Alberta Advantage Podcast

Building a Community Movement for Better Transit feat. James Wilt: Saturday, March 18th | University of Alberta. RSVP: michaeljanz.ca/transitcamp2023

A few short years into Alberta PC Premier Ralph Klein’s deficit-slashing austerity regime, Calgary’s hospital laundry workers were given devastating news: they were going to be fired. Having been pushed to the brink, they took to the streets the next day on a wildcat strike. Soon, the city would be galvanized by the strike, with sympathy strikes soon forcing Klein’s government to cancel health spending cuts and talk of a general strike in the air.

Our episode ends with an excerpt from Yvette Lynch, laundry worker and CUPE 8 member.

Listen to our previous episode on TORIES: Peter Lougheed, and check out our two-part series on why Ralph Klein sucked: Part 1, Part 2.

Further Reading: Chambers, Allan. Fighting Back: The 1995 Calgary Laundry Workers Strike. Edmonton: Alberta Federation of Labour and Alberta Labour History Institute, 2012..

Foster, Jason. “Revolution, Retrenchment, and the New Normal: The 1990s and Beyond.” In Working People in Alberta: A History, edited by Alvin Finkel, 205–241. Edmonton: AU Press, 2012.

Reshef, Yonaton, and Sandra Rastin. Unions in the Time of Revolution: Government Restructuring in Alberta and Ontario. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003.

Taylor, Jeff. “Labour in the Klein Revolution.” In The Trojan Horse: Alberta and the Future of Canada, edited by Gordon Laxer and Trevor Harrison, 301–313. Montreal: Black Rose Books, 1995.

Culture wars, long-term injury, workplace violence, sexual assaults, nationalistic militarism, and the appropriation of working-class aesthetics... is it possible to like hockey from the left? Can sport unite the working class? Is hockey a serious game for serious men, or a silly game for silly people? Cass Kislenko, Tyler Shipley and Doug Nesbitt join Team Advantage to discuss Canada's game.

Doug mentions the short film Valery's Ankle by Brett Kashmere.

Tyler refers to the 2016 film Hello Destroyer.

Follow Cass Kislenko @redkislenko Follow Tyler Shipley @le_shipster Definitely don't follow Doug Nesbitt because he's not @standingthegaff

The conclusion of our compelling Social Credit series! Team Advantage takes a hard look at Premier Ernest Manning, his religious views (and how these impact his politics), the discovery of oil in Leduc 1947 and Alberta's emerging relationship with large multinational corporations, paranoia over CCF-style welfare-state programs, and some absolutely shocking antisemitism.

Team Advantage discusses actual facts and realities about pipelines! Joining the show are Ian Hussey, research manager with the Parkland Institute, and Emma Jackson, research assistant with the Parkland Institute. The gang has a honest conversation about landlocks, tidewater, "energy diversification" and fossil fuel subsidies, climate targets, labour, just transition, and more.

Have you herd? There's a new Canada Food Guide advising us to eat our fruits and veggies. This is clearly a plot by George Soros and the Global Elite to attack Alberta's precious, precious beef industry. Our environment is, in fact, maintained by our dear methane-emitting bovines! Team Advantage does a close read of Danielle Smith's incredibly well-informed, smart, intelligent, brilliant, sharp, keen, astute, intuitive, perceptive, and discerning argument. Danielle Smith: If you care about the planet, eat more beef [January 25, 2019] https://calgaryherald.com/opinion/columnists/smith-if-you-care-about-the-planet-eat-more-beef