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I believe in Red Deer. I don’t want to lose this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Do you?

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I believe in Red Deer, I really do.
My wife and I decided to raise our family in Red Deer nearly 40 years ago.
We originally moved to Oriole Park and our children attended French Immersion at Fairview School at the start. Then French Immersion relocated to Mountview School and we followed and moved south of the river.
For several decades we have lived in Sunnybrook. We, even at our age, can walk easily to 3 high schools, the museum, Red Deer College, Downtown Recreation Centre , Michener Aquatic Centre, Downtown Arena (Servus Arena), Centrium complex, Collicutt Recreation Centre, Pidherney Curling Centre, Kinex Arena, Kinsmen Community Arenas, Red Deer Curling Centre, and the under-construction Gary W. Harris Centre.
When we lived in Oriole Park we could only walk to the Dawe Centre and Bower Ponds.
It was an easy decision, for our family.
Today, not much has changed.
Looking at future plans for Red Deer, it appears not much will change for the north side. Last year 311 more families moved out of the neighbourhoods north of the river than moved in. 280 more families moved into Blackfalds than left during the same period. Some will say it was low housing prices; negating the costs of commuting, the newly built Abbey centre or the prospect of a new high school, in the very near future.
North Red Deer has no current prospect of a high school even though the population is almost 3 times the size of Blackfalds. All 6 of the high schools, 4 current and 2 planned will be south of the river with 5 being along 30 Ave.
North Red Deer has no current prospect of a new indoor pool while the downtown recreation centre will see a 100 million dollar plus renovation. They do have a conditional prospect of a new ice rink added to the Dawe Centre. Conditional that the 40 year old structure is sound enough, if not it will be built at the Collicutt Centre.
The North will get a Recreation Centre, no pool, no ice rink, but a rec. centre. Apparently that is good enough.
The North gets the developments that the south side does not want. Industrial parks, public works yards, social housing to name but a few. The last school that was to be built north of the river, was at Johnstone Park and it was built south of the river. You wonder why 311 families or 777 residents moved out of the north.
But it is not just the North that is declining. 79 more families moved out of the south side of Red Deer than moved in, too. A decline 198 residents south of the river. A total of 975 residents more moved out of Red Deer than moved in.
Our crime rate has garnered national attention ranking sometimes second highest per capita nationally. There was a report talking about intensifying efforts on youth at risk.
One third of our youth lives north of the river, with no high schools, and only the Dawe Centre for indoor swimming and skating. Do they have time to commute from high school on the other side of the city to go home, have dinner and then commute again, across the city for extra-curricular and sports activities then commute a third time, across the city to home, do their homework before bed times? Can the parents afford the time and costs of so many cross-city commutes, possibly, carrying younger siblings to boot? Might be tough.
Living in Sunnybrook, it took very little time to commute. The kids could walk, roller blade, bike, skateboard, but then they very seldom had to cross the river. It was the right decision to move south.
It need not be anymore. We just have to get city council and the school boards to stop treating the north as some type of second-class society.
Tell them, when you vote on October 16, that there is another option. Build the next Aquatic Centre in the North-west corner to compliment the successful south-east Collicutt Centre. Red Deer North has Hazlett Lake, a hundred acre lake, with 2 miles of shoreline and an average depth of 10 feet, highly visible from Hwy 2 and Hwy 11a just waiting to be utilized, by people with vision, courage and strength.
On October 16 I will be looking for candidates with those qualities.
The next high school to be built will be a public high school, slotted in for land by 67Street and 30 Avenue. Let the board candidates know that, this is unacceptable and should be changed. It could be built in Johnstone Park or on the 3,000 acres now up for development north of Hwy 11a.
The next aquatic centre is slated for downtown, replacing the recreation centre. It was supposed to cost 87 million if built in 2013, then that would mean 95.7 million in 2014, 105m in 2015, 116m in 2016, 127m in 2017, 140 million dollars in 2018 not including the costs of demolition, improving transportation routes and services.
Why not invest that approximately 150 million dollars and build the Aquatic Centre on Hazlett Lake to complement each other, highly visible and easily accessed from Hwy 2. I heard tourism is a big industry, highly profitable and a huge draw for new residents. Am I insane to even consider an Aquatic Centre with a lake? People could take transit, bike, walk or drive to the beach, swim in the pool, and not pay 10 dollars for parking. The Collicutt Centre was controversial, but since becoming the most utilized facility, does anyone suggest it was a mistake. It helped kick-start development in the south-east.
What am I thinking? Look at the Riverlands. The city has spent over 230 million dollars moving the public works yard, aligning roads, upgrading services, and burying cables, etc. to create a 23 acre riverfront downtown neighbourhood. Yet it would be insane to consider building an aquatic centre on Hazlett lake? Do not forget, they are also talking about a 21 million dollar footbridge, 100 million dollar plus upgrade to the downtown recreation centre, and a downtown concert hall, and do not forget, added to that is the new skating rink, now being built.
With all this on the books, the city’s population still declined by 975 residents last year. Why not consider other options without shrugging it off?
Anyone?
I believe in Red Deer, I just do not want to lose a golden opportunity. Do you?

