Court Painter seems obsessed with painting more white elephants .
Meanwhile his trusty Press Attache AHM read and recommends this article by Max Fawcett where he sets up the premise that Prime Minister Carney knows the pipeline will never get built while achieving concessions that help advance his government’s climate agenda far more than anything the previous federal government managed to achieve in, and with, Alberta.
Premier Smith & Prime Minister Carney appear to tussle in the elephant room.
Click link for National Observer November 27th 2025 article by Max Fawcett
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2025/11/27/opinion/method-mark-carney-madness
The method to Mark Carney’s madness
Excerpts from article:
‘This MOU strikes me as one giant wink to the climate community — one that commits Ottawa to supporting an oil pipeline Carney knows will never get built.
That’s because Smith and whoever steps up as its proponent will still need to negotiate with impacted First Nations.
They would have to negotiate with BC Premier David Eby, who will be looking ahead to the next election and the prospect of rallying his base around fighting back against another Alberta oil pipeline.
And, most importantly, they will have to convince the oil and gas industry to invest in the sort of high-cost growth projects that would be needed to fill the pipeline.
That isn’t going to happen.
Court Painter’s pictorial rendering of the reasons an oil pipeline will not get built.
The oil and gas industry may have deliberately cultivated a reputation for itself as a place defined by risk-taking and swagger, but today’s oil and gas sector is run by glorified spreadsheet jockeys who consistently shy away from even the smallest quantum of uncertainty.
And while they might support the political ambitions of Premier Smith and the UCP, but they have a legal fiduciary duty to their shareholders — one that requires them to seriously assess the prospect of things like peak oil demand and its impact on any new projects they might want to build.
The MOU, then, is textbook Carney. By telling a political adversary what they wanted to hear, he’s gotten them to agree to something he needs.
A white elephant
He’s effectively daring Danielle Smith to do the work required to get her coveted pipeline built, knowing full well she can’t actually do it.
But Smith’s concessions help advance his government’s climate agenda far more than anything the previous federal government managed to achieve in, and with, Alberta.
For a guy who wasn’t supposed to be a natural politician, he’s turning out to be pretty good at it — better, even, than the one he replaced. ‘
Alberta Premier Smith strikes a triumphant pose over a smiling PM. Carney
Court Painter resting after his prodigious pachyderm painting production.