Our glorious and beloved Premier has been speaking in public again... (from the Vancouver Sun)Can Canada's oilsands save the U.S. Republicans from defeat this fall in mid-term congressional elections?And Cheney's response?
Alberta Premier Ralph Klein thinks so and said as much during a private meeting Wednesday with U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney.
In a bid to persuade Cheney to visit northern Alberta's oilfields this fall, Klein told him a high-profile trip would help Republicans win votes from Americans worried about buying oil from unstable countries in the Middle East.
Klein's unusual venture into U.S. election-year politics he called Alberta Canada's only Republican ''red'' province came amid separate appeals for a joint Canada-U.S. energy task force to help accelerate Canadian exports of oil.
''It might be good for American politics, and for the Republican party in the U.S., for the vice-president to visit,'' Klein said following a 30-minute meeting with Cheney in his West Wing office at the White House.
''It would be politically wise for him to travel to the oilsands.''
According to Klein, Cheney ''said that he would try'' to reschedule.Calling Alberta Canada's "only Republican red province" is flawed in many different ways - calling Alberta Canada's more conservative province is quite more accurate.
In Michael Adams' "Fire and Ice: The United States, Canada, and the Myth of Converging Values," social additude survey's taken in all of North America's regions found that attitudes and values held by Albertans were less traditional and more "liberal" than the United States most "liberal" region - New England - suggesting that though Alberta is Canada's more conservative province it is far from being a "Republican red province."
I would predict that if (*heaven forbid*) Alberta were an American state, we'd probably float between moderate Republican and Democratic governments (as opposed to the type of hardcore Christian social conservative Republicans documented in Thomas Frank's "What's the Matter with Kansas").
As for Dick Cheney's junket to Fort McMurray helping the Republicans in November's mid-term elections, I don't think most Americans would even care (not that it's likely the Democrats will actually take back the Senate in November 2006 - see the Swing State Project).
I agree that it's completely ridiculous to suggest that Alberta is a "red state". While Bush might get a good share of the votes in some communities in Southern Alberta, I highly doubt that his brand of theological, far-right social conservative and corrupt politics would sell in Edmonton, suburban Edmonton, or even Calgary. It's also hard to imagine places like Medicine Hat, Lethbridge, and Fort McMurray embracing the Iraq War. I'm sure even broad swaths of rural Alberta would be reluctant to vote for anyone who supports a completely insurance industry-dominated private healthcare sector.
ReplyDeleteNo, while the Republicans would do their best to give Alberta a go if we were an American state, I highly doubt we'd end up a red state. A swing state, perhaps.
I was thinking of the same book when I watched King Ralph "the Dunce" making those remarks. I too find it a contorted sort of collusion. Funny map by the way!
ReplyDeletewoah woah woah. Klein has to use the threat of "you're not going to win the election unless you come to Alberta"??? Cheney's response is hilarious "he would try"? wow, what a burn. He doesn't give a damn about Klein or his brownnosing disguised as political advice.
ReplyDeleteEmbarassing.
So you think Alberta would be a solid red state?
ReplyDeleteI happen to agree with the sentiments here. Alberta is conservative by Canadian standards, but having travelled to several red states myself, Alberta is pretty liberal when compared to states such as Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, and North Carolina. Edmonton only went conservative federally due to anger over the Liberals it is not even conservative by Canadian standards. Calgary is right wing by Canadian standards but mostly on economic issues as opposed to moral issues. Rural Alberta is really the only part of Alberta that is similiar to the Red States. In fact all polls taken during the 2004 US election show Kerry would have taken all ten provinces. It is true Bush would have taken Alberta in 2000, but not 2004.
ReplyDeleteEven in 2000, Bush was dead even with Gore in Alberta, if I recall.
ReplyDeletePeople just didn't know how awful Bush was back in 2000.