Thought For The Day

Jewish mayor of Edmonton. Muslim mayor of Calgary. And now a female Premier of Alberta. Are we still redneck central? According to the Globe And Mail, probably so, given their print edition for this story read "Alberta Moves Into Present".

Seriously?

Vox Populi

Today is the election for the mayor of Calgary. There are fifteen candidates on the ballot today; I'm ineligible to vote given my non-citizenship, but it's been fascinating to watch the coverage all the same. 

The three main candidates were the long-time alderman Ric McIver, conservative, with the reputation of "Dr. No". Also were the former CTV news anchor Barb Higgins (think the Calgary version of Christa Ackroyd, but not quite as orange), and the left-leaning Naheed Nenshi, former professor at Mount Royal university in Southern Calgary. Nenshi leads by 14,000 votes with about 65% of the votes counted. So far, there are 185,000 votes counted, dwarfing the turnout of previous elections. There have been long queues and voting extended beyond the 8pm deadline, such has been the interest. Most people at work disappeared at 6pm to go and vote.

For the people of the city to pick a brown, muslim man as mayor -who was unheard of a few months ago- in this supposedly bluer-than-blue ultra-conservative province, will hopefully do something to dispel the image of Calgary as a town full of rednecks. It isn't.