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Bruce Dowbiggin

Hyperbole Is Dead. Big Brother Killed Him

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Antietam, Maryland: On Sept 17, 1862, the combined forces of the Union Army (under George McLellan) and the Confederate army (under Robert E. Lee) met on sleepy farmland west of Washington. When the ten hours of vicious fighting was done, there was an appalling 22,717 casualties. It still stands as the most lethal day in American military history.

History records it as a draw, although the Union army stopped an attack by Lee’s 30,000-man army on the U.S. capital. Walking the rolling lands alongside the Potomac River with Matthew Brady’s grisly photographic record in mind a modern visitor would ask how did it come to this slaughter? What issue was so divisive that it led to this?

The issue as seen today was slavery, although the Confederates would say it was states’ rights. From the day the ink dried on the Declaration of Independence the issue of slavery pointed to that day in 1862. Attempts to reconcile the issue of the South’s dependence on slavery produced failed compromises (The Great Compromise of 1787) and the creation of the Republican Party.

It all failed. The reason? For 75 years, the two sides divorced themselves from one another, demonizing and distancing in escalating rhetoric and political corruption. With the election of Abraham Lincoln, an abolition-sympathetic Republican, war was on. Before it ended in 1865 there were 828,000 Union casualties while the South experienced 864,000 casualties. There were almost a million civilians and free slaves left dead as well.

This ominous historical note is relevant today as the two sides in the American and Canadian debate slide inexorably toward a schism. With a presidential election this November and a Canadian federal election likely next year, the sides have given up on policy. Oh, they still make a show of plans for the economy. Or housing. Or the military.

But the real battlefield is the war on information. Who will be censored? Who will write history? As a picture of intolerance it has reached DefCon 4. No better example exists than the hissy-fit from employees of the NBC News department at the attempt to hire Rona McDaniel, former RNC chairwoman as an employee. The sanctimonious stars of NBC and MSNBC news— several of them Obama-era employees or Democratic fundraisers— launched a collective insurrection against the hire, saying McDaniel was a purveyor of lies and disinformation in the service of Beelzebub aka Donald Trump.

Never mind that Racial Maddow and Joyless Reid and Chuckles Todd spent the past eight years carrying water for Hillary Clinton’s demented RussiaGate and Hunter Biden’s laptop hoax. Former Republican Joe Scarborough spoke of the “sacred trust” with viewers as grounds for forcing NBC to fire McDaniel after about 48 hours.

No one is now allowed to pollute the minds of Morning Joe viewers. A narrative is a narrative, and no niece of Mitt Romney is getting in the way of that carefully crafted line as we head to November. Trump World is a cesspool of Nazis and enemies of democracy, and they’re going to play that card.

Viewers of last Sunday’s 60 Minutes saw a more subtle version of demonizing the other. In the fusty Tiffany Network style they introduced  Kate Starbird, a professor at the University of Washington and a leader of a “misinformation research group” created ahead of the 2020 election. Who gave her that title is left to the listeners’ imagination.

Naturally Ms. Starbird did a hit job on Jim Jordan and the GOP. Naturally, 60 Minutes neglected to mention Starboard is a longtime Democrat donor and foot soldier in the 2024 Biden Army. Naturally, the divide was widened further. The effect was achieved. Anyone voting Trump is a dedicated Nazi.

It will only ramp up from here because, with no successes to brag about and Biden’s polls plunging, fear is king. (Adding Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to siphon left-wing votes is another threat.) They know Biden is a millstone in efforts to eradicate Trump. And 40 percent of the U.S. population thinks this is reality, much the way the opposing sides at Antietam saw the devil across the Bloody Ditch and Antietam Bridge.

The federal Liberals in Canada have been paying attention. With polls that even Biden would faint over, Justin Trudeau is ramping up the disinformation dodge with the same fervour as the MSNBC fainting goats. Skippy has added a little Russian sauce to his equation, claiming that Putin has Conservative leader Pierre Polievre in his control, manipulating the public to abandon Ukraine.

