Smith fights fires while Notley goes negative
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Summary
In this week's special edition of The Alberta Roundup, host Rachel Eichenauer is joined by Evan Menzies, former Director of Communications for the United Conservative Party, Chris Sims, the Alberta Director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, and Erica Brodies, a senior advisor on the UCP campaign, to discuss the devastating wildfires that have ravaged the province over the past week.
Transcript
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Hey everyone, welcome back to the Alberta Roundup.
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That's a special edition of the Alberta Roundup in which we focus solely on the Alberta election
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This week, I am once again joined by Evan Menzies.
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He's a political campaign strategist at Crestview Strategies, and he's also the former director
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of communications for the United Conservative Party.
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We're also again joined by Chris Sims, the Alberta director of the Canadian Taxpayers
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And this week, a new addition to the show, we're joined by Erica Brodies, a senior advisor
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So last week when we started, the wildfire crisis was really just emerging.
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And that kind of broke out on Saturday to the point where Danielle Smith essentially
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took a step back from her campaign for about three days, really, to deal with the crisis.
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We didn't get a chance to discuss it last week, but I think it's important that we discuss
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it now because it is really shaping this campaign and it's changing the face of it.
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Do you think the wildfire crisis is helping Danielle Smith as she has a chance to present
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herself as a really stable and comfortable and consistent leader?
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Or do you think it's hurting her because it is removing her from the campaign trail so
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Yeah, I think whenever a political leader has a chance to show that they can be, you know,
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statesman-like, stateswoman-like, I should say, it gives a certain glow to the politician.
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In this case, I think, you know, obviously it's a huge tragedy, the amount of Albertans
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who are suffering and dealing with this right now.
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I think Premier Danielle Smith has shown what she's shown since she's become premier, that
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she's a pragmatist, that she listens, that she's responsive, and she's ready to be put
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It's, yeah, you know, Eric is on the call and she can attest to this, but both the UCP
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and NDP certainly didn't have in their election scripts, losing an entire week of announcements
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practically and being able to control that media narrative.
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So I'm interested to see how the campaign set it up here over the final two weeks, because
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yeah, now there's a full week of messaging days that were lost.
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And, you know, we'll see how Albertans respond ultimately.
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Now the leaders have lost a week of the campaign, or at least Danielle Smith did.
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And I expect we're going to see that continuation.
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Danielle Smith described it this week actually as a heat dome.
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So I suspect we're going to see an increase in the wildfires yet again.
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Can you describe some of the thinking that went into how should Danielle Smith respond to
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the wildfires and how much time should she spend on the fires as opposed to actually campaigning?
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Yeah, so to Evan's point, you know, there is an opportunity to show the state's woman that
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she is, but from a campaign perspective, you never want to politicize the horrific events
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So from the campaign side, obviously had to pivot and remove her from campaign centric
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I think that's the biggest priority for anyone that's in government.
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And, you know, she put down the partisanship sides and, you know, briefed the NDP and kept
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And many of the NDP or many of our candidates in those affected areas paused their campaigns.
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You need to focus on, you know, for your first title, which is premier over being the leader
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But now, you know, you saw it the rest of this week where once the fires were starting
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to get, you know, more under control and evacuees could go back home for the most part, focusing
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But as we all know, it's supposed to be a hot weekend again, and that could shift the campaign.
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But I think, you know, to Evan's point, they've done a good job so far.
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But, you know, there's a period where in the next two weeks, it's going to be critical
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to do that balance of what are you going to do for your vision of Alberta and how are
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So while Daniel Smith might not have politicized the fire, we all know Alberta NDP leader Rachel
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Notley did in a press conference on Monday in Calgary.
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Rachel Notley said Daniel Smith was insensitive.
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That was an exact quote because the premier announced her state of emergency on Saturday
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to some UCP supporters at a fundraiser event before announcing it to the general public in
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a general press conference immediately following that fundraiser.
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I had the opportunity to ask her why she thought it was fair to call the premier insensitive
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while she herself was out campaigning in Calgary.
