in the donations game and has a reasonable nest egg.
Isn’t this a pretty good reason for average small-C conservatives to decide what banner to unite under? Who cares about the name? Wind up the PC party with all its baggage and move on. What is with these few partisans from the PCs who still oppose a merger if Wildrose is the banner? Are their feelings so hurt that they don’t care about what is best for the province? Jeesh, junior high school is over, they need to get over themselves.
Canada has ten provinces. We should use those political jurisdictions as test beds for new ideas.
For example, instead of rushing ahead with Justin’s idea of some form of PR for Canada, why don’t we try it in Alberta? Historically, there has been no province where First Past The Post has resulted in more lop-sided legislatures than Alberta. With some kind of PR, the Tories might never had had such ridiculous majorities, and a decent and effective opposition might have kept them in check.
And of course, with some kind of PR, it would be doubtful if Notley would ever see the door to the Premier’s office from anywhere other than the hallway.
“That is the only way to keep ‘progressives’ from infiltrating a party and pulling it’s policies, increment by increment, toward socialism.”
This is what happened after the Reform/Alliance Party merged with the Progressive Conservatives. There are precious few real conservatives left. Trost, Leitch to name two.
I think Canadian Conservatives better up their Game.. The NDP could have an Apiphany, drop the world global Movement, and Climate change nonsense. If they hitch to the Trump train & Alberta roars back to life… you are dead….
Video – Full Coverage of the 44th Annual March for Life:
http://commoncts.blogspot.com/2017/01/march-for-life-full-coverage-new-york.html
Here’s the deal….the PC party has to disintegrate. It (and Alberta) has been ruined by the left wing of the PC’s (i.e., Liberals pretending to be conservatives)…the PC party must shed those leftists in its ranks (probably several in the executive that have to go). Those that are shed, move over to the Liberals, strengthening them somewhat (it wasn’t just the PC’s that lost votes in the last election, the Liberals more or less collapsed with them moving to the NDP). So with a slightly stronger Liberal party, the left wing will split with the Liberals who parked their votes with the NDP coming back “home”. The Wildrose and the right wing of the PC’s combine and Bob’s your uncle.
LOL>
Alberta will never vote in (or traditional conservatives will never be able to elect) a good ol’ conservative such as Ralph Klein ever again in Alberta since the millennials are all snowflakes and socialists and since immigrants or loyal liberal (left of center) voters. Edmonton is the HQ of the left in Alberta and it now shows everywhere in that city. The typical rural Albertan is screwed…
Your mention of Ralph Klein reminded me of the day he announced he was moving into provincial politics. It was the day the city commemorated the Scouts and Guides, probably BP Day (Feb 22). Our daughters had been co-opted into attending the ceremony at City Hall. The Scouts presented Mayor Klein with a pin; not to be outdone, the Guide leaders present swooped on youngest daughter, nabbed her World pin, and presented it to the mayor. We still have the pictures.
When, some years later, MP Klein decided to run for the leadership of the PC party, eldest daughter was turning 16 and was – therefore – eligible to vote for the leader. I bought her a membership and picked up pamphlets and other information from all the other candidates for her to read. On her 16th birthday, we went over to the local polling station to cast our votes. One scrutineer there – whom I know – asked her just WHEN she was born that day. Luckily she was born early, and so was definitely 16 plus some hours. Still wonder what would have happened had she been born ten minutes before midnight.
I haven’t heard non gimmicked recall legislation in anyone’s platform. If they won’t guarantee recall legislation, they’re not worth voting for.
Right wing extremists will never have enough votes to form a government. The votes to form governments come from that vast middle-of-the road group of apolitical/undecided voters who are left-leaning on some issues and right-leaning on others. Unless you can appeal to them you’re SOL.
Unite the right under a new name or you don’t have a hope in hell. Even lovely Danielle couldn’t make it work with a right-wing splinter group.
“Politics is the art of the possible, the attainable – the art of the next best.” — Chancellor Otto von Bismarck