Tit for Taft.

[allhatnocattle]

For the last 4yr.s I've lived in a Liberal riding. Nothing changed for me last night. Former local radio celeb, Dave Taylor is still my MLA. Unfortunately, neither Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were on the ballot, a disappointment for many, I'm sure. Dave Taylor handily beat the well financed PC Candidate, former CNN reporter Art "scud-stud"

Comments

[penlessej]

Wouldn't it be more disappointing for an Albertan that McCain wasn't on the ballot? :P

[allhatnocattle]

Don't stereotype. Just like the USA, we havn't heard of him either.

[penlessej]

Haven't heard of him? He is going to be the next President of the United States of America.

[allhatnocattle]

The same imaginary USA that elected Ralph Nader? Not likely even in my best dream state.

[tridus]

Not being from Alberta, I have a hard time understanding how one party can stay in power this long without becoming so arrogant and complacent that they can't govern (and thus get voted out).

Maybe you can help me out here, how have the PCs earned this kind of long term support?

[penlessej]

The PC Party was very arrogant and complacent under Klein. I think that with Steady Eddy the PCs had a bit of a wake up call and there was even talk of a major shake up in the legislature. Sadly Taft ran a piss poor campaign and if you watched his concession speech you can really see the mood of the Liberals afterwards.

[allhatnocattle]

I'm from Toronto myself, so I can't speak for days of yore

[mijopo]

Thanks for that erudite characterization of the Albertan people, but I think it's bullshit. It's not that Albertans are a bunch of Larry the Cable guy hicks. At least not much more or less than Ontario is comprised of Larry the Cable guy hicks. The reason asshats like Ralph Klein and company can keep winning in Alberta is not because they appreciate that he's such a dick, it's because Alberta has been awash with money for a long f--in time. Any moron or gang of morons can keep winning in those conditions. If the economy is strong, people are happy and won't look for change and if it isn't, they will. It's a pretty simple political formula: Latch on to a political party that's in power in a region awash with natural resource. Stay with that party. If you can do the latching on part, the rest is simple.

[mijopo]

Well, as with Smucker's jam, with a name like 'Edward Stelmach' he must be a great politician.

[allhatnocattle]

Steady Eddie to his friends and supporters.

[conejita_diabla]

Actually, in 2004 the Greens got 2.8% of the vote (24,588). So there was a substantial increase.

[allhatnocattle]

You're right. My error. I'll edit to make fact.

[sensorglitch]

It's hardly a suprising result, maybe you are right about that name change thing.

[penlessej]

That was the exact same problem that we had with Liberals on Ontario. I was in a pretty lock-tight Liberal riding but there were a lot of (former) Liberal voters that either didn't want to publicly put up a sign or vote Liberal ever again thanks to what happened on the Federal level.

[sensorglitch]

Also, Dalton is a so-so leader

[allhatnocattle]

Judging from call-in radio, the amount of talk about Dion, Afghanistan, etc., folks have a hard time distinguishing the feds from the provincial.