Sometimes one news story helps illuminate another.
Consider, for example, Wildrose Finance Critic Derek Fildebrandt’s announcement Tuesday he’s pondering a run for the leadership of the as-yet-embryonic United Conservative Party.
Fildebrandt made his plan public at almost the same moment as Progressive Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney was telling a crowd in the Edmonton suburb of St. Albert that if the two parties merge and he becomes leader of the UCP he will take measures to ensure candidates prone to what are known in Alberta as “bozo eruptions” are sidelined.
Now, Kenney may just be looking for a way to make sure he gets to control who runs for the UCP. Still, there’s no question that ever since the notorious Lake of Fire brouhaha in 2012, bozo eruptions have been a problem for the Alberta right. And since it could be argued Fildebrandt is a bozo eruption waiting to happen, each story tends to put the other into context.
As it happens, Kenney made his vow to suppress bozo eruptions on the fifth anniversary of one of his own: It was on June 19, 2012, that Kenney famously called St. Albert resident Thomas Lukaszuk, then Alberta’s PC deputy premier, “a complete and utter asshole” in an email, then hit reply-all.
I didn’t attend last night’s Kenney Fest in St. Albert — where I live as well — so I can’t tell you if Lukaszuk, who now spends much of his time on social media, made it out to hear Kenney’s remarks.
Regardless, Fildebrandt, MLA for Strathmore-Brooks just east of Calgary, says he has a leadership campaign team in place should they be needed. They’re just waiting for Wildrose Party members to actually endorse the unnatural union with the Progressive Conservative Party now headed by Kenney.
This news will not come as a complete revelation to the readership of this blog, which asked three weeks ago: “How else but as a draft campaign brochure are we to explain Mr. Fildebrandt’s rambling paean to Maxime Bernier, the unexpectedly unsuccessful longtime front-runner to lead the Conservative Party of Canada, which appeared in the pages of the National Post?”
Kenney’s plan, however, may offer a more insightful explanation for Fildebrandt’s hints than mere youthful ambition.
“Let’s be honest about this,” Kenney told about 350 souls at St. Albert’s finest hostelry, “I’ve heard it every day for the past year — every single day — I’ve heard about the one or two bozo eruptions that have imposed a lasting brand problem on the Wildrose Party. And we cannot afford that to happen to this new party.”
Accordingly, he vowed, “I will propose a rigorous screening process for prospective candidates to red light those who have advocated truly hateful views or who have serious reputational problems.”
This could create a problem for at least half the current Wildrose caucus, but we’ll stick to the case of Fildebrandt for the moment.
Much depends, of course, on how low the PC leader plans to set the bar when he talks about “reputational problems,” and whether sitting MLAs would be exempt from rejection’s red glare.
But, as alert readers are certain to recall, Fildebrandt has quite a history of this sort of thing.
Back in May 2016, Wildrose leader Brian Jean, who also has ambitions to lead the UCP, fired Fildebrandt as the party’s “shadow minister of finance” and suspended him from the party’s caucus for praising another Facebook account holder’s homophobic smear of Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne. This decision was soon rescinded after the anger of Fildebrandt’s supporters shook Jean’s resolve.
Since then, Fildebrandt has demonstrated his loyalty to Kenney by defying Jean — a lesson that may or may not be lost on the PC leader.
Fildebrandt is also well known for alleging the NDP hoodwinked voters by keeping its promises, an opinion that caused general hilarity from coast to coast.
Covering most of the bozo bases, Fildebrandt has also refused to answer news conference questions from a respected reporter while loudly proclaiming her to be seeking work in the premier’s office (she wasn’t), praised climate change deniers, and, as a Canadian Taxpayers Federation operative, dismissed an international conference on women’s poverty as “a feminist pow-wow.”
Speaking of the CTF, back in 2014 he announced suddenly he was leaving the supposedly non-partisan Astro-Turf group after a blogger reported he had been recruited to run for the Wildrose Party by then leader Danielle Smith.
Naturally, much depends on how Kenney defines “bozo eruption.” This would presumably not include publicly calling a fellow Conservative an asshole or saying that schoolchildren who join gay-straight alliances should be outed to their parents.
Nevertheless, the new leader’s effort to ensure the UCP doesn’t drown in another Lake of Fire raises the possibility Fildebrandt’s ambitions may be nothing more than a simple case of self-preservation.
This post also appears on David Climenhaga’s blog, AlbertaPolitics.ca.
Image: Twitter/@pcyouthalberta
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