Last week I took a day off jumped in a plane with Jimmy “The Jet” Mackinnon and ventured north to Fort McMurray. Our trip wasn’t without purpose — we were on a political mission, to deliver Ted Morton to the Alberta PC Leadership debate up in the far north. Of course the other contestants and their entourages were on hand for what as a well organized, well attended event.
Now everyone who knows me understands I back Morton 100 per cent, lots of reasons why George Groeneveld and I support him, but mostly because we know Ted is most like us. I won’t go into anymore depth, but I want to look at the other candidates in the race. It was my first time to see them up close and mix and mingle with their people as well.
I have to admit I was impressed with Doug Griffiths and his stage presence, I don’t think it’s his time yet but he obviously will have a future in Alberta politics. Doug has a bunch of daring new ideas, like hiking taxes so Education can have more money, which I have a little trouble with. He is considered a blue conservative and I can tell he has a deep commitment to Alberta. Doug is far from the status quo and the establishment, which I find refreshing.
Allison Redford, to me, is the most interesting of the other candidates. She is well spoken, and has a very good understanding of what is going on here in Alberta. Some view her as a red Tory and this may be true. However, I see her as more of a moderate with a spine. I was impressed with her tenure as the Minister of Justice and I quite liked her tough stance on law and order. I think the thing I like most about Allison is her stand on party renewal and changing the way the PC Party does things.
Doug Horner is another strong speaker and is good at the mike. I guess my challenge with him is his obsession with the Stelmach era. He contends Eddie never should have quit and they were just about to turn things around as a government. Doug is proud to be progressive and that is warm and fuzzy; he doesn’t like words like hard right, or Republican, and he doesn’t like making dollars a priority... sound familiar? So at this point he is simply the Stelmach era candidate.
I also experienced the Gary Mar campaign first hand. It comes complete with banners that would cover up the side of a prairie elevator, a tour bus with his picture all over it, and free food and drinks after the debate, a splashy campaign. It is of course reminiscent of the Jim Dinning adventure last time, he also has a large amount of MLA’s lining up behind him chomping at the bit for a cabinet position. Gary is smart, and extremely smooth, he manages to sidestep many questions, and he looks like he is just trying to not lose the race. Of course, Gary has been under fire lately for going back on his promise not to take a salary in Washington, after his MLA pension was paid out. Also the Kelley Charlebois issue is coming around again where he paid his former aid almost half a million dollars for verbal advice without work product — that little problem kept Gary out of the race last time. He is what I would call the old boys/establishment candidate.
There are obviously many aspects to each particular campaign, red Tory, blue Tory, establishment, or non-establishment. To me the most important of these is to look to a new group that has not been in the party for 20 years to renew it. Ralph Klein knew it had to be done and was working on it before he was moved out.
I hope that members of the PC Party look to renewal and not the status quo in the upcoming leadership vote as well.