My latest Calgary Herald column looks at Ted Morton's vision of uniting Alberta's right, and argues why that should not happen:
...In his surreal resignation/ campaign launch news conference last week, Morton made it apparent that his focus will be ensuring that the Tories once again enjoy a monopoly on the right of the Alberta political spectrum.
In referring to the Wildrose Alliance, Morton argued that what the two have in common is more important than the differences. Morton then urged Wildrose supporters to return to the PC mother ship.
Wildrose Alliance Leader Danielle Smith dismissed Morton's vision as "delusional," and in a subsequent news release, declared that "swapping out the PC leader won't change the fact that this is a government on its last legs." That same news release, however, also acknowledged that many Wildrose Alliance members "were PC supporters and even PC MLAs" and that they had left because "this government stopped listening to Albertans."
In a way, that bolsters the mother ship argument. It further implies that a change in direction could lure back some disaffected Tories.
But even if the possibility exists that the right could be reunited under a Morton-led Progressive Conservative party, there's the separate question of whether it ought to be. For many reasons, the answer should be no.
First, it is very self-serving. What better way to ensure the Tory dynasty survives than by neutralizing your biggest threat?
It's been a very long time since the Alberta Tories have had to face the possibility of losing the next election. There's no reason to absolve them of that fear. As we've seen, without such fear, there exists a fair amount of arrogance.
Second, this is not federal politics. Morton would have conservatives believe that the real danger lies in a potential Liberal victory. But one only has to look at the byelection in Calgary-Glenmore to see how weak the vote splitting argument is.
Moreover, it's hard to see how dramatically different Alberta would have been under Kevin Taft as premier than it was under Ed Stelmach. One would expect a Liberal government to govern from the centre if it wanted to survive in right-of-centre Alberta.
Regardless, the prospect of a Liberal government is remote enough that there's really no reason for any small-c conservatives to lose sleep over the matter.
Third, what exactly are these conservative policies that are imperilled without a return to the mother ship? Morton might be the champion of smaller budgets and Bill 44 (that gives parents the right to pull their children out of class when lessons on religion, sexual orientation or sex are being taught), but that's pretty thin gruel. To begin with, Bill 44 was an atrocious piece of legislation. It may have appealed to some social conservatives, but it's a pretty lousy beacon for the mother ship.
Morton also overlooks or underestimates the anger over other legislation, such as Bill 19, the Land Assembly Project Area Act and Bill 50, a piece of legislation that passed in November 2009, that removes the requirement for public hearings on new power lines. In many ways -- some more than others -- Morton is tied to the decisions of the past four years.
Another major part of the appeal of the Wildrose Alliance is its belief in direct democracy. In all their years of governing, the Alberta Tories have never shown an appetite for such reform, and it's hard to see how they can convincingly make what at this point would seem like a deathbed conversion.
It may well be that under this next leader, the Alberta Progressive Conservative mother ship will return to the political stratosphere. For now, Alberta politics are well served by the threat posed to the Tory dynasty by parties on both the right and left.
Uniting the right suits the Tories just fine, but offers little benefit to anyone else.
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