What Danielle Smith’s Win Means For Canada

By Spencer Fernando, Exclusive to the National Citizens Coalition

Rarely have we witnessed an all-out effort to defeat a political leader as obvious as the effort by the media to defeat Danielle Smith and the United Conservative Party in Alberta.

Coverage of Smith was almost uniformly negative, with Smith and her party repeatedly cast as ‘extremist’ and ‘far-right.’

That kind of coverage said far more about the media than it did about Smith. After all, if Smith and the UCP were really a ‘far-right’ party, then that would mean half of Albertans were ‘far-right’ for supporting them. 

Yet, the slanted coverage continued, despite poll after poll showing a close race. You likely noticed how the NDP was never cast as ‘far left’ or ‘extreme’ whenever they were trailing in the polls, and Rachel Notley was rarely if ever framed in negative terms by the press.

The implications of this are clear: A massive portion of the media – even in Alberta – are completely beholden to a socialist worldview.

After all, it’s becoming increasingly clear that communism – the entire goal of those who call themselves ‘socialists’ – simply rebranded itself rather than disappearing when the Soviet Union collapsed, and the ideology was discredited. A significant number of people within the education system, within ‘environmental groups,’ within the press, and within political parties like the NDP & Liberals are communists who have found a more politically safe way to push their ideas.

For example, a recent Tweet by ETFO – an Ontario education union – listed “conservatism” as one of the “alarming” trends in Canada and around the world. In a province with a sitting Conservative government, a large union is openly saying that they see a widely held political ideology as a threat. Does anyone doubt that many of the teachers in that union are doing everything they can to inculcate a socialist ideology in impressionable young minds?

In Alberta, Danielle Smith and the UCP were subjected to rampant misinformation, with the NDP getting free rein from the press to say whatever they thought would damage their opponents without any regard for the truth. Of course, there were no cries from the media about misinformation when the NDP spread lies.

And yet, despite all of this, it wasn’t even that close in the end:

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, the supposedly ‘extreme’ candidate, led her party to 53% of the popular vote, just 2 points below what the UCP won in 2019.

The NDP won 44% of the popular vote, showing they were the ones out of step with most Albertans all along. Though they increased their vote share from 2019, that was largely due to the collapse of the Alberta Party vote, with that party dropping from 9% in 2019 to under 1% this time.

Smith managed to overcome attacks from the national media, the Alberta media, the NDP, and even parts of the Alberta government power structure to secure a decisive victory.

So, what does this all mean?

At the surface level, it demonstrates how unpopular the socialist way of thinking really is when it is revealed and confronted. Consider that if people really wanted to shift far to the left, there would be no need for constant media propaganda, no need for imposing far-left viewpoints on impressionable young people, and no need for such rigorous ‘cancellation’ of those who dare to offer a different perspective.

It’s the same thing that applies to dictatorships. They claim to be popular and strong, yet their need to constantly watch for dissent and savagely punish critics belies their insecurity and weakness.

Again, just imagine if the popular vote numbers in Alberta had been flipped. If it was the NDP who won 53% and the UCP who won 44%, the media would be talking about how Albertans “rejected the far-right extremism” of the UCP and how the party needed to “moderate itself.” But that discourse only goes one way. You don’t hear that when leftist parties lose. And it could easily be said about the NDP, given that they ran multiple candidates who were open communists.

Still, though, there’s something going on here – not just in Alberta, but across the country and across much of the Western world. To understand this, ask yourself why it is that the left can give the appearance of widespread support even when they are advancing extreme viewpoints?

The deeper issue is that there is a disconnect in our society between what people believe, and the rhetoric we use to express our beliefs.

Why are conservatives so often on the defensive even when most people agree with many right-wing positions?

Well, what the left has done – and what communists have exploited in their successful ‘rebrand’ – is that values and principles we apply to our families and personal lives can be hijacked to advance radical policies when it comes to governing millions of people.

Most people would help a loved one in need with financial support, or a place to stay if necessary. We share within our families, without meticulously tallying up how much each family member is ‘producing.’ We often give our loved ones second chances when they make mistakes, because we believe they can improve. We don’t want to be harsh or cruel to those we love.

The issue however is that how we deal with our family is largely up to our own discretion and is voluntary.

When those values are imposed by the government – and when those values are applied to strangers – that’s where things go seriously wrong.

The left hijacks the idea of sharing and twists it around into forcing the most productive members of society to give more and more of their income to the government, who then turn around and ‘redistribute’ it to less productive strangers – after taking a cut for themselves and the bloated bureaucracy of course.

The left talks about ‘second chances,’ but applies that to the most vicious and dangerous criminals who get chance after chance after chance to victimize more innocent people.

The left opposes ‘harsh budget cuts’ or ‘cruel tough-on-crime policies,’ yet provinces and countries often must make harsh decisions to prevent debt crises, and criminals often must be dealt with harshly when being reasonable and ‘forgiving’ fails.

All of this puts conservatives on the defensive from the outset, because the left-wing socialist perspective ‘feels nice’ to many people, even as they recognize it doesn’t work logically. That’s why Jagmeet Singh constantly polls high in terms of personal ratings even as he spouts nonsense. What he says often seems ‘nice’ and ‘caring,’ and is easier to promote than someone talking about the difficult decisions facing our country and the need for real trade-offs.

Thus, the Alberta election results in some ways represent a reprieve from what would have been a disastrous socialist takeover of Alberta. But until we can directly counter the way that the rebranded neo-communists have hijacked values and the framing of issues, we will always face a significant challenge in confronting them.

What this means is that it is essential for us to promote a vision that appeals to other deeply ingrained aspects of human nature, like our drive to achieve, our belief in the heroic potential of great individuals, our desire to expand our wealth and influence, to compete, to rise above our challenges, to move beyond mediocrity. There is a very positive and uplifting message to be shared that is compatible with confronting reality, rather than evading it.

And so, the results of the Alberta election can give us the confidence to know that there are many people who reject the radicalism of the far left. And that confidence can be the foundation of a nationwide countermovement that confronts and defeats the rising tide of neo-communism in our land.

Click to join the mailing list so you can receive his exclusive weekly column for NCC supporters right to your inbox.