Never without her BlackBerry, Wildrose Alliance leadership hopeful Danielle Smith gets her message out.Todd Korol
In 1971, the year Danielle Smith was born, Alberta Progressive Conservatives wrestled power away from the Social Credit Party, which had run the provincial government since the Depression.
That unlikely victory was led by Peter Lougheed, a bright, media-savvy Calgary lawyer. Today, Ms. Smith, cutting a comparable figure, aspires to put an end to the Tory dynasty Mr. Lougheed launched nearly four decades ago. Well-spoken and telegenic, she may be the resource-rich province's great right hope for people weary of the Tories' deficit-laden ways.
A telephone poll this week by the Citizen Society Research Lab at Lethbridge College had the Tories holding the lead with 38.4 per cent, but Ms. Smith's right-wing upstart Wildrose Alliance second at 21.5.
Many people are betting on the former media commentator and lobbyist to expand that base. But first she must win a tough leadership vote next Saturday against Mark Dyrholm, a 38-year-old chiropractor, former Reform Party organizer and anti-abortion conservative with a formidable political machine, who charges that Ms. Smith is too socially liberal.
Ms. Smith knows buzz alone won't elect her. "If we can't convince people to buy memberships and vote for me, then all the media coverage is going to be for naught," she says.
While Ms. Smith may be new to provincial politics, she has already gained the support of Alberta's conservative elite. "I'm hopeful that, under Danielle's leadership, the party could … become a serious contender," says Tom Flanagan, the University of Calgary political scientist who helped to groom Stephen Harper for the Prime Minister's Office.
Ms. Smith had been a lifelong Tory until this year. But Premier Ed Stelmach's government changed that: "There's nothing left that is conservative about this party at all except their name," she says.
She criticizes the royalty rate the province is charging oil companies, and finally abandoned the Tories in April after the government tabled a budget that projected a historic $4.7-billion deficit while still green-lighting double-digit spending.
That disillusionment sent her into the arms of the "big-tent conservative alternative" that has set its sights on similarly disgruntled Tory voters, including its bedrock rural constituency.
Ms. Smith credits Link Byfield, a respected Edmonton-area social conservative, with helping to persuade her to leave her job at the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and join the race.
"I've always had this sense that she should be premier," says Mr. Byfield, a Wildrose founding member and former publisher of the defunct Alberta Report magazine, which played a key role in supporting the federal Reform Party.
Conservative credentials
Ms. Smith was born and raised in Calgary - a rarity in Alberta, where most people hail from someplace else - in a middle-class family with four siblings where political debates were common at the dinner table. She attended the University of Calgary, where she majored in English and economics.
In 1996, she started a year-long internship at the Fraser Institute, the country's leading conservative think tank. Since then, her résumé has expanded to include work with the Canadian Property Rights Research Institute and other lobby groups and hosting a national current-affairs program for Global Television.
Her entree into politics came in 1998 as a trustee with the Calgary Public School Board, a period marred by infighting between right- and left-leaning members. In 1999, Alberta's Learning Minister declared the board "completely dysfunctional" and fired all of them.
Jennifer Pollock, a Liberal and a third-term trustee at the time, recalls Ms. Smith's determination and, not flatteringly, single-mindedness. "I don't think people should vote for her," Ms. Pollock says, comparing her former colleague to Stephen Harper - a parallel Ms. Smith's supporters make in a much more positive way.
Like Mr. Harper, she was mentored at the University of Calgary by the members of the conservative "Calgary School." But while her free-market bona fides are secure, her pro-choice views on abortion and her support of same-sex marriage are a barrier for many right-wing voters. Mr. Byfield is trying to convince his fellow social conservatives that Ms. Smith is the only candidate who can lead them to power.
Ms. Smith herself argues that the party will remain at the province's political fringes if it focuses too much on issues such as abortion. "The 'single issues' aren't top-of-mind for most Albertans," she says. "If we go into an election talking about things that are going to cause division, we aren't going to be successful in building that big tent."
Prof. Flanagan, a central Calgary School figure and architect of the Reform Party, believes Ms. Smith "potentially could have national impact" - although he says it's "too speculative to discuss" whether she might eventually end up in federal politics.
Other charter Calgary School members, political scientists Barry Cooper and Rainer Knopff, are also endorsing her campaign. "Alberta was the first to elect women MLAs and women MPs and we could be the first to have a female premier," Prof. Cooper points out. "That would be good. Rednecks can be feminists. That will irritate all the people who don't like Alberta."
Chaldeans Mensah, a political-science professor at Grant MacEwan University in Edmonton, says Ms. Smith's blend of views would help her both in the leadership race and a general election. "What is likely to tip the race in her favour is there's a sense that she represents something dynamic and new," he says.
But Keith Brownsey, a political scientist at Mount Royal University in Calgary, points out that despite Ms. Smith's profile, Mr. Dyrholm has the rallying and fundraising chops of Craig Chandler, a noted Alberta religious conservative, behind him. "Chandler can organize like nobody's business," Prof. Brownsey says.
In Prof. Mensah's opinion, a Dyrholm win would be a blow for a party that has made impressive gains in membership and interest in just a few months. "I think there will be a huge disappointment if she fails to win this contest."