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Rachel Manuel, True Morph, Miss Notley, how is the premier showing insensitivity when you're
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here in Calgary today hosting a campaign event and she's up in Edmonton dealing with the wildfires?
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I believe that we are both continuing to work on the campaign.
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But in the meantime, when it comes to making announcements that impact the victims of the
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wildfires, then that should be done in a political way.
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So is the criticism the premier is receiving for the campaign event she attended over the
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weekend or other campaign events she might choose to hold inappropriate?
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Is it right for her to continue campaigning considering, as you said, we are in an election period?
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My concern is only that she chose to announce the provincial state of emergency to her campaign
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workers before she announced it to the victims, the tens of thousands of victims of the wildfires.
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What do you think of Rachel Notley's decision to continue campaigning?
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And do you think it was right for her to politicize the wildfires and try to make the premier look
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You're in the middle of a provincial campaign for all of the marbles to be able to come premier
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and you have to behave as a premier should be expected to.
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What's interesting is that I got a couple of calls from media outside of Alberta who kind
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of have more of an overview impression and the images that they actually saw were those
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images of premier Smith, Daniel Smith with Rachel Notley.
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Some of those kinds of pictures that look like they're almost at like a cabinet emergency
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Those made a big impression on a lot of media from outside of Alberta.
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And so those looked more stateswoman-like on both of their parts.
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Communications-wise, it's always really tricky.
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How closely do you provide emergency care and encouragement to people being a leader?
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So I guess we'll have to see over the next couple of days how that plays out between these
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But I must say, I got calls from individual people outside of Alberta, both of whom were
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remarking on, whoa, both of those women put down the gauntlet, tools down for a little
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while, and at least did this picture consultation.
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And, you know, it might be true that Notley's comments didn't really get that much media
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Erica, I'm going to go to you next for the partisan response.
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What was the reaction in the war room when Rachel Notley called Danielle Smith insensitive
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after, you know, the premier had sort of reached out an olive branch and sought to include
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Notley in some of those discussions around the wildfire?
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Yeah, I mean, it was just like, this is not the time.
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You want to be premier and this is not premier-esque.
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So, you know, you never want to, we didn't opportunity, you know, use this opportunity
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The campaign decided to stay above it, that we are, you know, kind of creating a divide
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between government business and the politics that are happening.
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But I can say, you know, I don't always love the left media, but when a media individual,
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I think it was Safe Kaiser, came out and asked Rachel Notley, she couldn't even defend it,
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Like she held a press conference where she essentially was going up talking about nothing and she
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I'm always happy when the NDP make significant errors that show who they truly are.
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And it was, I think, exposing Talbertans that it's just distasteful.
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So Danielle Smith was finally able to return to the campaign trail in Calgary on Thursday.
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Otherwise, she's pretty much been up in Edmonton dealing with the wildfire and hosting a couple
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In that very first campaign event of her back in Calgary, we had some protesters disrupt
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Now, for my viewers who haven't seen that, we're going to play that clip for you now.
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Yeah, this is a great opportunity for everybody in the Alberta.
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You got lots to say about this not so long ago.
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It's the Family and Friends event at Shoppers Drug Mart.
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Get 20% off almost all regular-priced merchandise.
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Tuesday, February 24th, and Wednesday, February 25th.
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Certainly a little bit of a goofy protest there.
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We know that the NDP actually advertised the UCP's location of that event, so it's quite
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likely the protesters were able to learn of Premier Smith's location because of that
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She said, you know, the UCP tweeted out their location first, but the war room has told me
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At that announcement, Danielle Smith took the opportunity to announce some cost-saving
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She announced a 25% reduction in medical exam for licenses and camping fees.
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Interestingly, on Monday, Rachel Notley also took the opportunity to announce cost-saving
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measures for seniors, including investments in home care.
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Chris, we're seeing a lot of similarities in the campaign here.
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A lot of focuses on cost-saving measures, tax cuts, as well as public safety.
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We know both Danielle Smith and Rachel Notley have promised to increase officers on the streets
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to deal with the public safety crisis that we're seeing.
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Do you think that this is something that's resonating with voters, or is it kind of maybe
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turning into a little bit of a boring campaign?
