The Breakdown With Nate Pike

With Danielle Smith announcing over $8 billion dollars to go towards building new public, charter and private schools, we sat down with Alberta Teachers Association Local 38 President to get her read on Smith's announcement, Smith's claims that education has only been in crisis for the last 18 months and the state of classrooms in general!

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By special request!

We've split off our segment from Sunday where we begin the deep dive on Danielle Smith's Skybox Scandal, starting with our recent FOIP that appears to demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt that while the UCP wrote new "ethics" rules, it didn't take them long at all before they completely violated them!

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Not only is this another Alberta politics roundup, but we're also starting to peel back the layers of the UCP Corruption onion, and it's a lot worse than you think!

We start with our regular run down of the week in Alberta politics, including The Rebel's official designation as being part of the 1%, Danielle Smith's week of dogwhistles, the recent school construction announcement and a lot more!

From there we get into our recent FOIP that appears to demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt that while the UCP wrote new "ethics" rules, it didn't take them long at all before they completely violated them as we do the first of a series of deep dives on the skybox scandal!

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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Hold my hand is an advocacy organization that works to build community for families with disabled kids and also to advocate for changes to prevent those kids from falling through the cracks!

In this extremely important conversation, we chat with Hold My Hand leaders about their work, the challenges faced by disabled kids and their parents, the lack of supports available and the difficulties in accessing them!

*Warning - This episode includes the subjects of abuse and sexual assault.

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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It seems like last week everyone was in court!

The Coutts Convicts got sentenced, a former justice minister got sanction and the published of the Western Standard, Derek Fildebrandt was in court facing allegations of threatening kids with death!

Plus there was the continued Green Line drama and Danielle Smith leaned heavily into xenophobic and racist dog whistles on the immigration file!

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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Can you deal with bad faith actors in good faith?

On this breakdown of Alberta Politics, we take a look at the Western Standards latest taxpayer funded funding, the seeming cronyism continues in the war room, changes to accessing education, Jennifer "Poop Cookies" Johnson's impending return to caucus and cabinet and...

We do a semi deep dive on both the Green Line debacle in Calgary and Danielle Smith's broken promises to Alberta's Muslim community!

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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It's time for another Alberta Politics Roundup and this one is an absolute MONSTER!

There's all kinds of news with "Take Back Alberta", Alberta is rolling out a new Bill Of Rights (of some kind?), healthcare is in crisis and so much more!

Plus we break down Danielle Smith's recent exclusive town hall in Drayton Valley and we dissect the extraordinarily bad and revealing fiscal update that ended up having almost nothing to do with Alberta's projected deficit and debt and everything to do with the continued revalations around Danielle Smith's Skybox Scandal with the man who brought Alberta the Turkish Tylenot!

But you're definitely going to want to stick around for the end!

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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We’re solving education in Alberta with ATA President Jason Schilling!

(We come up with solutions at least, there's still a "political will" problem...)

In this episode we get into the challenges that students and teachers are facing as they return to school, including a very intense discussion on Danielle Smith's new outing polices.

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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We're back with another live Alberta Politics Roundup!

With summer ending, we've got a review of some of the biggest stories that are coming down the pipes in Alberta, including they state of education, healthcare, coal mining, the UCP's attack on charter rights and Smith's incoming attack on trans rights, access to health care and parental choice!

Plus oh yeah, we get into that whole thing with Jespo...

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!

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On January 31, 2024, Danielle Smith shocked many Albertans with a suite of policies designed to insert her personal beliefs into doctors offices across the province. Not only did these policies limit access to health care for trans youth, they also attacked trans participation in sports and will override the rights of parents to make decisions on their children’s medical care.


Smith defended these policies saying that she would be engaging in “robust” consultation, but as a recent FOIP we completed revealed, that consultation wasn’t about whether the policies should proceed, but how to manage rolling them out.


Dr. Victoria Bucholtz is a fierce advocate on a number of issues, and as a academic and a member of the Trans community she agreed to help us review the FOIP results, interpret them and suggest what Albertans can do going forward.

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As always, if you appreciate the kind of content that we're trying to produce here at The Breakdown, please consider signing up as a monthly supporter at our Patreon site at www.patreon.com/ thebreakdownab and we can now accept e-transfers at [email protected]!


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