In case Alberta politics isn't a hot enough topic, we're spending this episode on the intersection of religion and the machinery of public governance!In 2015 the Supreme Court of Canada decided in the Saturday Decision that prayer at municipal governments violates the states duty to neutrality, but is that decision being followed?To take this on, w…

To call the last Alberta legislative session a whirlwind is certainly an understatement!Where the Kenney government introduced single bills that were full of changes, making it hard for Albertans to follow, the Smith administration has instead just turned on a firehose of bills...Making it hard for Albertans to follow. So to try and make sense of a…

It's another Alberta Politics roundup and open mic!We take a look at David Staples spreading right wing astroturf propaganda, the Western Standard making bank off of the feds decisions, the healthcare voucher system, the UCP's noncologist event and the condem,national of it from the medical community, Shannon Phillips retiring from politics, Smith …

On this episode we take a look at Derek Fildebrandts new criminal charges, we do a deep dive on coal mining and who's behind it, we talk about insurance costs, the state of healthcare in Alberta, Alison Redford new appointment and more!Look for Part 2 with our open mic soon!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, includin…

With NDP members receiving their ballots across the province, we've put all of our conversations with the remaining leadership candidates together in one marathon episode!It starts with Kathleen Ganley, followed by Sarah Hoffman at 31:19, Naheed Nenshi at 1:20:42 and ending with Jodi Calahoo Stonehouse at 2:25:00!Don't forget, we now have merch tha…

In June 2023, Chilliwack Progress Editor Paul Henderson was fired for tweets criticizing those offering little more than "thoughts and prayers" in response to the near-drowning of a local child. In this presentation for the BC Humanist Association, Paul speaks about his firing and his time covering the religious right in the Fraser Valley. Read mor…

With the Western Standard episode out of the way, we’re back with a conversation with Jeremy Appel to talk about his book "Kenneyism"!In this chat we get into why Jeremy wrote the book, we unpack the mind of Kenney a bit and we talk about the future of Alberta politics with a contrast between Smith and Kenney!Don't forget, we now have merch that's …

In 2019, Derek Fildebrandt revived Ezra Levant's former publication th Western Standard and set about building a media empire out of Western Canada that was predicated on (among other things) not accepting any government funding. But can they really say that they don't accept any government funding and that they don't get taxpayer money?Over that l…

CONTENT NOTE: Parts of this discussion touch on child abuse and suicide. Perry Bulwer is the author of Misguided: My Jesus Freak Life in a Doomsday Cult. Misguided is a unique first-hand account of a life spent in the Children of God, a/k/a The Family, a millenarian doomsday sex cult under the sway of a charismatic leader, David Berg. In 1972, Perr…

It's time for a conversation with new Alberta Party leader, Lindsay Amantea!With more than a few pundits and political scientists making it clear that they believe Alberta is now inexorably a two party state, you have to wonder why the Alberta Party and it's leader believe that they have a place in the political conversation, and we pose exactly th…

Welcome to Episode 6.31, an in depth deep dive on Bills 18 & 20 with Political Scientist Dr. Lisa Young!In this conversation that is quite the ride, we hear from Dr. Young on what Bills 18 & 20 do and also what the implications are for the province of Alberta in both the short term and the long term, including an important call to action!Don't forg…

It's our final interview of the NDP Leadership race, and we're sitting down with non other than Gil McGowan!In this conversation, we get Gil's thoughts on the economy, healthcare, the future of the NDP and a whole lot more, including his reaction to Bill 20 and the UCP's chronic overreach!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.abpo…

Here's the Speakers Corner from our April 28th show!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, including a spring lineup!As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we’re trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/thebreakdownab.…

Time for another Alberta Politics roundup!On this episode we take a look at the saga of the anonymous letter to the UCP alleging conflict of interest in the halls of Edmonton CIty Hall, Danielle Smiths 2nd (!) $2 million COVID panel, the recent appointment of one of Danielle Smith's mentors to the Alberta Energy Regulator before we do a deep dive o…

Dr Wesley is a political scientists and professor at the Univeristy of Alberta who specializes in taking a look at not only how Albertans see themselves, but also how they believe other Albertans see the world around them as well!Dr. Wesley does these investigations through his organization, Common Ground and recently he and his team completed some…

Welcome to episode 6.27, a conversation with Harm Reduction and recovery advocate Guy Felicella!Guy made headlines recently when he was barred from a recovery conference in Calgary, and he generously sat down with us to explain what happened, but we get into a whole lot more than that, including the nature of recovery, the crossover of BC and Alber…

Time for another panel!With the political temperature in Alberta reaching a rolling boil over Calgary and Edmonton initiating blanket rezoning (even though Edmonton has completed the rezoning already), particularly to access federal housing funding, we decided it was time for another deep dive!To make sense of this we’re joined by Robert Tremblay o…