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We here at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation like boring campaigns, because that usually
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means that they're not trotting out multi-billion dollar pie-in-the-sky moonbeam ideas.
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And when they're actually focusing on things like reducing fees for seniors and cutting income
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taxes and making sure that we still don't have an Alberta fuel tax, we have the lowest fuel
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taxes in all of Canada here, and it's because we don't have a provincial fuel tax.
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Our folks, our supporters, want to see lower taxes, less waste, and accountable
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And if the parties are promising those things, and it's making for more of a boring campaign,
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Are you surprised to see how much similarities there's been in the campaign so far?
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They want to win Calgary, and they're going to drift closer to the centre, centre-right, and
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they've been pretty clear about making that appeal.
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They see they've been mimicking and copycatting a lot of UCP policies from the budget.
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They've been trying to shield message against claims that they will raise taxes.
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I remember last election and before they became government in 2015, when the carbon tax came
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after the election, despite having no mandate to do so.
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You know, I think for Daniel Smith and the UCP team to have a more boring day-to-day election
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And if the NDP can't get extra steam, extra controversy, whatever else, they, quite frankly,
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in my view, have a bit of a ceiling on their vote count in Calgary right now.
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So they have to scratch and claw for everything.
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For the UCP, their challenge over the next couple of weeks needs to be, while it's boring,
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they also have to figure out a way to get their voters excited to get out and vote at
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So they, you know, can go both ways when you're running a boring campaign process, but yeah,
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they need to figure out a way to remind their voters that a NDP term is something that they
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will not enjoy if Rachel Notley is premier on May 20th.
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Another big story that broke this week that I actually don't think got very much attention
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in the mainstream media whatsoever was the UCP released two letters they sent to Elections
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Alberta requesting investigations into NDP-affiliated unions.
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They are concerned that these unions are breaking elections law.
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And have you received a response from Elections Alberta yet?
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Yeah, so there hasn't been a response that I'm aware of.
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I think we'll be very public in confirming that an investigation, because we think it's
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quite and quite needed during this election campaign, is some of the major big unions,
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a lot that Rachel Notley, you know, directly reports to, have been violating, not releasing
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So we're calling on Elections Alberta to make sure that the voters are aware of exactly who's
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backing the NDP and, you know, that they're following the rules.
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You know, the QP Alberta chapter we've now seen in the second letter to your point was
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So the ATA, these are people that, and our leader, Danielle Smith, has talked about it
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So, you know, you say, well, the NDP always has unions on their side.
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Well, this is actually, like, in their decision-making process as a party.
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So it's completely unfair that they're not being looked into.
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And so we've, that's exactly the purpose of the letter is to ask Elections Alberta to
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promptly look into this and properly investigate.
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So one last thing I wanted to ask you guys something about is something I'm hearing a
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lot about from voters right now is the amount of mud slinging going on in this campaign.
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To be specific, a lot of voters are finding that the Alberta NDP are throwing anything
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they can at Danielle Smith and hoping something will stick.
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They are combing through all of the premier's old podcast appearances, trying to, you know,
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get her out of context, saying something a little bit weird, removing context of her
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discussions to make her look silly or weird, or to try and argue that she is going to say
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privatize healthcare or make you pay for your family doctor.
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I don't believe we've seen this really coming from the UCP towards the NDP.
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Certainly a lot of us in independent media have been pointing out some of these stories
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of the Alberta NDP and some of their candidates also having a bit of a questionable history,
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but we're not seeing that same level of mud slinging from the premier towards Rachel
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Are you guys purposely focusing on positive campaigning?
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Some say the bubbles in an Aero truffle piece can take 34 seconds to melt in your mouth.
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Sometimes the very amount you're stuck at the same red light.
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Yeah, I mean, call it boring, but this is about being government and about running the province
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and talking about things that matter to people, which is the economy, affordability,
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you know, creating opportunities for, you know, for access to healthcare as well as feeling safe.
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Those are the things that we're going to talk about as a United Conservative Party,
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about creating the best lives and livelihood environment that we can in our province.
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And if they want to get dirty because they don't have a plan, let them, right?
