Critical dates for Stelmach as Wildrose gains momentum

By Rick Bell, Calgary Sun
Published: September 16, 2009

Ed is out in Cardston yesterday trying to convince us in Calgary he gets it.

He says he knows what people are trying to tell him. He realizes what he has to do.

Communicate more clearly, be more conservative in budgeting, blah, blah, blah.

Pity such a revelation didn’t manage to make its way to the premier’s grey matter before the upstarts of the Wildrose Alliance took him and his party to school Monday, handing them a good old-fashioned licking right in the heart of Tory Calgary.

Now Ed is in a world he dreads. A party of conservatives, far more real in their principles than the tired opportunists and hangers-on huddling under the Progressive Conservative brand, has captured the momentum of the moment.

Next month, they will elect a new leader and Ed surely does not want frontrunner Danielle Smith to turn out to be the Wildrose Alliance No. 1.

Danielle is smart. She is passionate. She actually has a set of political beliefs. She cannot be written off as a zealot waiting to self-destruct. She can actually string many sentences together and all of the sentences somehow make sense. In the world of TV and cyberspace, Danielle does not scare cameras.

She is also from Calgary, where Ed is almost as toxic as a tailing pond, a fact the folks in Calgary Glenmore reminded us of loudly and clearly and without any apology.

Danielle says Glenmore gives the Wildrose credibility and exposure. They’re already scoring cash.

“We knew the discontent was out there. This is the talk in the coffee shops. People like Ed. They say he’s a nice man but he is not a leader,” she says.

It is said 10,000 ballots are at the ready for the Wildrose Alliance convention. These numbers exceed the interest generated by the Liberals and the NDP.

Enter Paul Hinman, the new Wildrose MLA for Glenmore.

By yesterday afternoon, the day after the election night before, his voice is raspy from all the talking. One minute nobody wants to chew the fat with him, the next minute he’s a political rock star with hungry microphones swallowing up his every syllable.

“We’ve got fuel in the tank and money in the bank,” says Paul, clearly still living off the adrenaline of a victory making politics interesting in the tedium of one-party Alberta.

“This is huge. There is new energy for people who are politically frustrated.”

Paul talks about the Wildrose Alliance being able to take on the Tories and possibly win government in 2012.

“I didn’t go back into politics to get a headache hearing them flap their lips,” says Paul, of the Tories who sometimes flap good and sometimes flap bad and often you’re not quite sure what they’re flapping. On occasion, they don’t flap at all. Enter Guy Boutilier, the former Tory MLA and cabinet minister, bounced from the party after sticking up for his people in Fort Mac. Guy says he will be seatmates in the legislature with Paul when MLAs head back to Edmonton in late October.

Before then, Guy and Paul will talk about Guy possibly becoming the second Wildrose Alliance MLA.

“I’m not ruling out anything. I’m keeping my options open. I want to learn all about the Wildrose Alliance,” says Guy, who is not surprised the Tories lost in Monday’s byelection.

“I want to do the best job for my constituents under the umbrella of true conservative values.” Read between those lines and make your bet.

Wait, here’s another date, the most important of all, the first weekend in November.

The Tories will meet and the party of convenience will decide whether to review Ed’s leadership. Some sorts are working hard to make sure Ed is not embarrassed by an approval rating less than glowing. Whatever the premier scrambles to secure it will be not be like the almost unanimous support given to Ralph in his early days handling a lousy economy and big budget slashing.

“I’d love to see what success looks like to them,” says the Wildrose’s Danielle, knowing Ed’s people will not set a number their man has to reach. As for Ed getting it, after being dropkicked?

“At this point, it’s show me, don’t tell me time,” she says.

With that, the real fun begins.

RICK.BELL@SUNMEDIA.CA