We all hoped it would work. I did, certainly. Only a sadist would want Alberta’s Open for Summer plan to fail. In this I will offer some defence of premier Jason Kenney and, by extension, myself — it wasn’t crazy to announce the lifting COVID-19 restrictions back in May, back when all of the comparative nations were showing promising signs of exponential decay in case rates along with rising vaccination. It was a risk, and that was pointed out. Many Albertans and many others in other provinces fretted. But there was a sound basis for daring to hope that increasing vaccinations would decouple severe outcomes from case rates, allowing us to re-open without imperilling health-care access.
So if Kenney is fucked (and he is), it’s not just because he and others were wrong, per se, but especially because he bet so much on being right. Jason Kenney laid his own table, picked the game, dealt the cards, checked his hand, nodded in confident satisfaction, and then pushed all of his own remaining political capital into the pot.
And then he lost.
Remember, reader, the premier was chest-deep in it when the pandemic seemed like it might be petering out in May. His approval ratings sat at historic lows — below even that of the approval of Justin Trudeau in Alberta. On his left flank, Albertans furious with his handling of COVID-19 to date wanted harsher restrictions to reduce the risk of unmitigated spread. On his right flank, and within his own caucus, an increasingly restive civil libertarian wing unhappy with even existing restrictions seemed to be on the verge of open revolt. Two members of the UCP caucus were booted from the party after one called on Kenney to resign. Things were not going well.
The sensible approach would have been the cautious one. Kenney could have inched into easing COVID-19 restrictions, gradually lifting masking, capacity limitations and the like, promising nothing, always warning that an increase in cases would force him to pull back.
But the premier needed a win. He needed to be able to gloat — to hang our Best Summer Ever over his critics and enemies’ heads. He left himself no exit strategy, and no escape hatch. In the Return to Normal, Kenney saw a way to bridge his fractured caucus and rebuild his damaged political brand ahead of the next election. So he we went all in, baby. Leeroy Jenkins-style. While it was, indeed, very good summer, Kenney has now lost the game playing the hand he chose. He’s not the hapless victim of the shuffle of fate.
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See Also:
(1) Disastrous miscalculation: Premier and health officer under fire during COVID update
(2) Where The Hell Is All Our Healthcare Money Going?
(3) Average age of Canadian COVID deaths is 86
(4) Study Shows Vaccine Will ENHANCE Delta Infectivity
(5) How Jason Kenney became the biggest issue sapping Conservative support
