Federal Tories fight for Morton (CINO/RINO hunting / 'ideological cleansing' in Canada)

Federal Tories fight for Morton

Jason Fekete, with files from Tony Seskus, Calgary Herald

Calgary Herald: Tuesday, November 28, 2006

A growing brigade of federal Tory MPs, including high-profile Jason Kenney, will storm back to Alberta this week to throw their political and organizational muscle behind Ted Morton in his fight for the Progressive Conservative reins and premiership.

In a move that political analysts suggest is bordering on a war between federal and provincial Tories, as many as a dozen Conservative members of Parliament could flee Ottawa this week to stump for Morton heading into Saturday's hotly contested leadership vote.

CREDIT: Dean Bicknell / Calgary Herald
PC party leadership candidate Ted Morton
speaking during a press conference at
his campaign headquarters, Monday.

And the man in many MPs' crosshairs is front-runner Jim Dinning, who scored huge votes in Calgary and led Morton after last Saturday's first ballot.

"The difference is (Morton) is a guy governed not by the interests of insiders, but by principles and a desire to plug into the common sense of the common people," Kenney, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's right-hand man, said Monday in an interview from Ottawa. "That really represents the vital force of the national party in Alberta."

Dinning was quick to fight back, assailing Morton's policies and leadership abilities in a speech in Edmonton.

"Ted Morton's Alberta is not mine," he told supporters.

Kenney noted that he likes and respects Dinning, but said it's unfortunate he's "the candidate of the past" who reflects the status quo.

"Ted isn't just seeking the premiership for the sake of being premier," said Kenney. "he's seeking it to change things -- which is the fundamental difference between himself and Jim Dinning."

Kenney, the parliamentary secretary to Harper, is one of a number of Alberta Tory MPs who've said they'll head back to Calgary from Ottawa as early as Wednesday, when the House of Commons adjourns for the week.

Dinning, however, also has some of Alberta's 28 Tory MPs on his side, including Calgary's Lee Richardson and Deepak Obhrai, as well as John Williams from the Edmonton area, who said he'll do his best to aid the former provincial treasurer's campaign.

A senior official in the Dinning camp said they're paying little attention to who's supporting their competitors' teams and argued Morton's federal support "is not a big deal."

"Who's working on who's campaign is not what this is about," said Brent Shervey, chairman of Dinning's campaign. "It's about the issues and what each of these guys stand for."

Not to be lost in the tussle is Ed Stelmach, the third candidate on the second ballot for the Alberta Tory leadership, who has the support of a number of provincial Tories.

Nonetheless, sources tell the Herald about a dozen federal Conservative MPs will rush back to Alberta in the coming days to help Morton capture Premier Ralph Klein's crown.

"I would be surprised if it weren't more (than a dozen)," said Calgary Tory MP Rob Anders. "I'm doing all I can. I see nothing wrong with that -- we're Albertans, you know," said outspoken Alberta Conservative MP Myron Thompson.

Certainly, the battle for the Tory leadership is proving to be not only a struggle of competing conservative visions -- but also two different Conservative parties within Alberta.

Much like Morton's supporters, many MPs on his side subscribe to more grassroots, big-C conservative philosophies of libertarianism and traditional social values long championed by the former Reform and Canadian Alliance parties.

Morton's main sparring partner is Dinning, whose just-as-impressive team is largely based on Peter Lougheed's style of small-c conservatism.

"It's a Reform party takeover in provincial politics," said David Taras, political analyst at the University of Calgary, adding the city could prove to be a battleground of epic proportions between these "two very different" visions for the party.

"This is the heavy ammunition coming in. Morton is bringing in the cannons and they're going to fire away in Calgary," Taras said. "Calgary is going to be at war with itself."

Dinning gave a passionate speech in Edmonton on Monday where he took aim at Morton.

While Morton has no MLAs endorsing him yet, Dinning has won support from the majority of the provincial Tory cabinet and caucus who've been able to use their constituency teams to provide a well-sewn blanket of support.

"What was a contest has now become a fight, -- a fight about Alberta's future, a fight about the values Albertans hold and a fight about Alberta's role in Canada," Dinning said.

But Kenney took more piercing shots at Dinning and questioned his record. He targeted him for a corporate cheque and letter of support he sent in 2002 to Paul Martin's Liberal leadership campaign on behalf of his employer at the time.

