Even Alberta gets confused on whats Liberal and Conservative

Alberta Liberals are being turned into Conservatives -- Alberta Progressive Conservatives are Conservatives – the Wildrose Party are conservatives -- the BC Liberals are conservatives -- and the BC Conservatives are conservatives.

I came across a story in Rabble.ca this morning, and I have to say it sure grabbed my attention … it seems even Alberta's Liberals aren’t sure if they are Liberals -- or Conservative.

The story is called “Alberta Liberal Conservative appoints conservative Liberals to battle progressive conservatives, true conservatives”

Here’s a couple of paragraphs from that story, which like me, will probably have you understanding why no one seems to know what it means to be a Liberal in the west:
Until a few days ago, the Liberal caucus had nine members, but Bridget Pastoor, an MLA from Lethbridge, crossed the floor to join the Conservatives. So now she's a traditional Liberal who has become a Conservative, under a Conservative Party led by Premier Alison Redford, who some Albertans accuse of being too liberal. But let's not worry about that right now.

The BC Liberals, by the way, really are Conservatives, and have been for years.

That would be why, over in British Columbia, Liberal Premier Christy Clark has just hired a well-known Conservative to be her chief of staff. Now, that particular Conservative, the one hired by Clark, is a fellow named Ken Boessenkool, who is a former adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, the Calgary MP who nobody is going to call a Liberal. Back in the day, Harper, Boessenkool and a couple of well-known dual-citizens signed the famously Alberta separatist Firewall Manifesto. But never mind that just now either.

Getting back to Sherman, the Conservative who leads the Alberta Liberals, who are still Liberals, he apparently hired the BC Conservatives who are called Liberals to help him do well enough in the election to turn the Liberal Liberals into either Conservative Conservatives or Conservative Liberals. Capische?

By the way, some of the old Alberta Liberals who are still Liberals and still MLAs, including the leader before last, Kevin Taft, turned up at an event last night sponsored by the Alberta Federation of Labour to publicize a book by Taft and a movie about it that describes how Conservatives like Sherman have been mismanaging the Alberta economy.

Since Taft is one of the Liberals who won't be running again, there's a school of thought he's "gone rogue" and is openly clashing with Sherman over the more conservative direction he is trying to steer the Alberta Liberals.

Regardless, somewhere along the line, you may have noted that there is also a British Columbia Conservative Party, which calls itself "B.C.'s only true conservative party." But they are not really conservatives exactly. They are really Wildrosers, except from British Columbia, although the Wildrosers, who are from Alberta, say they are really conservatives.

The Wildrose Party used to be called the Wildrose Alliance. It is running to replace the Progressive Conservatives under Redford, who replaced Stelmach. Neither of them, according to Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith, are true conservatives either. Harper, for whom Boessenkool used to work, is widely thought to back the Wildrose Party in Alberta because it's more conservative than the Conservatives.

So the Alberta Liberals are being turned into Conservatives, the Alberta Progressive Conservatives are Conservatives, the Wildrose Party are conservatives, the BC Liberals are conservatives, and the BC Conservatives are conservatives and they all want you to believe they are the only true conservatives. If this sounds like Protestant churches to you, you may have a point.

And now … if you are thoroughly confused … you too understand why politics in BC is in an ever changing flux.

Stayed tuned … we still have 16 months till BC’s next election, and maybe by then the Christy Clark Liberals will know who they are, and what they stand for.