[herbie]

And it would be a sad day when Alberta, which didn't join Canada as it never never existed until Canada made it, thought they (or any Canadian thought they had the right to) think of seceding.
Economic reason is about the lowest justification for such a thought.

[rickc]

Is the secessionist party really the second largest party in Alberta?

[Thanos]

Keystone would have been an incredibly helpful bonus but it wasn't the end-all be-all for the oil industry. The oil will get to the US one way or another. If it's going to be by rail and cause situations where a train will blow up in the middle of an American town one day, just like happened in Lac Megantic, then so be it. At that stage it's not the oil industry's fault anyway. It'll be the responsibility of those in the US that let their rail infrastructure turn to shit the same way they let the rest of their infrastructure turn to shit. Or, more likely, it'll be the fault of whatever railway company is working their train engineers to death or putting incompetent/untrained/stoned-on-uppers people behind the controls because they're cheap Wall Street assholes who could care less about safety.

For the most part the Alberta separatist nonsense is dormant now. Not fully dead any more than the Quebec version ever is. But it's still incredibly quiet now. It's just a few bloggers that were to the right of the old Reformers that are still preaching it. The only thing that will stoke it up again is if the feds do something incredibly infuriating like another NEP being forced down Alberta's throat. If that happens then it'll be the loons from the Western Canada Concept revving up again, and probably with the connivance of the troublemakers at the SUN papers too. I'm taking him at his word so I'll believe for now that JT isn't stupid enough to do something that gets these clowns all hyper again. It's possible he will but he said he wouldn't during the campaign. It's all up to him though to live up to his word though. If he breaks his word then he'll have to suffer the consequences that will erupt out here again when the anger rises out of control.

[Thanos]

rickc rickc:

Is the secessionist party really the second largest party in Alberta?

Not in the slightest. If there's even a secessionist group out here that ran candidates in the last provincial election they would've polled at about 0.00001% of voters.

[Jabberwalker]

Thanos Thanos:

rickc rickc:

Is the secessionist party really the second largest party in Alberta?

Not in the slightest. If there's even a secessionist group out here that ran candidates in the last provincial election they would've polled at about 0.00001% of voters.

It's good to know that treason is not wide spread.

[GreenTiger]

martin14 martin14:

Thanos Thanos:

I'm more concerned

About the 8 billion dollar project with thousands of jobs lost, all because Obongo

wants to be seen as a 'green' president ?


Seems like a pretty high price to pay, especially for Alberta people.

Perhaps He wants to poke Daryl Hanna.

[bootlegga]

uwish uwish:

please name them...if he is off, he isn't off by much!

I read his book (Accidental Superpower) and while it has a lot of interesting stuff in it, it's already dated.

The biggest problem with his analysis is that what was relevant in 2014 is not relevant now.

Our currency has dropped almost 30 cents and this no longer makes sense currency-wise as we now see a boost in price because of the differential. Oil is now half of what it was when he wrote the book and that impacts his prediction too.

While it may have helped get Keystone approved, that doesn't matter now either.

He also gets equalization wrong. By his analysis, it sounds like the tax collectors are going to come rob Albertans of everything they have and not collect taxes anywhere else in Canada. Yes, we may be a 'have' province and pay in more than we get back, but the other provinces also pay into the mix and the money gets shared.

He also got bad info on the Wildrose is not a separatist party. It may have members from other parties that may have wanted to separate in the 80s, but they as a party have never espoused any such philospohy. That issue is dead as a doornail.

Lat but not least, the May 2015 election has proven his prediction that Albertans would elect the WRP into government.

The book is interesting reading, but dated by the events of the last year.

Having said that, who knows what the future will bring - like after 2020 when oil prices are expected to rebound to $80/barrel.

[bootlegga]

Thanos Thanos:

rickc rickc:

Is the secessionist party really the second largest party in Alberta?

Not in the slightest. If there's even a secessionist group out here that ran candidates in the last provincial election they would've polled at about 0.00001% of voters.

Pretty close for a wild ass guess Thanos:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberta_g ... tion,_2015

[Thanos]

LOL Alberta separatists. Sorry andy, but you're stuck with us evil cross-burnin' coal-rollin' wife-beatin' Tory-votin' rednecks forever.

[uwish]

bootlegga bootlegga:

uwish uwish:

please name them...if he is off, he isn't off by much!

I read his book (Accidental Superpower) and while it has a lot of interesting stuff in it, it's already dated.

The biggest problem with his analysis is that what was relevant in 2014 is not relevant now.

Our currency has dropped almost 30 cents and this no longer makes sense currency-wise as we now see a boost in price because of the differential. Oil is now half of what it was when he wrote the book and that impacts his prediction too.

While it may have helped get Keystone approved, that doesn't matter now either.

He also gets equalization wrong. By his analysis, it sounds like the tax collectors are going to come rob Albertans of everything they have and not collect taxes anywhere else in Canada. Yes, we may be a 'have' province and pay in more than we get back, but the other provinces also pay into the mix and the money gets shared.

He also got bad info on the Wildrose is not a separatist party. It may have members from other parties that may have wanted to separate in the 80s, but they as a party have never espoused any such philospohy. That issue is dead as a doornail.

Lat but not least, the May 2015 election has proven his prediction that Albertans would elect the WRP into government.

The book is interesting reading, but dated by the events of the last year.

Having said that, who knows what the future will bring - like after 2020 when oil prices are expected to rebound to $80/barrel.

oh yeah his stuff is dated the month after it was printed, I don't think many saw the sudden drop in the oil/dollar being so abrupt and drastic.