Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
Your not going to change public perception when you have Notley jetting off for NDP fundraisers in Ontario to support a party that is anti-oilsands and anti-pipeline.
you are not going to change public perception when you go to Quebec and basically drop to your knees, give them a veto and tell them that Alberta is a dirty province with a bad environmental record.
You're not going to change public perception when Quebec files a court injunction that goes against the constitution of this country and you just basically shrug your shoulders and melt.
You stand up and very loudly sell this pipeline as a safer alternative and that you as premiere fully and completely and loudly support it. You support your industry loudly and from the top of a soap box. You don't mumble and stand by quietly.
When BC takes a shot at you, you tell them to shut their lying mouths. When Quebec mouths off tell them to come back when they live up to the standards that they want you to live up and then tell them to shut their mouths.
Every week you get on the phone with the prime minister and ask him the question. Have you set the deadline date for the review, and will your office support it when its approved. then you tell him to shut his mouth and get you some tang.
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Okay, well I thought you were referring to the federal Liberals, but with regards to Notley I think she's actually playing it right, I'm just not willing to give her any credit for doing it intentionally because I think it's more incompetence than strategy. Going all Brad Wall on this is exactly what you don't want to do. It might play well with Albertans and Saskatchewanites, but take a pulse of the rest of Canada and it's not moving the needle. If anything it's creating more division and intransigence on the issue.
Like it or not Alberta is bargaining from a position of weakness. Now, I don't know what political/negotiation strategies you're familiar, but most of the ones I'm familiar with would not advise antagonizing the people in the stronger position at the bargaining table. If Notley were to go all Brad Wall, get on her soapbox and basically antagonize the other provinces, all it would likely do would further damage the cause. The last thing Alberta wants is for more sentiment to go against pipelines to the point where they become an issue that none of the federal parties want to touch because it's going to cost them seats in every province but the prairies.
Again, I get that people are hurting, but with regards to Trudeau you can't seriously expect the guy to risk his chances for re-election to appease one province. I mean it'd be nice if politicians were more principled than opportunistic but that's just not the reality of the situation. Political parties and politicians in this country aren't in the business of running the country, they're in the business of getting elected. If the crowd here is generally against idealism when it comes to policies, then it absolutely shouldn't expect it in politics.
So yeah, the delay is absolutely a move to rebuild political capital surrounding the issue. Will it work? Who knows, but we do know that the approach the federal and provincial Conservatives took for the past 10 years definitely wasn't working, so an alternative was really the only legitimate option.