The gloves came off on the second day of the Alberta election campaign.
Premier Jim Prentice traded shots with opposition parties: calling Alberta’s New Democrats fiscally on the extreme left for wanting to spend more, and the Wildrose Party fiscally on the extreme right for cutting spending too deeply.
Both opposition parties punched back.
“If low taxes and balanced budgets is extremist, I guess most Albertans are extremist because I think that’s what Albertans want,” said Brian Jean, leader of the Wildrose Party.
“They want low taxes and balanced budgets, and that’s what we’re presenting for Albertans in this election.”
NDP leader Rachel Notley said Prentice is “using that particular characterization because we are promoting the idea that corporations should come to the table, roll up their sleeves and pay their fair share”.
“Let me tell you, 69 per cent of Albertans agree with us,” said Notley.
The Tories’ campaign website may have suffered a knockout blow as well: “Choose Alberta’s Future” is the Tory election slogan domain name, but the Alberta Party purchased it redirecting Tory supporters to the Alberta Party campaign website.
“One staff member got the ‘.ca’, and at the same time just by complete coincidence, another staffer went and got ‘.com’,” said Greg Clark, leader of the Alberta Party.
“You know we don’t have the deep pockets that the PCs have; we have to use the tools at our disposal to connect with Albertans.”
The Alberta Party spent about $150 buying the two domain names, and Clark says they are keeping both of them and will not sell back either one to the PC campaign team.
Comments