Danielle Smith’s plan to meet on a Calgary stage with far-right American bloviator Tucker Carlson on January 24 has generated a surprising amount of what passes for serious commentary in Canadian media lately.
Much of it, credulously citing the far-fetched excuses proffered by the Premier’s Office, is unintentionally hilarious.
According to Smith’s press secretary, “the premier participates in a variety of public and private events and does interviews with dozens of reporters, broadcasters and podcasters from across the political spectrum. Obviously, she does not subscribe to every view of every interviewer or reporter she speaks with, whether that’s the CBC, the Toronto Star or Tucker Carlson.
“The premier aims to share Alberta’s message with as many people as possible, whether they’re from Alberta, Canada or around the world,” the press secretary concluded.
The Beaverton, a satirical publication, hit the right note about this nonsense: “Criticism is brewing over the baffling choice to invite a right-wing demagogue and prominent anti-vaxxer to meet with Tucker Carlson.”
I’m here to tell you why Smith is going to go ahead and appear on a stage with Carlson.
1. Basically, she agrees with him
Asked about a specific offensive view held Carlson – promoting white replacement theory, calling for violent regime change in Canada, defending Donald Trump’s January 6 coup attempt south of the Medicine Line, whatever – the premier’s defenders will always say she doesn’t quite see it like that. Often though, there’s not really that much light between them. If she disagrees with anyone mentioned by her staffer, it’s most likely with the likes of the CBC and the Star. Real journalists who have some standards, in other words.
2. She’s a Tucker fan girl
After all, as The Beaverton kidded us, in her broadcasting career, she’s essentially a less successful version of the same thing, an offensively provocative far-right radio host whose unexpected political resurrection depends on the radical fringe she wound up on her radio show. Like Smith, Carlson was eventually fired by his right-wing bosses because his views were too much even for them. So they have the potential to form a mutual admiration society, one supposes, which would be pretty nauseating to watch.
3. It eases her most serious political problem
Smith’s most serious political problem right now is the Take Back Alberta insurgents who control her party. To many of them, presumably, Carlson is too left wing. If she starts to look like she’s soft on the hard right’s favoured issues, she’s going to be in trouble sooner than if she offends Alberta’s moderate middle. She’s not a moderate, but as others have pointed out, she’s moderate compared to TBA, which is about all that’s left of the UCP at this point. This is driving her rhetoric, and her policy, right now. Her appearance with Carlson will shore up that base. She’ll worry about sounding somewhat more sensible again later.
4. She can get away with it
Smith has a history of getting away with outrageous stuff. She was dismissed along with everyone else on the Calgary Board of Education in October 1998 after it descended into dysfunctional fighting, a situation for which Smith deserves much of the credit. She was rewarded with a post as a scab editorialist at the Calgary Herald. She returned to politics in 2009 with more success and was soon leader of the Wildrose Party. It looked for a time like the party could form government, but the results of the 2012 election were disappointing. She destroyed her political career a second time in December 2014, when she crossed the floor of the Legislature with several MLAs and returned to the bosom of the Progressive Conservative Party, leaving the Wildrose base feeling betrayed.
Her second political resurrection in 2022 after a long and doubtless disheartening spell as a radio talk jock is well known and need not be described in detail here. One is reminded of the words Winston Churchill may or may not have said on the topic of floor crossing, to which he was no stranger: “Anyone can rat, but it takes a certain amount of ingenuity to re-rat.”
Smith has plenty of evidence she can get away with saying or doing anything and still be a political success. To borrow a turn of phrase from Donald Trump, a politician with whom she has many similarities, she could probably stand in the middle of the 8th Avenue Mall and shoot somebody and she wouldn’t lose voters.
So she might just be right.
That’s more virtual ink than this topic deserves. But that sums up in four understandable points why Smith will be on stage in Calgary on January 24 – as long as Carlson doesn’t get cold feet and decide his reputation might be irreparably harmed.
NOTE: Much has been made on social media of the fact it was Lyle Oberg, recently appointed by Ms. Smith as chair of the board of Alberta Health Services, who dissolved the Calgary Board of Education in 1998 and sent her and her fellow trustees packing. This is seen as ironic. It is said here it is not. Although her fledgling political career (seemingly) may have been collateral damage, Smith and Oberg were essentially on the same side, the government’s side, in a fight with feisty progressive trustees who were willing to stand up for public education. Dave Cournoyer’s four posts on the CBOE debacle are a good primer on what happened. DJC
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