Ken MacDougall
Submitted
I watched everyone go nuts at the Northern Lights Casino Wednesday night, as the TORONTO Blue Jays – you know, that baseball team from “The Big Smoke”, drew ever closer to becoming World Series champions again after 32 years of waiting, winning that game by a 6 – 1 score and going ahead 3 games to 2 in this best of 7 contest. What was equally pleasing was watching a 22-year-old pitcher, Trey Yesavage, strike out all nine in the batting order at least once, finishing with a record 12 strikeouts for a rookie, and NO “walks”, another record.
All right, who’s going to be the first one to ask me how this “relates” to Alberta’s obvious (to me, at least) gambling problem? Come on, now; isn’t it obvious that THIS is CANADA’s TEAM? I know that when my wife sits down with me to watch the game instead of going to Bingo, this is a team that’s caught the hearts and minds of the nation – and that INCLUDES Albertans, a few of whom were part of the 52,000-plus attending the game and hanging around afterwards watching Hazel Mae interviewing player after player commenting upon how not only how calm this rookie was on the mound, even as they relished the fact that the eventual winner of the Series will have to claim the title on Canadian soil – that of THEIR city and THEIR nation.
This is a form of praise Canadians have come to expect from a world that has always seen this nation pragmatically engaged in world affairs, ready, willing and able to lend its hand in a positive manner in order to make this world a better place. A majority of the Blue Jays are American citizens (Vlady is a “Canadian” – sort of), including George Springer, the one person who perpetually references Canada as being “OUR nation” – and NOT in the manner of interpretation one could expect of Donald Trump in us being “the 51st state. It’s also an important distinction in that in a sport that unlike hockey is not known for its violent nature (profanity, possibly…), although Yesavage’s parents, family and girlfriend, ALL of whom are American citizens, were abusively harassed by some New York Yankee “fans” after Trey had done a Dodger-style “number” on Yankee batters, striking out 11 while thumping “America’s team” 13 – 7 on Oct. 5.
So, here’s a question I’ve wanted to hear an answer for ever since my father was posted to Germany in the late 195 as part of Canada’s military commitment to a frontline presence along the Iron Curtain: WHY do Canadians or their politicians (in this case it was Lester Pearson, winner of a Nobel Peace Prize in 1957 for organizing the United Nations Emergency Force to resolve the Suez Crisis), receive more favourable ratings outside our borders than in Canada itself?
What has retriggered my interest in having that question answered was by watching the news coverage on Oct. 25 of allegedly “thousands” of Albertans staging a demonstration in Edmonton advocating for a separation of Alberta from Canada. The crowd “looked normal”, save for its “whiteness”, with some hugging their kids even as they waved flags and listened to the speeches by the rally’s organizers advocate for this cause – people worried about mortgages, grocery prices and the threat to their jobs being threatened by Trump’s ever-changing tariffs, companies looking to trim manpower and “increase productivity” by moving rapidly towards artificial intelligence (AI) powered manufacturing and computerization of their organizations – you know, just like everyone else you know and have conversations about these very same matters?
Approximately 25 per cent of Albertans support this cause, and yet it took mere weeks for organizers to find almost a half million voters willing to sign a petition favouring their choice to remain part of this nation. It should then come as no surprise that Premier Danielle Smith, seriously “disappointed” that Canada again has a Liberal government, albeit in a minority of sorts, instead of one led by a potential Prime Minister of Hate, Pierre Poilievre, has gone out of her way to provide oxygen to this fiery cause, and claims its popularity at the moment is “coincidental” – a political euphemism, if ever there was one.
What was even more disturbing was the comments being uttered before press cameras coming from people in support of such a venture stating positions that bordered on the comical. One woman, for instance, expressed a “disgust” for Alberta having to prop up Canada’s economy by application of our Equalization Formula, and the feds not contributing funds to “help Alberta to again prosper”.
What such comments do is momentarily stop anyone who’s listening to the topic of debate truly examine the economic state of the province itself. Even before that government can begin to produce a budget, it has to be reasonably assured that it will receive at LEAST $4 billion in royalties, or else it will end up being just another deficit to worry about. As for anything else, since the passage of Peter Lougheed as their premier, successive premiers treat royalty money as their own pocket change, all too eager to let Alberta voters know that these funds, in Lougheed’s term headed for the Heritage Fund, are much better utilized convincing them that voters’ interests are paramount in their hearts.
In effect, then, Alberta’s UCP pols have become nothing more than gamblers with their province’s faith. They have no backup savings plan as does Norway ($1 trillion and counting in their heritage bank), only a vague expectation based upon past performances that $4 billion in royalties will arrive on schedule, have no idea as to what will happen within their farming communities as tariff issues start to trouble rural communities, face demands by Big Oil to cut back royalties, all while their health care and educational systems deteriorate and are in need of restructuring and upgrading.
Big Oil, in the meantime, knows that no one south of the 49th parallel will be building new pipelines any time in the near future to supplement Justin Trudeau’s original offer to Notley – all while Trump imposes his tariffs, takes a 10 per cent “vig” on the price of a barrel of crude because most of it is being “bought” by American refineries that increase profits shipping refined goods back to Canada – goods that could have been Made in Canada, had Alberta accepted Papa Trudeau’s National Energy Program back when Albertans weren’t as likely to go broke once their supply of cheap resources finally evaporates.
Damn them Liberals, anyway…