It's another Alberta Politics roundup and what a week!EMS profitization! Policing subsidization! Why is misrepresented BC drug policy playing such a big role in Alberta politics right now? We debunk a boatload of myths and we do a deep dive on Danielle Smith's Bill 18 and its attack on municipalities, post secondary education and well... pretty muc…

There’s a lot of conversation around the physician shortage in Alberta, but how did we go from being on of the most appealing provinces for physicians to practice in to one that is struggling to even fill residencies?To get some answers, we sat down with President of the Alberta Medical Association, Dr Paul Parks! But we don’t stop at the physician…

With incredible advocate Guy Felicella being banned from attending a recovery conference in Calgary this week, we figured it was time for a throwback to our episode originally aired on August 28, 2023!We are SO excited to present our conversation, with survivor, advocate and all around amazing person Guy Felicella! This is one of the most intense e…

We sit down again with Disability Advocate Don Slater to get his thoughts on how the provincial budget affects disabled Albertans, unintended consequences for the fight against the carbon tax, the erosion of social contact and a whole lot more!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, including a cold weather lineup!As alwa…

It's Part 2 of our March 31 episode and this is our speakers corner! You don't want to miss this one because not only do we hear from a few of our regular speakers but we also hear from advocate and politico Anna Murphy!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, including a cold weather lineup!As always, if you appreciate th…

It's time for another Alberta Politics Roundup and Speakers Corner and sure enough, this episode goes so long we're breaking it into two parts!In Part 1, we take a look at the recent Take Back Alberta troubles, the effect of the houselessness processing facility in Edmonton, the status of the grassy mountain coal mine, the latest on the NDP Leaders…

Bettianne Hedges of Humanist Canada hosts Leslie Rosenblood from Centre for Inquiry Canada alongside Teale Phelps Bondaroff and Ian Bushfield of the BC Humanist Association, who will discuss the many ways Canada still tangibly privileges religion and its institutions over similar non-theistic organizations. Just a few policy choices cost Canadians …

We've been working on having conversations with all of the candidates for the NDP Leadership, but as you'll see this conversation is more than a little different, and it's because what Jodi brings to the table is very different than any of the other candidates.Not only do we get into all of the same topics that we have addressed with the other cand…

We're continuing in our efforts to interview all the ecandidates for the NDP Leadership Race and we're very excited to present this conversation with Naheed Nenshi! We cover housing, energy, affordable housing, Grassy Mountain, renewables, and a whole lot more in this episode!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, includ…

In this episode, we're talking education with members of the Edmonton Public School Advocacy Network, Nancy Hunt, Jodi McDonald, Nancy Kirkpatrick! The UCP government introduced their new budget recently, and that's budget sees funding for private schools and early childhood centres increasing at four times the rate of public K-12 spending, the EPS…

In this episode we're addressing the rumors surrounding former MLA, Minister and Deputy Premier Thomas Lukaszuks alleged entry to the NDP Leadership race, But wait, there's more!We also cover the RCMP investigation into the UCP Leadership race, the provincial budget, TBA and a whole lot more!Don't forget, we now have merch that's available at www.a…

We're back for another roundup of Alberta Politics and the last week has given us a lot of big events to talk about!We start by getting into the bizarre state of counselling as a profession in Alberta before we take a look at the RCMP investigation into the 2017 UCP Leadership Race, Danielle Smith's bizarre take on Pharmacare and we end with a deep…

We're continuing on with our series with NDP leadership candidates with a conversation with current MLA and NDP Leadership Candidate, Rakhi Pancholi!As with all of our conversations so far, we get into her vision for the Alberta NDP going into the future, her position on the relationship with the federal NDP, safe supply, the carbon tax and a whole…

There's been a lot of talk about Danielle Smith's proposed policies limiting access to gender affirming care, and we've talked a lot about statistics and studies here on the show when it comes to gender affirming care...But enough of the academia.We sat down with an ACTUAL physician in Alberta who provides gender affirming care to cut through all o…

We're continuing on with our series with NDP leadership candidates with a conversation with former Justice Minister, Current MLA and Current NDP Leadership Candidate, Kathleen Ganley!As with all of our conversations so far, we get into her vision for the Alberta NDP going into the future, her position on the relationship with the federal NDP, safe …

The section of our show where Dr. David Keegan called in to share the story of his nephews death by suicide because of Smith's policies is so important and heartbreaking we decided to release a version with a few minor technical difficulties removed.