How Ukraine figures in Canada’s national interest isn’t explained, but if Canadians elect the Tories next year Western society will collapse, pace Trudeau. The PM’s lightweight posse is jumping in, too. Deputy PM Chrystia Freeland, who applauds Nazis in Parliament, is predicting a bleak future for the country unless the evil-thinkers to the Right are brought under control.

Hence Bill-63, the Liberal/ NDP diktat to criminalize WrongThink on the internet and what’s left on the traditional media. Not only in the run-up to what may be the Waterloo for Trudeau and NDP fashion model Jagmeet Singh. Freeland’s bill gives faceless bureaucrats the right to criminalize future behaviour as well. Holy Karnak!

There will be many attempts to pretend that permanently silencing the opponent is not the key issue of 2024-2025. Don’t believe them. People who just a few years ago laughed at the images of Mao’s purges in the Cultural Revolution now have succumbed to a new Little Red Book. They praise their heroes Obama and Clinton and demand jail for Trump. Hyperbole is dead. Big Brother killed him.

circa 1970: Chinese Red Guards reading from the little red book of Thoughts of Chairman Mao before starting their day. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster  A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada’s top television sports broadcaster, he’s a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. Inexact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History, his new book with his son Evan, was voted the seventh-best professional hockey book of all time by bookauthority.org . His 2004 book Money Players was voted sixth best on the same list, and is available via brucedowbigginbooks.ca.

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Frontier Centre for Public Policy

Trudeau ‘finished what his father started’ driving Canada into failing freefall

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From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy

By Linda Slobodian

In 2015 Prime Minister Justin Trudeau scorned Canada — a country that afforded him so much, yet to which he had contributed nothing of notable significance. His disdain for those on whose backs Canada was built was clear. History and European national origins had to be blotted out.

Canada was a “post-national” nation with “no core identity,” he arrogantly told the New York Times. The reckless socialist ideology he spat out was an omen of the division, fear and attack on so-called privileged (white) Canadians that hit like a storm. It hovers over us like a choking toxic cloud.

If Trudeau’s vision was a Canada “completely splintered,” with Quebec a nation unto itself “separate and distinct,” English-speaking provinces “fractured into oblivion” and breaking up our “common culture” — then mission accomplished.

“He’s finished what his father started,” said Lt. Col. Dave Redman (ret’d), who served 27 years with the Canadian Armed Forces and headed Alberta’s Emergency Management Agency.

The Trudeau concept of a post-national state is “dangerous and misleading.”

“It implies that democratically elected national governments are no longer relevant.”

Redman explained Canada’s “shifting socio-political landscape” with powerful clarity in Canada 2024: A Confident Resilient Nation or a Fearful Fracture Country? in the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.

Canadians know something has gone terribly wrong beyond mounting financial struggles and trampled rights. Our nation’s rife with “apologies and internal divisions,” said Redman.

“Confidence has been turned into fear and shame. Canada has become irrelevant on the world stage.”

Canada’s in a “failing” freefall.

“Why will no one invest economically in Canada? Why are people leaving Canada? Why are people not believing that Canada has a future? Why are our allies ignoring us and holding us in disdain? Because we are a threat to their national security because China can get to them through us.”

Canada’s at a “critical juncture.” Until politicians and Canadians unite with common values and defended borders —necessary for a successful nation — Canada will be “stumbling from one crisis to another.”

Until Canadians hold them to account, politicians will fixate on minor “wedge” issues — such as diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) — to divert attention from critical national concerns they want us to ignore.

Convincing people to feel bad about themselves makes it easier to manipulate guilt and usher in destructive, ideological programs with obscene price tags.

Canada must foster national pride, prioritize national interests and protect national security to secure its future, said Redman.

“A nation is successful when a group of people live in one country with defended borders and share common values, even if they vary in cultures and languages.”

Redman’s six-point framework for national interests includes unity, national security, good governance, protection of rights and freedoms, economic prosperity and growth and personal and community well-being. He offers strategies on how to achieve these critical objectives.

“I believe the current sitting government truly does believe that the World Economic Forum’s concepts and ideals of post-national states is what Canada should be and they have started it.”

“I believe the current government of Canada is intentionally walking each of those six national interests away from Canada in a way that will allow Canada to become part of a broken world.”

It’s up to Canadians to decide what direction we head in.

