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Jason Kenney is a deft exponent of funambulism – the fine art of political tightrope walking. The Alberta premier’s high wire act requires him to be suitably outraged at Ottawa’s anti-energy policies but not so aggrieved that he incites what he calls “the fear and anger roiling the Prairies”.
Kenney met with Justin Trudeau on Tuesday, as part of a Team Alberta delegation to the nation’s capital of eight ministers and 11 deputy ministers.
In his speech to the Canadian Club the day before, he made a convincing case for the federal government to take “meaningful action” to address the concerns of many Albertans about their place in the Canadian confederation.
Declaring himself “an unconditional and proud Canadian patriot”, Kenney played the gracious guest, while his host, deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland, scribbled furiously to keep up with the flow of statistics the premier deployed to make his case: Alberta’s oversized contribution to Canada (a net bestowal by its taxpayers of $23 billion a year); and, the human cost of its five years of stagnation (80,000 job loses in the energy sector, rising emergency visits for substance disorders, a per capita suicide rate 50 per cent higher than in Ontario).
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See Also:
(1) Senior Tory MP ridicules Trudeau for massive job losses in November
(2) GUN BANS: Pandering to the outrage mob
(4) Freeland signs new NAFTA pact, urges Parliament to ratify as quickly as possible
