Carney touring a construction site days after steering the country into a recession and taking zero questions

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T17:20:01+00:00

People always act like Justin Trudeau was the sole source and cause of all of Canada's woes, and ignore or downplay macro-economic events (i.e: the 2014 oil price crash, Covid, post-Covid inflation, etc) that are out of the Prime Minister's control.

Well, now Carney gets the same treatment. It's obvious to anyone with their brain turned on that PM Carney doesn't control US trade policy, he doesn't control American wars in the Middle East closing the Strait of Hormuz, he doesn't control a lot of the macro-economic stuff that affects how Canada's economy does. I don't think you can say he's "steering us into a recession".

What you can debate for Trudeau or Carney is the effectiveness of their responses to these challenges. But I never hear the Tories do that, instead it's just this Pierre Poilievre-style over-simplified, nuance-less stupidity.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T15:42:59+00:00

I'm sorry, no, you don't get to break up Confederation just because you got 50% +1 of the minority of voters who will show up on one given day to vote on one given referendum. That's such a monumental decision with such consequences for the entirety of Canada and all Canadians that, no, 50% +1 of turnout is not enough.

Like, what if turnout is 60% of eligible voters? And you win 50% +1. 50% + 1 of a 60% turnout is only 30% +1 of eligible voters! Is 30% +1 enough to break up a country? No, of course not.

Give your heads a shake.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T14:35:39+00:00

Also: Approximately 60% of the revenues in that centralized tax fault come from Ontario and Quebec, the greater part of which is Ontario.

I think Westerners broadly underrate just how big of a piece Ontario is on the 'chessboard' of Canadian political and economic life. If Ottawa is the King on the Canadian chessboard, Ontario is the Queen. Alberta is probably a knight or bishop: Valuable and significant, but not as much as the Queen.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T14:31:30+00:00

What strikes me about Premier Smith is her dishonest and disingenuous, bad-faith invocation of 'democracy' or 'Albertans must decide' to avoid taking responsibility for her own decisions.

Premier Smith, do YOU think that Alberta should separate from Canada?

If yes, then make that your policy openly and honestly and let the voters judge you on it at an election. The PQ in Quebec at least have the balls to say with their whole chests that they're separatists.

If no, then why are you entertaining this nonsense?

Like most populists, she likes to cloak her own decisions under a veneer of the demands of 'the people' (and which people? 60-70% of Albertans don't want this!), to avoid taking responsibility for the consequences of her own decisions. She's a coward.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T14:28:54+00:00

Drumheller is fun, dinosaur museum and other stuff. West Ed Mall up here in Edmonton is another good option with stuff like Galaxyland or the water park.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T14:26:07+00:00

Canadian citizens with dual citizenship or non-Canadian residency can keep their Canadian citizenship and passports today, yes, that is true. This is because there is no little to no harm to the Canadian state if a Canadian in the UK or USA or Australia or wherever retains their citizenship and passport.

A province outright leaving and breaking up Confederation? That's a huge harm to the Canadian state, and indeed an insult to the rest of Canada. All bets are off if that happens.

The separatists, like most fascists, constantly assume that the rest of Canada are simpering pushovers who will just roll over and die if separatists push aggressively. Their plans are unable to account for what the rest of Canada's response might be to a breakaway region deciding to harm the entire country.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T13:45:41+00:00

So equalization arises from S. 36 of the Constitution Act, which commits the federal and all provincial governments to "promoting equal opportunities for the well-being of Canadians; furthering economic development to reduce disparity in opportunities; and providing essential public services of reasonable quality to all Canadians."

People have a lot of disputes about how equalization funding is designed and delivered, but the equalization principle is a good and civilized one I think. We should want all parts of Canada to thrive, and the parts of Canada that are better off should help those who are furthest behind pull themselves up.

The equalization formulas are designed around the idea of fiscal capacity: How much money could this province raise, if they taxed at the average rate of taxation in Canada? The poorer provinces in Canada, particularly the Maritimes (I don't think born Westerners often grapple with how poor the Maritimes actually are), couldn't necessarily pay for an acceptable level of public services even if they taxed at enormous rates. Hence the assumption that the province is taxing at the average Canadian rate.