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I think that media has done a good job of exposing some of their extreme views.
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And we'll continue to take, you know, the high road to show people that we are the best to manage the economy,
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create opportunity, and also just make sure our fiscal house is in order.
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Do you think it's a missed opportunity for the UCP to not throw back some of that questionable history
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that we're seeing in some of the Alberta candidates?
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Or do you think that this is the better route for them?
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Yeah, I think for the UCP, their job over the next two weeks, again, I referenced it earlier,
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but I do think there is a requirement to remind their voters and folks who are on the fence either way
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that Alberta simply can't afford to go back to an NDP government.
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There's obviously lots of candidate stories that we can go back and forth with,
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but on those macro issues on economy and affordability,
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the NDP mandate in 2015 to 2019 was not a good period for Alberta.
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We saw billions of lost economic investment, increased red tape.
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Albertans given a bit of an edge on the health care file,
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but quite frankly, the UCP term has been much stronger on health care.
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And so I think it's important for the UCP to remind people about that bad record.
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So I think they have to really lean into that over the next couple of weeks.
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She is the leader and she's creating a nice sort of glow around her of not getting into the mud.
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Rachel Notley and the NDP have not hesitated to jump in the mud.
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And I think a lot of Albertans recognize and see that.
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They haven't hesitated in spending a significant amount of ad revenue or ad spending attacking UCP.
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And that can be effective, but it also can leave a bit of a bad taste in voters' mouths.
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So that's what I'll be watching over the next couple of weeks.
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Thank you so much for joining the show today and we'll see you all next week.
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Okay, guys, and before I ended the show, I just wanted to take a minute to do my weekly comment roundup.
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I know we missed it last week, but I really enjoy doing this.
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You guys know that I read through all your comments underneath my show and I love to hear what you think about it.
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And since we're doing something new, I am especially curious to hear what the input is.
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YouTube user Biddy Diddab said, great clarification from a couple of great guests.
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I can't imagine that a thinking population would ever consider Notley for Premier anymore than any Canadian would vote for Trudeau.
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User Robert Carlyle said, why are they not talking about the NDP taking free speech away from Albertans like Bill C-11?
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And something that I also want to note to you guys is that I'm having a really hard time getting access to Alberta NDP events.
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They won't send their campaign events to True North.
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And sometimes they don't even let me ask a question at the event.
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In fact, in that very first clip at the beginning of the show, if you're wondering why I'm yelling,
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it's because the NDP communication staffer would not hand me the mic to ask a question.
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After they got through all the legacy media journalists,
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they decided to turn to the phones and not take any more questions from the room,
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even though it was just me and a Western Standard reporter left.
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So anyways, I just decided to yell out my question.
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And luckily the NDP heard it and Rachel Notley actually answered it.
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At another campaign event later in the week, they did hand me the mic to ask a question.
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So hopefully moving forward, they'll have a bit of a better policy.
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they didn't allow Western Standard or Rebel News to ask their questions.
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And it does leave me concerned that what would happen under an Alberta NDP government
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would conservative media outlets and independent media outlets be able to get any questions in?
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However, I think the reason the UCP aren't campaigning on this is because
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they're really looking to appeal to moderates within the Calgary and Edmonton area
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And I don't know if the topic of free speech is something that really resonates with moderate voters.
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Rachel Emanuel, you've got what it takes to be a great journalist.
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I genuinely appreciated this compliment so much.
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I take a lot of heat online for being a conservative woman in politics,
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especially when they're hidden behind an anonymous account.
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So I really appreciated this generous compliment.
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Before I let you go, I just wanted to let you know that if you're interested in seeing more of my coverage of the Alberta election campaign,
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I would recommend that you follow me on Twitter.
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I am hot on the campaign trail right now, and I am posting so many videos and articles of what I am hearing and seeing.
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So you can head over to Emanuel underscore Rach to find me and to see all my content.
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As well, if you're interested, you can also listen to the Daily Brief.
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That's True Norse Morning Podcast, of which I am currently the host.
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And we certainly spend a lot of time discussing the Alberta election campaign.
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As always, if you're able, please consider supporting my work.