This is probably our most important episode of The Breakdown ever.We're back for our regular live round up of Alberta Politics, including the announcement of the fact Alberta intends to opt out of the new national Pharmacare program, the multiple environmental disasters that the province is inevitably facing, Smith's recent provincial address and h…

For episode 6.12, we’re proud to present this heartfelt conversation with Marni Panas! Marni is an advocate, a leader and a whole lot more, and she generously joins us to share her perspective on how Smith's anti-human rights policies already have and will continue to cause very real harm to the trans community.And we now have merch that's availabl…

On this episode we take a deep dive on the history or "Parental Rights" in Alberta and we further explore how Danielle Smith's new anti-trans, anti-choice, anti-expertise policies will affect all Albertans with Canada Research Chair for the Public Understanding of Sexual and Gender Minority Youth, Dr. Kristopher Wells!And we now have merch that's a…

With 3 official candidates for the NDP Leadership race having announced their intention to become the next leader of the NDP, we're very excited to present our first conversation with one of them!Sarah Hoffman has been a multi-term MLA, deputy premier and Minister of Health during the NDP's time in government. She joins us in this episode for a con…

After Danielle Smith announced on her radio show on January 27th that she would be introducing some gender and pronoun policies, Political Scientist Dr. Duane Bratt joined us to try and make sense of what she was saying. No one was prepared for what she actually announced though.So a week later, we're thrilled to welcome Dr. Bratt to the show for a…

Danielle Smith and the UCP have launched a series of policies attacking trans kids, the LGBTQ2S+ community, parents ability to choose medical procedures with and for their kids, teachers and the education system and the entire medical community.In this episode we fact check Dani from her launch video to several press conferences, and it becomes pre…

With the devastating news from the provincial government of their new policies targeting trans kids and minors ability to access healthcare, we wanted to have a conversation with someone who could bring some humanity to the conversation as soon as possible!Pam Rocker is a SUPER gay advocate, presenter, writer poet and a whole lot more! We are super…

Dr. Bratt is a professor of Political Science at Mount Royal University and he joins us for a conversation on the state of affairs in Alberta Politics! We start by taking a look at the potential political implications of Danielle Smith's recent appearance with Tucker Carlson before we pivot to the NDP leadership race and Danielle Smith's announceme…

Another episode so big we had to split it into two parts!In this special Part 2, we sit down with politico and strategist Sarah Biggs to try and make sense of some of the choices that were made in Alberta Politics in the last week before we open it up to our open mic!And we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, including a fall lineup!A…

Another episode so big we had to split it into two parts!In this first part, we take a look at a few of the weeks bigger Alberta Politics events before we do a complete deep dive/fact check on Tucker Carlsons recent speeches in Calgary and Edmonton!(And there's a LOT to fact check!)In the process we end up fact checking a lot of Smith's recent clai…

With Edmonton cracking down on homeless encampments and teaming up with the province to create a processing centre, as well as the UCP ignoring the overwhelming evidence that supports harm reduction, we sat down with Euan Thomson from DrugDataDecoded.ca to try to make sense of these issues as well as address safe supply, supervised consumption site…

Time for another Alberta Poliotics Roundup!This week We're talking about the oil and gas liability facing Albertans, policing in Alberta, homeless and houselessness encampments, Tucker Carlson, Rachel Notley's resignation and more!And we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, including a fall lineup!As always, if you appreciate the kind …

Time for another Alberta Poliotics Roundup!This week We're talking about the ongoing healthcare crisis, especially in EMS and in Red Deer, the infamous Tylenot Childrens Medication scandal that just keep getting worse, Fracking and the Brazeau Damn plus we go through our latest FOIP results!And we now have merch that's available at www.abpoli.ca, i…

We’re back!And we’re kicking off the new year by asking what it even means to be conservative or progressive in the province of Alberta anymore! We take a look at Danielle Smiths track record, her year and comments and we deconstruct her appearance on the “program” Alberta Update that’s run by UCP staff and paid for by taxpayers and we measure that…

We're rounding the year off by revisiting our top 10 episode of 2023 (in no particular order).Guy Felicella spent 30 years in the repeated cycle of gangs, addiction, treatment, and jail. He spent nearly twenty years residing in a two-block radius in Vancouver’s notorious Downtown Eastside. Miraculously, with sheer determination and the help of othe…

We're rounding the year off by revisiting our top 10 episode of 2023 (in no particular order).David Gray is someone with extensive knowledge of Alberta's electricity system, and he sat down with us to explain why Alberta's electricity prices went through the roof this year! He also has a long history in Alberta Politics and provided some historical…

We're rounding the year off by revisiting our top 10 episode of 2023 (in no particular order).Collin May is a highly educated lawyer who made the news in 2022 when he was appointed to be the chair of the Alberta Human Rights Commission, but that was only the start of his media coverage… Later that year, an academic book review he provided was portr…