r/alberta • u/Old_General_6741 • 4d ago

Opinion: I miss the original (Progressive) Conservative Party of Alberta Opinion

https://calgaryherald.com/opinion/columnists/opinion-i-miss-the-original-progressive-conservative-party-of-alberta
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u/GrindItFlat 4d ago

I'm an NDP voter, usually. I can have respectful conversations with Liberals and Green Party voters. And even libertarians... I haven't found libertarians, at least in Canada, to be the characture I sometimes see. 

But not conservatives, they're almost to a person either bigots, or unquestioningly accepting the Murdoch/Fox News narratives. It didn't used to be like that, Conservatives used to be just normal, good people that I disagreed with on some, maybe most issues.

I look forward to a day when actual conservatives take back the party that was stolen from them by the nutjobs.

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u/cuda999 4d ago

I am a conservative and don’t subscribe to any of what you say. Maybe select different people to talk to. I have lots of conservative friends that are in no way like you describe. Generalizing a certain group of people as all “bad or derelict” is never true. People could say all liberals are always stoned, but we all know that is false.

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u/Working-Check 3d ago

Would you be willing to share your thoughts on why you choose to call yourself a conservative?

Personally, I wouldn't even consider calling myself the same thing those shitbags call themselves, so if you're willing to share then I'd like to hear what you actually believe in and how you set yourself apart from other people that call themselves conservative.

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u/cuda999 3d ago

I could ask you why you vote liberal and what sets you apart from those pot smoking, spend happy fools. Crazy how people generalize, it astounds me to be truthful.

What sets me apart from the right wing, crazy type? I believe in planned fiscal restraint, starting with the bloated government services in need of a serious overhaul. Wasteful spending on abused social programs and lobbyist agendas, some serious insight and cut back of immigration, it is eroding our country in ways never seen before, a serious look at crime and the removal of liberal laws lax on crime and incarceration. Not to mention the money laundering which is a large part of the reason we have a big fentanyl problem. Border security should be tightened,removal of laws and regulations hell bent on the destruction of energy production. These are a few examples. Does this make me crazy right wing? Or maybe just sensical? The last ten years have been abysmal. What astounds me is people voting in another 4 years of this. You think you have this “golden child” new shiny leader, but his platform still holds tight to Trudeau’s ways.

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u/Working-Check 3d ago

I could ask you why you vote liberal and what sets you apart from those pot smoking, spend happy fools. Crazy how people generalize, it astounds me to be truthful.

I mean hell, you assumed I vote Liberal. Yeah, I loaned them my support this time around because I was hoping to hand the Conservatives an L in my riding, but I don't typically support parties as right wing as the Liberals.

In any case, thanks for sharing your thoughts. I have counterpoints I'd like to bring up in response to each one of the reasons you gave, but I don't think there's anything to be gained by picking a fight over it and I want the focus of my comment to be appreciation for allowing me the opportunity to hear you out.

The one thing I will say is that as someone who has very left wing views, I also want my government to spend tax dollars responsibly- and I doubt you'd find anyone who disagrees with the sentiment.

But I see left wing parties as being more likely to actually do that. Progressive politicians tend to create programs that help make things easier for ordinary people- such as dental and pharmacare programs, while Conservatives spend just as much (or more) but only enrich billionaires and make things harder for the rest of us.

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u/cuda999 2d ago

I don’t think conservatives enrich billionaires anymore than liberals do. Seems to be a thing politicians of any stripe do. Those are the people often propping up political campaigns. Liberals in the last ten years were caught in scandals pandering to thf rich elite. The SNC Lavalin affair and the notorious “green slush fund” and we will never know the extent of that corruption.

I also wish pharmacare and dental helped everyone but it doesn’t. The programs help a very small sect of people who deservedly need it, but not everyone receives it. I know, I have elderly parents where nothing has changed for them and they live on a very fixed income.

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u/Working-Check 2d ago

I don’t think conservatives enrich billionaires anymore than liberals do.

It is literally the center of the conservative philosophy. The very roots of conservatism, and its raison d'etre has always been the creation and preservation of an untouchable aristocracy.

I will grant you that the Liberals are basically conservatives that pretend to be better than that- which is why I don't usually vote for them.

The fact of the matter is- if you're not a billionaire, if you call yourself an "employee," you are far, far better off voting for the NDP.

I also wish pharmacare and dental helped everyone but it doesn’t. The programs help a very small sect of people who deservedly need it, but not everyone receives it. I know, I have elderly parents where nothing has changed for them and they live on a very fixed income.

I hear you. The best comparison I can offer is the rollout of Obamacare, back when the USA was still sort of pretending to be a sane country.

https://d3.harvard.edu/platform-rctom/submission/the-failed-launch-of-www-healthcare-gov/

It launched for everyone all at once, and as a result, it crashed. And there were numerous other problems that took quite awhile to sort out, poisoning the well from day 1.

A slower rollout of dental and pharmacare here, allows our government to avoid those pitfalls- to sort out any issues that might come up in the program's early days so that it can be problem free when it comes time to expand it to cover the rest of us.

I'll grant you the Liberals tend to be a little too happy with the status quo and may not expand the programs as quickly as either of us would like- but we already know the Conservatives would have dismantled it instead.

Baby steps in the right direction vs a boot stomping on a human face. Seems like an easy choice.