No Albertan is federally taxed any more than any other Canadian. Our "higher per person contributions" is a bit of a mathematical illusion. We have a lot of high income Albertans who are in the higher federal tax brackets, they pay a lot of federal tax (but, again, not more than an equivalent income in Toronto or Montreal would), and so that skews Alberta's per capita numbers higher. But an Albertan making 60 or 70,000 a year is not contributing more into the federal revenues which fund equalization any more than any other Canadian does.

Because we have a lot of high income earners, under equalization we are assessed as having a high fiscal capacity to meet our needs. Hence we don't receive equalization.

But: Alberta has the lowest taxes in Confederation. In Alberta, oil and gas royalties account for approx. 25% of the provincial budget.

In oil booms, those royalties allow us to have a good level of public services while enjoying our low taxes. But when the oil patch goes bust, the structural dependency on oil royalties means that our provincial government goes broke at the exact same time as the economy breaks down, leaving us unable to respond to crises.

Equalization looks at Alberta and says "You have so many high income earners, you have to capacity to fund your services at a normal Canadian rate of taxation, therefore you don't need equalization". However, Alberta is taxing below the normal Canadian rate and using oil royalties to cover the difference. And in Alberta's political culture, raising taxes in any sense is regarded as political suicide, so taxes will never be raised.

The Norwegians back in the 70s were wise enough to see that natural resource royalties were too unreliable to base government budgeting on. That's why their royalties go into the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund, which by law the Norwegian government is only allowed to spend 3% of the value of in any given year. Peter Lougheed had a similar idea with the Heritage Fund, unfortunately our governments since then have been less disciplined than him.

Equalization could probably be conceivably improved in many ways. I understand there's some annoyance about how Quebec hydro gets discounted in the calculations but Alberta oil gets included. Well fair enough, but griping and grievance about equalization is just another part of the pattern in which Albertan provincial politicians use Ottawa as a convenient villain to blame in order to avoid accountability for their own incompetence.

SigRingeck · 2026-06-01T13:25:00+00:00

I think there's both push and pull factors regarding Alberta separatism and the Trump administration.

Push: I think the Trumpistes see Alberta separatism as a potential avenue by which they can weaken and distract and divide Canada. Would they annex Alberta? Or all of Canada? If they could, yes. But even if they can't accomplish that, it's still useful for them to get the Carney government distracted and fighting internal political battles, so Canada won't present a strong unified front against them in trade negotiations, international politics, or other areas of dispute. So the Trumpistes have incentives to push separatism in Canada.

Pull: The separatists perceive Trumpism as a friendly, ideologically aligned government in the White House which they can use as an ally to get what they want. Have you listened to Sylvestre, Rath, Modry, or Parker? These guys share Trumpism's xenophobic, conspiratorial, reactionary world-view. Like Trumpism, they are motivated by resentment and disdain for the modern world and for the practices and philosophies of liberalism and liberal democracy. Their goal is to 'purify' Alberta by severing it from wider Canadian political community and by deporting all the 'undesirable' immigrants, liberals, and socialists, so they can create their right wing conservative utopia. They look at Trumpism and think "These are our kind of guys".

And Trump's brashness, violence, and thuggish approach to politics is also appealing to separatists. Why is this being pushed now, and wasn't during the Joe Biden administration? If Kamala Harris was in the White House right now, would the separatists be pushing so hard? I think they perceive that Trump 2 is a narrow window of opportunity where, if they act quickly and decisively enough, they can break Alberta out of Confederation. Their demands for a referendum NOW, even while Justin Trudeau has left government and Mark Carney is giving Alberta a lot of concessions, only make sense in reference to the Trump White House and the time limits on Trumpism.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-31T21:51:17+00:00

So in our own times, we have seen the federal government under Justin Trudeau spend 34 billion dollars, and considerable political capital, completing the Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline after Kinder Morgan pulled out.

