Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spent two days in Calgary and Edmonton, March 29 and 30, the second time in 2016 he has come to the province.
Here's the good news: Alberta is part of his political geography and its second year of distress, triggered by low global oil prices, is in his political calculus.
In contrast, all that his father Pierre knew about Alberta's geography was that he flew over it to get from Ottawa to Vancouver. And he schemed to pirate its oil and gas wealth.
The backdrop to Trudeau's visit was the province's 7.9 per cent seasonally adjusted unemployment rate, up 50 per cent compared to 5.4 per cent a year ago.
Canada has seven provinces in which crude oil and natural gas production has become economically significant in the boom years so the oil price problem is a national one.
However Alberta's hydrocarbon sector dwarfs them all. Its oilsands and the interprovincial pipelines to take it to market are centrepieces of the national political conversation.
Here are two things we learned from Mr. Sunny Ways and Sunny Days during his two-day pilgrimage:
He has no silver bullet to fix Alberta's economic problems.
Don't hold your breath waiting for a new pipeline during his term of office.
The federal government can protect the integrity of the currency. But creating jobs, pricing crude oil or choice of individuals between the economy and the environment and between pipelines and poverty is beyond its reach.
One reason that the province is small “c” conservative is that most people here know the limits of government.
And Justin Trudeau's honeymoon with voters – even in skeptical Alberta – isn't over yet.
Here's the question that he left unanswered:
He talks, but does he listen?
He gave more “exclusive” interviews to reporters than the number of roundtables he sat through. Those interviews were used to justify his decisions and the journalists who conducted them did not challenge him toughly.
Not an admission of missteps. Not a promise to think about whether or not he should change a small thing.
His policies are as perfect as his hair.
And we Albertans should just say thank you.
- Frank Dabbs is the editor of the Didsbury Review and a veteran political and business journalist. He has written four books and edited several more.
