Danielle Smith’s rule has been characterized by a loose relationship with the truth: among the big fibs have been a great-grandfather who didn’t actually flee communism, claims that she would, did, and then didn’t interfere in the prosecution of Coutts blockaders, and a false claim of Cherokee heritage.

Shama Rangwala joins Duncan Kinney to discuss the students of Uleth owning Frances Widdowson, the UCP reaction and the historical context of academic free speech and how it's been weaponized by the right. 

Despite the release of a recent study showing the closure of Lethbridge’s supervised consumption site cost lives, the UCP is shutting down another similar facility, this time in Red Deer. 

A proposed $4 billion methanol plant for the Grande Prairie area that would have brought thousands of construction jobs to northern Alberta has gone belly up and it’s not the first time a big value-added petrochemical project has vanished on the UCP’s watch. 

Very rarely does a journalist in Canada have to talk to their lawyer before attending a press conference and make sure they’re available that afternoon in case you get arrested. But this is what it’s like to cover the Edmonton Police Service as a journalist who aims to hold the police accountable.  

The expected provincial election may be this year’s big show, but adjacent to the spotlight, local power struggles continue apace.

A clear example: the muted but ongoing campaign against Edmonton’s mayor, Amarjeet Sohi.

The corporate potheads at Sundial Growers turned out not to be so mellow as Teamsters Local 987 have won an unfair labour practices complaint against the Olds, Alberta based cannabis producer and processor.

Paris Marx of the Tech Won't Save Us podcast joins Duncan Kinney to explore Danielle Smith's obsession with cryptocurrency and taking Alberta out of the Canada Pension Plan. 

In an undated editorial from fall 2022 in a quarterly publication from the Alberta Federation of Police Associations, Chris Young, the president of the Alberta Federation of Police Associations and a vice president with the Calgary Police Association, wrote an editorial titled “Political Leaders Need to be Responsible” where he calls out a city councillor and makes several extraordinary statements. 

It might be a relatively harmless and money-losing affectation for a former talk radio show host turned business group lobbyist to have a mid-life conversion to the church of cryptocurrency. It becomes a lot less harmless when that person becomes the premier, can tell Alberta’s pension fund manager what to do and wants to take Alberta out of the Canada Pension Plan.