With two weeks of electioneering to go until the final ballot in the Alberta Progressive Conservative leadership election, any of the three candidates still standing after Saturday's first-ballot vote could emerge as the winner.

So it seems highly unlikely any of the three will drop out of the race "for the good of the party" before Oct. 1, as some naïve observers were suggesting in the wake of the ballot counting Saturday night.

That said, with more than 13,000 votes over second-place finisher Alison Redford, Gary Mar remains the front-runner by a considerable, some would say comfortable, margin.

Politics, as Carl von Clausewitz didn't exactly say, is merely a slightly more civilized version of war. Thus, among the immutable laws of politics is this one: When in doubt, shoot those whose loyalty is in question and blame your communications people.