May 2026
Re: “Danielle Smith started a fire and Alberta — and Canada — will suffer for it” (Toronto Sun, Warren Kinsella, 27 May 2026):
I’ve said before that you ignore Warren Kinsella’s political advice at your own peril, but I would still like to inject my perspective into the conversation. While I do agree with Warren and Karl Belanger that Smith has opened up a messy can of worms by advocating for the referendum to proceed, my take is a little more pragmatic.
I believe Smith is banking on two things happening. Firstly, after the inevitable loss, Smith can say to the separatists, including those in her own caucus, that Albertans have spoken and they reject the ideal of separation. The separatists certainly won’t like a loss and given Quebec’s example, probably won’t stop advocating for separation, but at least she can argue that they had their chance.
Secondly, I feel that if Smith deep-sixes the referendum, it could lead to a split in the UCP, with a separatist faction forming a new right-wing party, and we all know what happened the last time that happened at the federal level. This is a golden opportunity for Carey to throw cold water on the separatist movement by rapidly getting pipelines and port facilities built to transport Alberta’s ethical oil and natural gas to international markets. It certainly won’t kill the separatist movement, but one step at a time.
Maybe Carney can accomplish this before the Maple Leafs win the Stanley Cup again, now that activist and convicted criminal Steven Gilbeault is leaving the caucus. Along with Climate Barbie, Gilbeault has done massive damage to Canada’s economy and Canadians quality of life. Let’s get our country back on track.
In a related story, does anyone want to lay any bets on what will happen first: Carney allowing pipelines to get built, preferably by the private sector, or the Leafs winning the cup? Yeah, that’s a tough one!
************************
Sources: https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/danielle-smith-alberta-started-fire-separatists.
KINSELLA: Danielle Smith started a fire and Alberta — and Canada — will suffer for it
The premier legitimized the separatists and their mission. It’s completely delusional to believe they are going to give up.
“When you have a problem and no solution” — and here he shrugged — “you have a way of life.”
The barber worked not far from the Prime Minister’s Office in Ottawa, and spent many years offering wisdom to MPs and senators. And he was right, of course.
His aphorism applies, these days, to Alberta’s erstwhile premier, Danielle Smith. Smith has a big problem, one entirely of her own making. To mix metaphors, Smith has let loose a rabid dog in her own backyard — presumably to keep Ottawa at bay.
But now the rabid dog is biting her.
Smith’s big mistake
Woulda, coulda, shoulda. If Smith had any political smarts at all, she would have said no to the separatists in her own UCP caucus, and she would have never agreed to embrace separatism. She would have never allowed a referendum on Alberta separation to happen. She would have done what Peter Lougheed and Ralph Klein and Jason Kenney always did — fearlessly defend Alberta’s interests, but within Canada.
Instead, she has chosen to offer up a vomitous, byzantine 37-word salad, and thereby place the country — and Alberta — at risk. She has chosen to stir up division and anger that will last for months.
And, say those who know, it will last for years, too.
Her referendum to destroy Canada will not succeed. The Angus Reid polling people did a survey in the wake of Smith’s announcement. Nearly 70% of Albertans said they’d vote “no” to a question that simply asks whether Alberta should leave Canada, or stay in Canada. And nearly 60% say Smith has handled the issue poorly, and half of the province wants her to quit.
She won’t, of course, because she’s politically illiterate.
It was all avoidable. Recent history in the province of Quebec could have saved Smith lots of trouble. Ask Karl Belanger. He knows.
Belanger, full disclosure, is a friend. Karl’s a francophone, he lives in Quebec, he’s a broadcaster and a regular on my Kinsellacast podcast. And he was the guy who helped Jack Layton’s NDP win a historic breakthrough in Quebec in 2011 — reducing the Liberal Party to third place for the first time in its history. So, he knows a thing or two about Canada, federalism and separatism.
Karl’s take: Danielle Smith has made Alberta separatism a permanent feature of our politics.
“Well,” says Karl, “she’s in over her head, it seems, and she created this monster by campaigning on it for the leadership of the UCP. But she’s lost control. She’s trying to get control back by creating this process that’s supposed to please everyone. But I think she’s making huge mistakes — a huge mistake, both for her political future, but also for national unity.”
There’s a lesson to be learned from Quebec’s never-endum referendums, Belanger says.
“The lesson from Quebec separatism is that (the separatists) don’t move on,” he says. “They keep going. They organize. And now she has given them not only a platform to campaign on, but also a tool to organize, get more names — to be emboldened to keep fighting for this.” He pauses. “It won’t disappear. Maybe you get a pipeline through B.C., but it won’t disappear. That’s not what this is about. And that’s the mistake she’s making.”
Smith has legitimized the separatists and their mission. And, now that they have money and organizers and some credibility, it’s completely delusional to believe Alberta secessionists are going to give up, Karl says.
“They will not move on. Quebec has proven it,” he says. “We are on our way to a third referendum here. And I remember when the Bloc Quebecois was elected in 1993 they were supposed to be there for one election. How long has it been?”
Belanger concludes. “It’s not even that she legitimized that separatist movement. She’s enabled it! She’s made it easier for them to get this thing going. She was using it as a tool, as a bargaining chip against the federal government, but it’s backfiring — big time.
“As I said when she first started to talk about this: This is a very dangerous game. She was playing with fire, and guess what? It’s burning right now.”
Danielle Smith created a problem for herself, and she doesn’t have a solution.
And so, for Canada and Alberta, she has created a way of life.
