Made in Alberta: Alberta really is different

This is proof, yet again, that Alberta really is different from the rest of country and would probably be better off as a separate country. It also shows that Liberal does not equal Liberal. Liberals in Alberta are quite a different breed from the dysfunctional and misguided ones in Central Canada. Anne McLellan, therefore, is still a popular figure in Alberta today, and the reason why she won – as a Liberal – in Alberta several times was due to her espousing Alberta Liberal values and the support she garnered from provincial conservatives as a result.

In Alberta, politics is determined by factors unique to Alberta. Albertans believe in small government (anyone in their right mind would, for only fools believe in Big Government), small-l liberal ideas in the classical sense of liberalism (as opposed to the socialist/communist ideas peddled nowadays by Marx-worshipper Stéphane Dion, for example) and an individual's freedom from government. These principles are shared by all Albertans, whether they vote Tory, Liberal or even NDP at the provincial level.

This is why the ill-advised policies and ideas originating in Ontario will never be accepted in Alberta.

Now the Liberals in Alberta have come up with their own platform, making their federal leader Dion look even more foolish and clueless than ever before:

Alberta's Liberal candidates are telling voters they support free tuition for a students' first and last year in post-secondary schools, a policy Stephane Dion's national campaign admits is more "ambitious" than the official Grit promise. That initiative is one of many contained in the party's published "made-in-Alberta agenda" which do not match ones promised by Dion in the first two weeks of the election campaign.

The document, available Friday on two local candidates' websites, also calls for a national pharmacare strategy that goes beyond the Liberal leader's pledge earlier this week for a plan for catastrophic drugs -- those for serious illnesses such as cancer and diabetes. Alberta Grits are also saying they'll push for elected senators and a review of the temporary foreign worker program, alongside actual party promises such as reform on income trusts and the Green Shift's combination of a carbon tax and income-tax reductions.

The fact that they are pushing for an elected senate, an idea typically associated with the Reform/Conservative parties, shows that they have very little in common with the federal leadership out east. From the looks of it, Dion could help himself and his party if he relinquished control of the platform to the Alberta wing of the party. If anyone can come up with more reasonable ideas, or even figure out sensible improvements to Dion's failed Green Shift, it's the Albertans in the Liberal Party.

While those Made-in-Alberta ideas are great and more than welcome, particularly compared to the usual silly ideas thought up by the Liberal HQ in Ontario, this ricochet bullet that has hit Dion in the head now also demonstrates his lack of leadership, as Stephen Taylor points out:

In an election, the candidates are the team and the leader is the captain. Now, the Alberta candidates are off playing their own game while captain Dion is madly erasing the team's chalkboard and fails to come up with any new plays. Can you imagine a Prime Minister Stephane Dion that can't implement his own agenda because his Alberta caucus has gone rogue? What does this say about Dion's leadership when his team is turning their backs on Dion's plan for winning this election?

Perhaps Canada should be ruled from Alberta, rather than Ottawa. Or Alberta should just take its show on the road.

Follow-up: Just as the Reform Party came onto the scene because the Progressive Conservatives were going nowhere, so will a new "Reform" party emerge from all this -- but this time splitting the Liberal Party in two. Ha!

The new reform party that will likely result from this will probably return to classical liberalism -- something that is already underway now at the provincial level thanks to the next leader of the Alberta Liberals, Dave Taylor, and his New Liberal concept. In other words, there won't be any red left; instead there will be a shift to blue-yellow.