"Don't let them tell you it can't be done."

A year ago, would any of us have imagined, even in our wildest dreams, that the New Democrats of Alberta would win a provincial election? I have crazed dreams but nothing as strange as Rachel Notley winning a majority government in a province that has kept the Conservatives in power for over forty years.






Back in 2011, no one gave the NDP any thought of electing MPs in Quebec. Yet the NDP did.





Now the Liberals and Conservatives will tell us, the NDP has no hope at winning a national election; that becoming Canada's Official Opposition was just a fluke, a one-time event that won't happen again. Liberals, and their friends in the media, will remind us that they are the natural governing party; that they are entitled to govern. Again.




There are several things to remember with last night's election in Alberta:

First: it can be done, if we work together. Rachel Notley didn't make last night happen all by herself. Albertans came together to create change.

Second: only New Democrats defeat Conservatives, even in Stephen Harper's heartland. And let's be honest about the two parties on the right: Liberals and Conservatives are both parties on the right.

It was the Liberal Party that cut funding to the CBC.

It was the Liberal Party that signed the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change, then did nothing. Absolutely nothing.

It is the Liberal Party of Justin Trudeau that voted for Stephen Harper's  Bill C-51.

So.

"Don't let them tell you it can't be done."  Jack Layton, 20 August 2011.

We're all in this together. For what matters.



by Jim Murray. Copyright 2015.