"When Jim Dinning was sending $25,000 to Paul Martin's leadership campaign and personal notes of encouragement, Ted Morton was working down here with us in the Canadian Alliance to be a strong voice in Ottawa."

jfekete@theherald.canwest.com

Bottom line background for American friends:
- while long compelled to tolerate recently retired Alberta Premier & drunken waffling buffoon Ralph Klein due to his mysterious personal political popularity, philosophic conservatives are now battling ideological backsliders for provincial (state) control of Canada's Conservative heartland.
- Ted Morton would easily make virtually anyone's list of prominent Canadian conservative intellectuals.
- this is plainly the final public thrust in an attempted purge and/or 'ideological cleansing' being carried out at Prime Minister Stephen Harper's behest & with his blessings.
- MP Jason Kenney is Harper's Parliamentary Secretary & principal spokesman and could easily also be his 'Karl Rove' as well if Harper wasn't such a master tactician in his own right.

Background:

Born: March 28, 1949, in Los Angeles.

Education: PhD in political economy from University of Toronto, BA with Phi Beta Kappa honours from Colorado College. Studied in France during third year.

Work history: 25 years of teaching political science at the University of Calgary. Taught previously at Assumption College near Boston.

Family: Wife Bambi, three grown children.

Politics: Early supporter of federal Reform party. Elected as a Reform "senator-in-waiting" in 1998. Elected to Alberta legislature in Foothills-Rocky View in 2004.

Platform: Save 30 per cent of non-renewable resource revenue; cap public sector spending growth; allow private health clinics to deliver some services; establish fixed election dates and term limits.

Writings: Five books, more than 50 scholarly articles, newspaper columns in the Globe and Mail, National Post, Calgary Herald, and Calgary Sun.

Awards: 1992 Alberta Writers' Guild award for best non-fiction book for "Morgentaler vs. Borowski: Abortion, the Charter and the Courts." 1995 winner of the Bora Laskin Fellowship in Human Rights.

Hobbies: Hunting, fishing.

Quote: "People say, 'Oh, Ted's too conservative.' Well, I frankly think being a conservative running for the leadership of the Conservative party is not a bad label to carry."

Sheesh ! What is there not to like about Ted Morton ???

Source (candidates' backgrounds listed alphabetically - scroll down page)

I like a lot of what I see about Morton, and if his election does anything to break up the "politics as usual" crowd in Alberta (as I'd dearly love to see down here), I'd pretty cheerfully sneak through the trees and try to cast an illegal immigrant vote for him.

Only one thing: I see somebody promoting a platform to "establish fixed election dates" in Kanukistan and I wonder if he's trying to kill off some of the fun and put you poor guys in the same sorry crap cycle of 23 7/8 month-long political campaigning we've got.

I'd rather poke myself in the eye with a sharp stick than make THAT change.

First off, municipal elections have always been fixed date in Canada anyway - so we're only talking federal & provincial.

Second, as we have less direct democracy up here, these elections are very simple by comparison to yours: paper ballots & put an 'X' next to the candidate of the party you wish to see form a government and/or the one you see as the lesser of evils.
Note: even in most local jurisdictions you only vote to fill 3 Offices - Mayor, Councilor & School Board Trustee.

Third, since our federal & provincial governments operate under Parliamentary systems, there's both a major up side & a major down side to fixed date elections:
UP: it stops governing Parties from manipulating the system to their advantage by calling snap elections when the outcome appears most likely to benefit them. It also saves money since governments would be legally bound to hold only exactly 3 elections over a dozen years rather than possibly 4 or 5.
(in practice, opportunistic calling of elections, while a problem, isn't quite as big of one as it might first appear: since, by law, no Parliamentary majority government can exceed a 5 year term, the window of opportunity for chicanery is really not much more than a year. Call an election much under 3 1/2 years into your term & voters will likely punish you &, go too much 4 past years, and it looks like you're afraid to face the electorate.

DOWN: if a minority government is defeated on matter of confidence prior to completing its term in Office (which has been the case with every single one of them in the nation's history) a new election must be held immediately. So, if there's also a mandatory fixed date, the result will actually be more elections. Plus, if you try to get around this by making the fixed term 4 years from date of election, should a minority government be defeated in January and replaced by a majority one, you'd keep on having January elections for as long as you kept electing majority governments.

Unfortunately, as I reside in matriarchal socialist Ontario, I won't enjoy the privilege of voting for Ted Morton this coming weekend. Although I don't know him personally, we have several friends in common, I'm quite familiar with his writings & he has my full support.

I've e-mailed several supportive articles such as Morton Alberta's best choice for leader ~ Lorne Gunter, Edmonton Journal, 11/19/06 to conservative contacts across the country in hope they're further passed along and suggest you do the same.

Re: " Morton is not hindered by the opinion of the socially isolated elite." .... but enough about the Supreme Court - LOL!

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