[Bassic Lab]

Originally Posted by freeweed

A bit of Devil's Advocate here...

Perhaps "change" is a bit more nuanced than merely the name of the party in power. I think it's a commonly held belief that the PC party in Alberta has slowly been moving towards a more centrist position in general - and arguably with Redford, much moreso than ever. They're certainly not the "cut government to the bone" party of the Klein era.

The WRP and their supporters are essentially the old-time, hardline CONSERVATIVES that ran Alberta for decades. So, Redford and the PC party going forward are in fact "change" in a meaningful sense.

Now, I don't necessarily agree with all of that, but it does speak to something that's mystified me about this entire campaign. I really failed to see where the WRP is a "change" other than in name. I mean shit, they stole a page directly from Ralph's playbook and promised cheques when the government had too big of a surplus. The only "change" I saw there was a different colour on an elections result map - and perhaps a few more crazies in power, depending on how out of context certain comments are taken.

"Change" in this province would be to elect a Liberal or NDP style party. Not just "PC, now with 5% extra conservatism".

It's pretty hard to say that "hardline CONSERVATIVES" governed the province for decades. Lougheed was hardly a hardline conservative (hell, economically he would left of the NDP as it exists today) and neither was Getty.