Juno News - An authentic politician in Canada？

00:00:00.000 I think there's one very noteworthy takeaway about Danielle Smith's rise to power as the new

00:00:05.340 Premier of Alberta, and that is her consistency. It's incredibly rare, unfortunately, in Canadian

00:00:11.780 politics, and it's quite refreshing to see it from her. Allow me to explain. So back when the UCP

00:00:17.560 leadership race first commenced, Smith was a guest on my former podcast, and I asked her right out of

00:00:23.000 the gate, okay, why are you running to be Premier of Alberta? She said there were two things, two

00:00:27.140 driving things that was motivating her to run. One was she wanted to make sure that she could be in

00:00:32.380 office so there would be somebody to say, no more COVID restrictions at all. Over. It's done. And

00:00:38.320 number two, she wanted to make sure Alberta got a fair shake in its dealings with the federal government

00:00:43.220 because it wasn't happening, and she would be the one to stand there and say, no more. Well, guess

00:00:49.040 what? She said that at the very beginning of the race. She kept saying it throughout the race. She

00:00:53.720 won. She became the Premier. She gets into office, and so much of what she has done has actually been

00:00:59.180 consistent with those two themes. So much of it has circled around those. She has said that we're not

00:01:05.140 going to be accepting from the federal government any edicts that are not consistent with Alberta's

00:01:09.320 best interests. She has apologized to the unvaccinated for all of the various restrictions

00:01:14.580 that they face. She said controversially that the unvaccinated were the most discriminated in

00:01:19.360 recent history. I'm not sure why it was that controversial. I appreciate that made people

00:01:23.200 unhappy, uncomfortable, but factually speaking, it's just kind of like a correct statement.

00:01:28.360 These things, though, leading themes, she stuck with them from beginning to end. And you're saying,

00:01:33.820 okay, Fury, how is this particularly noteworthy? It's noteworthy because think about it. It's

00:01:38.320 exceedingly rare. That's actually not how Canadian politics operates at all. Grassroots activists know

00:01:44.700 they have been so burned because they have someone who runs for office, runs into leadership, says,

00:01:49.960 I'm going to be just like this. I'm going to stand for X, Y, Z. And then the months pass by,

00:01:54.280 you get to the point where they're in office, they're in the position, and you're like, who is

00:01:57.840 this person? This person is not at all like what I thought I was getting. A lot of people say that

00:02:02.620 about Ontario Premier Doug Ford. I think this is such an interesting, instructive pathway for

00:02:09.000 conservative politicians in Canada, for politicians, I guess, of any political perspective,

00:02:13.980 liberal NDP, the idea of being consistent, being authentic, and how maybe that's just the better

00:02:20.540 pathway into electoral politics in the first place. Daniel Smith, an incredible breath of fresh air

00:02:27.380 for saying, this is what I believe in, vote for me if you agree with me, gets into office,

00:02:33.300 and actually follows through. Hats off to an authentic politician.

00:02:43.980 Thank you very much.

00:02:51.500 Thank you very much.

00:02:56.420 Thank you very much.

00:03:02.520 Thank you very much.

Juno News - October 31, 2022