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Alberta

Graven Images: The Greening Of Calgary

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The city of Calgary this week elected the first woman mayor in its history. This is a source of great satisfaction to those citizens who cringe at Calgary’s image as part buckaroo/ part bitumen cowboy. The fact that Jyoti Gondek is of Pashtun origin only deepens the sense of accomplishment for the urban elite of Calgary.

How giddy are the wokesters? A CBC reporter illustrated the story with a tweet showing a long series of emoji men followed by a single emoji of a woman. Because journalistic objectivity at the national broadcaster demands a clever tweet.  “Look what we’ve done, world! Woman! Punjabi! Now we can hold our heads up in the polite society of the urban hives.”

The new mayor has a PhD in urban sociology which “furnishes understanding of the complex as well as profound meaning of every urban reality, notably the territorial stabilization of social life, the rise of a space symbol system and culture, and the origin and evolution of human settlements.”

Which sounds like the sort of convoluted stuff that Wokesters toss around when they’re trying to distance themselves from the Stampede crowd. What it means in reality is that Gondek will commit $250 K to declare a climate emergency in Calgary as her first priority as mayor. As this photo below shows, it’s not a moment too soon.

Can she tame the city’s transit snarls and stare down a council bent on destroying the budget? Who knows? Who cares? The natural gas/ petroleum bastards will now have to take a knee to the symbolism of her outreach to Big Climate.  And that’s enough.

Okay, it’s just a mayor in a mid-sized Canadian city, but you have to start with small dreams if you’re going to make the world a progressive paradise. Especially when, like Gondek, you spend every working day cloying with guilt over how Calgary’s energy industry is ravaging Mother Earth.

The big Green virtue dreams are the ones about to be dreamt in Glasgow in the next weeks as the world’s guiltiest liberals— aka the IPCC— convene to reconstitute the world economy by killing fossil fuels. If this all sounds familiar it’s because the Al Gores and Neil Youngs have been hard at this project for decades, sending thunderbolts of doom via a captive media. (Sample: 1987: NASA’s James Hansen predicts world 3C warmer by 2020. Reality: average temp only 0.44C higher.)  And lots more faceplants.

No matter. The evolution of Green is a litany of half-baked predictions and salacious slanders. Even as European governments scramble to replace their sacred renewable dreams with the realities of nuclear power or, gasp, Russian natural gas, the pious will still party like it’s 1999— when all things seemed possible. There’s a revolution of purity happening here, folks, and a few inconvenient facts isn’t going to harsh the vibe.

The vibe, of course, is not climate change or even first women mayors. The vibe is victim culture, re-fitting Marxism so the uncouth and intemperate opposition can be permanently rendered inert. If Marx’s wealth re-distribution is to happen equity— not just equality—  must be achieved. Any weapon at hand— climate, gender, victimization— will serve to get there.

The old Commie’s theories just need a new coat of victim’s paint to make them current. Author Chris Rufo explains how the Left is making the quick flip after their Cold War dreams died in the ‘70s at the altar of capitalist riches. : “… rather than abandon their political project, Marxist scholars in the West simply adapted their revolutionary theory to the social and racial unrest of the 1960s. Abandoning Marx’s economic dialectic of capitalists and workers, they substituted race for class and sought to create a revolutionary coalition of the dispossessed based on racial and ethnic categories.”

Suddenly, it’s all victims, all the time.

Thus the new liturgy, funded by Big Tech oligarchs such as Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates. Capitalist roaders are failed humans. Writes Christopher Chantrill: “Today’s elites are totally down as Allies of the Oppressed Peoples. Their political power is justified by their untiring support of and advocacy for The Victims.”

Andrea Widburg describes the role reversal in The American Thinker: “In its new iteration, Whites are irredeemably racist and evil.  Equality is a trap because White societal dominance means that the other races (and sexualities) will never be able to catch up.  Forced equity is the only answer, and one way to pave the way for that to happen is to force Whites to remove themselves from society, from the economy, from politics, and from any other area in which they can be seen to have an advantage.”

Celebrating the ascent of symbolism, not the skill-set of politicians such as Barack Obama (and the removal of statues) is how whites willingly remove themselves from the economy and society. As Rufo tweets, “@LockheedMartin, the nation’s largest defense contractor, sent key executives to a three-day white male reeducation camp in order to deconstruct their “white male culture” and atone for their “white male privilege.”

To the surprise of the Marxists, their old enemies on Wall Street are enthusiastically taking the bait.  Now they have only the rump opposition of libertarians and stubborn conservatives left to hammer into shape and the Bernie Sanders revolution, begun in the ‘60s, will be complete.

