NIKIFORUK What Brought Down the Petrostate Premier?

[Oscar]

What Brought Down the Petrostate Premier?

[ http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2014/08/09/Br ... e-Premier/ ]

It may be impolite, but there's one major culprit Alberta needs to address.

By Andrew Nikiforuk, August 9, 2014 TheTyee.ca

Sometimes the fall of a political leader can tell you as much about the political geography of a place as it does about the character of the politician.

One, after all, creates the other. And the demise of Alison Redford, a millionaire lawyer, is a case in point.

Her misuse of public funds and departure from politics not only mirrors the state of the Progressive Conservative party (it has ruled for 43 years), but reflects something fundamentally wrong with Alberta's democracy.

It's an uncomfortable point. Every petrostate, including Texas and Russia, suffers from an exclusive form of narcissism: oil exporters think they are better than everyone else because they are sitting on piles of the world's most lucrative commodity. In turn, that feeds an arrogant culture of entitlement.

The auditor general's report on Redford's unique approach to travel expenses should also be read as a rebuke of the province's political culture. It is worth citing in full.

"Premier Redford and her office used public resources inappropriately. They consistently failed to demonstrate in the documents we examined that their travel expenses were necessary and a reasonable and appropriate use of public resources -- in other words economical and in support of a government business objective. Premier Redford used public assets (aircraft) for personal and partisan purposes. And Premier Redford was involved in a plan to convert public space in a public building into personal living space."

How then did things get so bad?

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[ http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2014/08/09/Br ... e-Premier/ ]