Sure looks that way.

After the weekend Ontario NDP convention – wherein leader Andrea Horwath was mightily embarrassed by a pro-election resolution put forward by union boss Sid Ryan – I’d say the odds just went up dramatically. Ryan is pushing for an election, and his resolution passed. Horwath isn’t in control so much, anymore.

We don’t want an election, but we’re ready for one. If it happens, we will remind voters that (a) the Ontario PCs promised to vote against the budget before they’d even read it and (b) the Ontario NDs are promising to vote against the budget unless they get their billion-dollar ransom note demands met.

Ontario doesn’t need or want an election just a few months after the last one. If it happens, we’re going to make Hudak and Horwath wear it. And I believe we will win a majority, too.

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Danielle Smith stood by her candidate: “Every single political party has people with strong religious views.

“As long as they keep that in their personal lives, and don’t anticipate that there’s going to be legislation on that, I don’t believe we’re doing anything different than other political parties.”

When asked if there were personal opinions that were beyond the pale for the party, Smith did not directly answer the question, wrote reporter James Woods.

“Look at our party platform,” Smith said. “The things that we focus on are the things on which we agree.

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CALGARY — Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith entered the final week of the campaign defending controversial comments decrying homosexuality and public schools posted by an Edmonton candidate on his blog.

Edmonton-Southwest candidate and pastor Allan Hunsperger posted a rant on his blog last June, using Lady Gaga’s hit song, Born This Way, to blast the Edmonton public school division’s policy of accepting students for who they are.

“Sounds great at first except nobody is mentioning what the results will be of living the way you were born,” read the post, which has since been removed, with a statement from Hunsperger addressing the issue.

“You see, you can live the way you were born, and if you die the way you were born then you will suffer the rest of eternity in the lake of fire, hell, a place of eternal suffering,”

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I’m no longer a person! I’m a concept!

Cool. My billable rate just went up. Thanks, Pete!

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Mr. Tulk was warned, and he’s now banned from this site.

Bye-bye, Gord. Find a new sandbox. I suspect you won’t be missed by others.

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People who don’t live in Alberta should be paying attention to the Alberta election. And not simply because it may be historic, signaling the end of a 40-year political dynasty.
It’s historic, and worthy of your consideration, because Alberta is on the cusp of plunging itself into a divisive, needless debate, one that could spill over into other provinces.

The debate centres on some of the most difficult issues of our era: Reproductive choice for women, equal marriage for gays and lesbians, the wall that exists (supposedly) between church and state.
Alberta Wildrose leader Danielle Smith wants to tear down that wall, although she would never be so impolitic as to say so out loud. When a microphone is pointed in her direction, the frontrunner in the Alberta election insists she doesn’t want to defund abortion.

She claims she doesn’t want to stop gay marriages. She will say, with a straight face, that she wants to keep religion out of politics.

But here’s the thing: Smith — who, with her background in TV journalism, knows how to lull voters to sleep — isn’t telling the truth. She’s lying, in fact. She’s trying to have it both ways.

Here are some of the things that Smith said before Wildrose existed, and before she became its leader. She was a lot more candid, back then.

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SFH and Bjorn are going to lose their shit over this.  Godlike genius. Sent by Mraz, via some anonymous person who told him to give it to me.  Now, I give it to you.  It will change your life.

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[Son Two has just been picked up by Dad from a sleepover at a pal’s. He’s asked how it went.]

Son, wearily: Dad, it was a party.

Me: You actually look like you did some partying, to tell you the truth.

Son, bemused: Dad, I am the party.

Me, marveling: Wow. Are you a Kinsella male or what?

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Q: What is Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath’s leadership?

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Her Majesty makes it official.

I was there, that cold April day – with my roommates Harold, Chris and Ryan. Afterwards, we went to Grad’s on Somerset to have what we described as “Constitution beers.” We had not a few, as I recall.

I also recall that we grumbled about the number of old white men onstage on the Hill, and how seats were reserved at the front for VIPs. We thought of the Constitution as the people’s document, not the personal property of the elites. But, in the main – and like everyone else on that blustery Ottawa day – we were happy. It felt like we were a new country.

In the intervening years, of course, quite a few other Canadians have come to be fond of our Charter of Rights and Freedoms, too. Polls have shown that Canadians, everywhere, are proud of it.  Twenty years after that day, a national survey found that 88 per cent believed the Charter was a “good thing for Canada,” and 72 per cent said it adequately protects the rights of Canadians. Support for the Charter was strong in all regions, running from a high of 91 per cent in Quebec to 86 per cent in Western Canada.

Thirty years later, support for the repatriation of the Cosntitution – and the proclamation of the Charter – remains just as high.  Even with the mythology surrounding “the night of long knives,” Quebeckers remain enthusiastically onside.

Because they despise the notion of equality which it embodies, Stephen Harper’s Reformatories refuse to acknowledge the Constitution.  The New Democrats, meanwhile, have their Sherbrooke Declaration, which advocates for breaking up Canada with just one vote, contrary to a hallowed Supreme Court constitutional decision – and a new leader who passionately favours “asymmetrical federalism,” and constitutional inequality, and the Sherbrooke Declaration. 

In the United States, political parties jostle to be seen as the defenders of the Constitution.  To them, it is the supreme legislative expression of the nation itself. In Canada, the two (presently) leading federal parties regard it as inconvenience, or worse.

For Liberals – who repatriated the Constitution, and proclaimed the Charter – the path is clear: we need to renew ourselves as the party of the party of the Constitution.  Politically, it is the smart thing to do.

And, morally, it is our obligation.

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