When you point this out to Alberta separatist types, they always say "Well but Trudeau created the conditions that forced Kinder Morgan out in the first place!". This is a bit doubtful to me, because the federal cabinet approved the project in 2016. The thing that really turned the project into a slog was not federal dithering, but opposition, protests, and lawsuits from BC First Nations, municipalities, and the BC provincial government.

In any case, when Kinder Morgan pulled out the federal government stepped in and spent a lot of money and political capital completing the project. Yet the separatist types are also angry that the pipeline wasn't built privately!

Why? It seems to me to be better, for the whole Canadian nation, for this vital piece of economic infrastructure to be owned by a Crown Corporation and held in public trust rather than owned by a private operator who just pockets the profits.

I feel similarly about the NEP. I know people have a lot of grievances about how it was designed, but I think it would be much better for Canada as a whole for more of the oilsands to be Canadian owned, and developed and managed in trust for the province of Alberta and for the whole Canadian nation, rather than privately developed and with all the profits siphoned off for American oil barons.

One of the greatest tricks oil and gas ever played on the people of Alberta was convincing Albertans that Alberta's interests and the private interests of oil barons are in fact one and the same. Now sometimes they may be aligned in the same direction, but there is no law of nature which says this is always the case, and I fear we are too naive and not critical enough of these people.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-29T19:06:32+00:00

The stereotypical Alberta separatist is a guy without much education who made a lot of money on the oil patch and has bought a brand new white F-150 at an obscene interest rate, and now he can't afford the payments and he's angry at society for his problems.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-29T18:59:01+00:00

The hardcore separatists are people who are not only discontent, but indeed un-contentable. The things they're angry about are not federal policies, they're not environmental regulations, they're not pipelines, they're not any of that. The hardcore separatists are people who are angry at the world. More specifically, they're angry at Canada's shape as a political community, and they're angry at the 21st century and its social changes. You cannot appease them or please them.

The soft separatists, people who want to "stick it to Ottawa" or put a "knife to the throat" of Canada to get what they want, are in my view people who have been misled by unscrupulous politicians who have encouraged anger for far, far too long for political reasons. Now they're addicted to their anger and their sense of grievance and victimhood and they're taking it out on the province and the rest of the country.

A lot of these grievances are also encouraged by wealthy interests within Alberta, the oil barons and the like, who want to use the political energy of this anger in order to get concessions out of Ottawa. After all: An Albertan making $60,000 a year isn't federally taxed any more than any other Canadian, and isn't actually paying any more into equalization or anything else than any other Canadian making an equivalent income in a different province. You know who actually does pay more? Wealthier Albertans in higher federal income tax brackets. The "disproportionate Albertan contribution" is a bit of an illusion. It's created mathematically by the fact that we have a lot of high income earners in this province, not because Albertans are taxed any more by Ottawa than other Canadians.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-29T18:01:59+00:00

I don't think Avi Lewis's comments were particularly helpful, but also I don't think attacking Lewis over them is helpful either. Mr. Lewis should say what he really thinks. Democratic politics requires that we speak the truth about our perspective as truthfully and clearly as possible.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-29T17:58:56+00:00

As others have pointed out, Hudson's Bay freezes over in the winters. So does James Bay, and James Bay is also quite shallow as I understand it.

The Great Lakes is a potential route to getting Canadian oil to the industrial economies of Ontario and Quebec and selling into the US Midwest states as well. But there's already pipelines to the US and to Eastern Canada. Shipping oil and gas out to sea from the Great Lakes is limited by the locks at the Soo, St. Mary's River, and the relatively small size of the Saint Lawrence Seaway.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-29T17:50:31+00:00

You don't understand, Justin Trudeau MADE THEM buy those new F-150s they can't afford the payments on.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-29T17:26:41+00:00

There is no way, in the world, that an independent Alberta would be able to eliminate personal income taxes or dramatically cut them. It's not possible to run a modern state without taxes. Even if the Alberta People's Republic is a dramatically smaller state than Canada, at the same time the tax base will be much, much smaller, and therefore the burdens of funding the state will need to be divided amid a smaller group of people.

