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Is it too late for the PCs to reclaim Alberta?

<OFF THE RECORD

If you’re Danielle Smith and the Wildrose Alliance party, you might want to be careful what you wish for.

The upstart party of Grumpy Old Tories has been throwing stones, calling out the Progressive Conservatives for more than a year now, daring the government to blink, to change its tack and respond to the winds of change.

So, in one of the most bizarre weeks any Alberta government has experienced, Premier Ed Stelmach created a stir with his sudden announcement that he would retire, and that his steadfast promise to lead the party into another election and Alberta back into the black financially in 2012 has been scrapped. Finance Minister Ted Morton followed that two days later by resigning his cabinet post and announcing he will run for the leadership of the party that passed him over five years ago.

Progressive Conservative MLAs and some pundits credit Stelmach with seeing the graffiti on the wall and doing the right thing for the party that has ruled the province for two generations. Rather than spend another year infighting and rewriting legislation after misreading the public’s mood, Stelmach decided to get out in front of the storm. Word is that Morton threatened to quit his portfolio rather than deliver a budget that he couldn’t support. Now everyone saves face. Treasury Board president Lloyd Snelgrove, who will not be a candidate the leadership, is the new finance minister and will present the budget in the legislature in the next session.

But is it too late for even a new leader to reinvigorate this stale political party, interest disengaged Albertans and encourage new candidates to replace tired old MLAs?

In a dead heat in the polls with the Wildrose Alliance that doesn’t have its leader in the legislature, has but one elected MLA and three Tory defectors, the Stelmach government had a year left in its mandate to turn things around, present a budget or two, appoint a new cabinet and come up with a new set of policies to be the foundation of its election platform. The government would also be another year removed from such bonehead issues as power lines and landowner rights, Raj Sherman and health care, the H1N1 vaccination plan, MLA pay raises, $2 billion for carbon capture, and the oil and gas royalty scheme.

In the 2006 leadership race Stelmach was the baloney in the Tory sandwich —, inoffensive, not too spicy. In the middle between Jim Dinning on the left and Ted Morton on the right, Stelmach was the compromise candidate who slipped up through the middle. He was the compromise party members could hold their nose and mark their X for. Stelmach may have appeared weak and indecisive to voters, trying to run a government without losing friends or making enemies.

It makes sense for the PC party to have its leadership convention this fall after a summer of stumping on the barbecue circuit: the shorter the campaign the less time the party has of imploding with a lame duck premier, a budget that caucus doesn’t support whole-heartedly and MLAs campaigning for the job while still collecting a ministerial salary. That will still give the cabinet ministers, federal Conservative MPs and former provincial politicians like Gary Mar and Mark Norris to come in from the wilderness and distance themselves from the policies that have split Stelmach’s caucus and alienated urban and rural Albertans alike.

The Tories, Wildrose Alliance, Liberals, Alberta Party will all have new leaders for the next election.

In a party that has attracted members and MLAs with diverse and opposing views on fiscal responsibility, social programs, universal health care and environmental stewardship to name a few, it’s unlikely Jim Dinning, Ted Morton, Dave Hancock or Jim Prentice would be strong enough and offer a vision that would reunite the Progressive Conservative party, stamp out the Wildrose Alliance threat and return Alberta to promised land status.

Will a leadership change bring Albertans back to the Progressive Conservative party or will it signal the end of the political dynasty?