“The reason I wrote this paper was to make people think about our country in a 20-to-25-year vision. And not let the current government which loves to use divisive, tactical issues to destroy the larger picture conversation. And in doing so, destroy our economy, destroy our unity, destroy our national security by focussing on tactical issues,” said Redman.

A vision for Canada involves citizens who are optimistic about the future, have self-respect to follow through on their ideas, and courage to stand up for their culture and ideals, he said.

Trudeau and his band of self-serving renegades unleashed an ideological curse on Canada.

But we let them.

Then COVID-19 demonstrated how quickly rights and freedoms “can be trampled on, eviscerated and dismissed.”

For a glorious moment in time Freedom Convoy truckers rejuvenated Canadian pride, united Canadians and emboldened us to fight for freedom. Peaceful protesters who waved the Canadian flag were punished.

Yet the silence is deafening as people who despise Canada’s core identity — yes, Trudeau, we have one — hijack our nation and our children’s future.

Redman points to “diaspora marching routinely in the streets of our cities supporting illegal terrorist organizations demanding the death of both citizens here and abroad.”

They wave flags but never the Maple Leaf. They support other countries “but do not march for Canada.”

“Unity is the core value for a country. A cultural unity is based on common shared ethics, values and beliefs. People wishing to become citizens of a country must understand these principles of belief and join the country because they wish for the same to be the foundation of their daily lives.”

“Many who come to a country, not wishing to join the cultural unity of that country, are enemies, intentional or otherwise, who work to erode or destroy this unity.”

Immigration is part of national security.

“You’re pouring people into our country who do not share our ethics and values. And you’re doing it intentionally. That will destroy unity and while it’s destroying unity it will destroy economic prosperity and growth.”

“Our police and courts take no action or in fact support these illegal acts.”

“Our current federal government, many of our provincial territorial governments and our municipal governments stand silently by, or in some cases support the destruction of our values, laws and national interests.”
Redman said the question is, what do Canadians want Canada to be? Will we stand up and root out infectious ideology? Is it too late?

“My paper is about how to overcome what’s happened. It’s happened, we can’t change that. But it’s how to get politicians and Canadians to change how they think about our country. And to have a process to put in place, a vision for our country and have elected officials explain what they see the vision to be. Canadians can make a choice between visions.”

Citizens, academia, public and private sector organizations, unions, religious and non-religious groups need to get involved to break down national interests into “clear and attainable objectives.”

Politicians must explain what unity and democracy means to them. That’s not happening.

Many Canadians are pinning hopes on Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre forming the next federal government.

“My line to Poilievre is I understand his tactical four bullet plan you know that inflation’s up, the cost of living’s up, that housing’s bad and people need more money in their pocket.”

“I get it. He’s beating that drum over and over. But we’ve got a year before the election, he needs to start talking about his vision for Canada.”

Canada was once internationally respected, trusted and consulted. Now we are pitied by shocked outsiders witnessing woke ideology and crushed free speech forced upon us.

“We’ve been taught to be ashamed of our history instead of proud of it, or even to learn from it.”

“We have completely shattered democratic institutions. Our election system is in question. Our legislatures are in turmoil, our courts, our schools, our medical system. The mainstream media is completely partisan. Our economy is broken. People can’t meet bills at the end of the month and we’re ignored and shunned by our allies.”

Redman addressed good governance, offering guidelines on how to “strengthen and preserve the democratic way of life in Canada.”

“Good governance to me means defence of democracy, where in other countries it can mean absolute control of a totalitarian government.”

Redman’s suggestions to stop Canada from being completely “shattered” include a 100% immigration policy review; halting funding to universities that are “domestic threats” and removing Marxists professors; establishing a monitored election process; and ending government-funded media.

Agencies that counter external threats must be “equipped to work individually and cooperatively, with each other and our allies.”

Stop foreign aid that counters our interests and national security.

“While Canadians are challenged to put food on the table and to have a house, they watch as the federal government sends hundreds of millions of dollars to international organizations and specific countries that do not share our democratic aims or our national interests.”

There must be “a wall of people hitting” politicians telling them to listen or face defeat.

“In 25 years will Canada be a democracy? Or will it become a country led by an authoritarian government that uses fear and threats to remove imaginary risks from the daily lives of Canadians who have lost their self-respect and courage?”

Look at what eight years did.

First published here.

Linda Slobodian is the Senior Manitoba Columnist for the Western Standard based out of Winnipeg. She has been an investigative columnist for the Calgary Herald, Calgary Sun, Edmonton Sun, and Alberta Report.

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