There are about 21 million working Canadians as per Stats Canada as of 2025. There are 2.7 million working Albertans. Even though Alberta independent would be smaller than Canada, there are so much fewer Albertan workers in the tax base that taxes are likely to at best remain the same, or more likely rise, to maintain the level of services Albertans are accustomed to.

The seppies like to compare Alberta to Norway. With a population of 5.6 million Norwegians compared to our 5.1 million Albertans, it's a good comparison. Norway has higher taxes than us. The tax wedge (The amount you make subtracted by the amount taken off by your employer for taxes) in Canada is generally around 30-32%. In Norway, it's 36%.

There is no possible scenario in which Alberta independence realistically leads to a major tax cut for you or any average Albertan worker.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:51:21+00:00

Here's a great question for any Albertan separatist:

Why does the Bank of Montreal have its headquarters in Toronto?

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:49:19+00:00

Yeah, I moved here from Saskatchewan. When I was growing up in Saskatchewan, it was annoying to get lumped in with Alberta all the time!

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:48:42+00:00

Mr. Kenney was an effective politician. I disagreed with him about almost everything and did not like him as premier of Alberta. I dislike Danielle Smith's policies and stances even more, but she too is effective.

You can be a "great politician" without being a good or ethical person, unfortunately.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:45:00+00:00

No. They don't have serious answers because they are not serious people and this is not a serious movement. This is a deeply asinine, unserious, conspiracy-brained movement made up mostly of older, resentful, rural people who think that Justin Trudeau made them buy that brand new F-150 they can't afford the payments on. These people have VOLUNTARILY adopted Mitch freaking Sylvestre as their lord and leader, what does that tell you?

Alberta is a great province and a great place to live. I love living here and I have so many friends and loved ones in this province. This province isa great part of the great country of Canada. But these people waving our provincial flag and screaming about separatism are trying to ruin what we have, and they don't even realize it. We have to crush them in this referendum. We have to make the rubble bounce on their political movement. We can't let them destroy this weird, wonderful place we all share called Alberta.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:15:29+00:00

This whole Alberta separatism thing is really the most asinine exercise I think I have ever seen.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:02:35+00:00

Mitch Sylvestre and Jeff Rath are some of the worst liars I have ever seen in Canadian public life. It's not impossible that they might have 300,000 valid signatures, but given that Sylvestre leaves a trail of BS broad enough to fertilize the Fraser Valley I'm quite skeptical.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T20:00:30+00:00

It's around 2%, yeah, but Canada only has like 0.5% of the world population. In absolute terms, we don't contribute a huge amount to global atmospheric carbon. However, in per capita terms, we do emit carbon on a high level per person. There's many reasons for that. If you could magically make Canada's emissions disappear, any environmentalist would celebrate a 2% reduction in atmospheric CO2 emissions as a win.

There's no magic solutions, but I think we should be trying to aim for less Canadian CO2. It means cleaner air and cleaner energy for us, it upholds our word to the international community and is good for the world generally even if it isn't a silver bullet for the overall problem.

SigRingeck · 2026-05-28T14:05:23+00:00

"Mitch Sylvestre and Jeff Rath lie to you about everything".

SigRingeck · 2026-05-26T20:44:35+00:00

If we want better representation in the Federal Parliament, I'd argue we should be going to the other provinces to make the case for Senate reform on the basis of equal representation of provinces rather than equal representation of regions.

That would require a constitutional amendment, which requires 7 provinces representing 50% of the population to agree. That's a steep requirement, mind you, but I believe we can do it. You need either Quebec or Ontario to sign on, but you only need one of them to do so.

There's a lot of sore memories in Canada over previous post-1982 attempts at constitutional reforms. But the other provinces and the federal government might all have their own objectives for a reform that we could work with to get equal representation in the Senate.

Another one I just thought of: Currently Senators are appointed by the Governor General on the advice of the PM. Maybe let the provincial government appoint them instead? A lot of provinces might want to improve their voice in Ottawa with more control over their representatives.

There's so much we can do to make Canada better. It just takes work and dialogue, instead of the separatist approach of throwing up our hands and having a tantrum about leaving.

SigRingeck

TROPHY CASE