According to a recent poll, some "60 per cent of Albertans don't think the rest of Canada gives the province the respect it deserves."I'm an Albertan. I'm not among that majority. These Albertans apparently believe that we live in the Rodney Dangerfield of all of the provinces. The reality is that it seems the more vaulted some peoples' egos get, the more praise they expect to receive.
Roger Gibbons, head of the Canada West Foundation decries Alberta's critics, which include me, who basically believe that 100 monkeys with calculators could manage Alberta's finances as well as anyone considering the enormous amount of resource wealth this province has. Gibbons also believes that many Canadians see Alberta's financial prosperity as based on luck because we have so much oil. Well, guess what? That's true. We are lucky to sit on all of this black gold. It's just a matter of geography gone right.
Of course it takes entrepreneurs and a keen business spirit to make money here, but when the Conservative government has been giving its oil buddies tax breaks for decades while not similarly sharing the wealth with its citizens - who have had to endure severe cuts to essential services - perhaps Albertans should be asked how much respect they think their own government has been giving them instead.
This isn't about Alberta vs Ottawa or Alberta vs the rest of Canada. Those among that 60% need to stop and think about what Klein and his goons have done to their lives, but it's often much easier to blame "the others" than to admit that the Conservative government you elected has been screwing you without so much as a kiss for years on end.
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