Calgary will be so proud.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author of Cap In Hand is also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada’s top television sports broadcaster, his new book with his son Evan is called InExact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx

BRUCE DOWBIGGIN Award-winning Author and Broadcaster Bruce Dowbiggin's career is unmatched in Canada for its diversity and breadth of experience . He is currently the editor and publisher of Not The Public Broadcaster website and is also a contributor to SiriusXM Canada Talks. His new book Cap In Hand was released in the fall of 2018. Bruce's career has included successful stints in television, radio and print. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster for his work with CBC-TV, Mr. Dowbiggin is also the best-selling author of "Money Players" (finalist for the 2004 National Business Book Award) and two new books-- Ice Storm: The Rise and Fall of the Greatest Vancouver Canucks Team Ever for Greystone Press and Grant Fuhr: Portrait of a Champion for Random House. His ground-breaking investigations into the life and times of Alan Eagleson led to his selection as the winner of the Gemini for Canada's top sportscaster in 1993 and again in 1996. This work earned him the reputation as one of Canada's top investigative journalists in any field. He was a featured columnist for the Calgary Herald (1998-2009) and the Globe & Mail (2009-2013) where his incisive style and wit on sports media and business won him many readers.

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Alberta

Official statement from Premier Danielle Smith and Energy Minister Brian Jean on the start-up of the Trans Mountain Pipeline

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Alberta is celebrating an important achievement for the energy industry – the start-up of the twinned Trans Mountain pipeline. It’s great news Albertans and Canadians as this will welcome a new era of prosperity and economic growth. The completion of TMX is monumental for Alberta, since this will significantly increase our province’s output. It will triple the capacity of the original pipeline to now carry 890,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Alberta’s oil sands to British Columbia’s Pacific Coast.
We are excited that Canada’s biggest and newest oil pipeline in more than a decade, can now bring oil from Edmonton to tide water in B.C. This will allow us to get our energy resources to Pacific markets, including Washington State and California, and Asian markets like Japan, South Korea, China, and India. Alberta now has new energy customers and tankers with Alberta oil will be unloading in China and India in the next few months.
For Alberta this is a game-changer, the world needs more reliably and sustainably sourced Alberta energy, not less. World demand for oil and gas resources will continue in the decades ahead and the new pipeline expansion will give us the opportunity to meet global energy demands and increase North American and global energy security and help remove the issues of energy poverty in other parts of the world.
Analysts are predicting the price differential on Canadian crude oil will narrow resulting in many millions of extra government revenues, which will help fund important programs like health, education, and social services – the things Albertans rely on. TMX will also result in billions of dollars of economic prosperity for Albertans, Indigenous communities and Canadians and create well-paying jobs throughout Canada.
Our province wants to congratulate the Trans Mountain Corporation for its tenacity to have completed this long awaited and much needed energy infrastructure, and to thank the more than 30,000 dedicated, skilled workers whose efforts made this extraordinary project a reality. The province also wants to thank the Federal Government for seeing this project through. This is a great example of an area where the provincial and federal government can cooperate and work together for the benefit of Albertans and all Canadians.
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Alberta

Protecting the right to vote for Canadian citizens: Minister McIver

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Minister of Municipal Affairs Ric McIver issued the following statement in response to Calgary City Council’s vote to extend the right to vote to permanent residents:

“Yesterday, Calgary city council passed a motion advocating for permanent residents to be extended the right to vote in civic elections. Alberta’s government has been clear since the beginning: only Canadian citizens are able to vote in civic elections. That will not be changing.

“The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms affirms the right of every Canadian citizen to vote and to run as a candidate. This right extends to voters in municipal, provincial and federal elections.

“Protecting our democracy is of the utmost importance. Our provincial election legislation, like the Local Authorities Elections Act, has also been clear since its inception that voting is a right of Canadian citizens.

“Alberta’s government is also ensuring that voting is accessible for more Albertans. The Municipal Affairs Statutes Amendment Act proposes to enable special ballot access for any voter who requests it, without having to provide any specific reason such as physical disability, absence from the municipality or working for the municipal election. The ministries of Seniors, Community and Social Services and Service Alberta and Red Tape Reduction are also making it easier for individuals to obtain the identification Albertans need for a variety of services, including the ability to cast a ballot.

“Our government will continue to protect the integrity of our elections and make sure voting is accessible for all Albertans who are Canadian citizens.”

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