If so, that means the only urban area the Wildrose could win at all, is Medicine Hat.
There’s a huge urban/rural divide in this election, but you can’t win Alberta without the cities.
Edit: At last count, Calgary-Shaw flipped blue. And I just noticed that NE riding – it’s a really tight 3-way race with less than 200 votes between them all.
Perhaps the different networks are using different colours. On CTV, Tories are blue, Wildrose is pink (no idea why), NDP is orange, and Liberals are red.
As Jim says, that’s where all the rednecks and farmers are. 
My wife agrees and said it was very confusing that the green colour didn’t represent the Greens. The G&M and CBC are both using green for Wild Rose.
[Alberta Tory Supporters] Forty more years! Forty more years! [/Alberta Tory Supporters]
Too soon? 
And he’s right. The letters column in our local daily paper often features a letter from somebody who feels that we need to be reminded how abortion is offensive to Jesus, that gun ownership ought to be a right like the Americans have, and that gay marriage destroys the family. Seriously. :rolleyes:
But not everybody here thinks that way, and I think the results are showing that. We may not have a Gay Pride parade, but local gays do have an annual Pride rally at City Hall (done with the approval of the city and not bothered by any anti-gays); and abortions are regularly performed in the local hospital. And the police zealously pursue people who use firearms in illegal ways: the guy who shot up a photo radar unit, for example, or the recent nightclub shootings.
Still, we do have a large number of people who think that the clock can be turned back forty years.
Let’s say four years, and see how things go. 
I didn’t vote for the Wildrose, but I was secretly a little interested to see just what would happen with a provincial government who weren’t the PCs - I’ve only been here 22 years, so all I’ve ever known is a PC government.
Interestingly, for no particular reason, I recall seeing a poster on the wall at my polling place. It basically told you how to vote–that you mark an “x” in the spot next to the candidate of your choice, and that you can only make one “x” and so on. But the interesting thing was that it was rendered in six languages: I was able to recognize Spanish, Hindi, and German. I cannot say what the others were.
But what I can say is that none of them were French. I did look for it on the poster (being able to read and understand French myself), but I did not see it. I wonder what our friends Hypnagogic Jerk, mnemosyne, matt mcl, and detop would say; they being Quebecers.
My own feeling? I was surprised, and a little disappointed. French is one of the two official languages of Canada; and while this was a provincial election, it seems to me that if you are going to present information in different languages in order to accommodate those whose English is shaky (which position I fully agree with), your first two languages on the poster ought to be the two official languages of Canada: French and English.
What good would that do? The government would still be Tory. 
What are the demographics of Lethbridge like?
There are still some really close ridings in play – not going to change the results, but might give some of the smaller parties a bit of a boost. Raj Sherman’s riding in Meadowlark is still within about 30 votes, Fish Creek is within 10, Battle River is within 20, Cold Lake within 30, Dunvegan-Central Peace-Notley is within 50, and Edmonton-Beverly-Clareview is under 100.
While I don’t have a tremendous love for the PCs (although Redford is about as good as we could do, as far as I’m concerned, for a PC leader), I’m incredibly relieved that Alberta saw through the Wildrose platform and didn’t vote “change for the sake of change”.
Raj Sherman is back ahead in Edmonton. By 17 votes. The other races seem to be widening, though Fish Creek is still within 30.
I know you’re having a little fun, but I’m going to seriously consider your question.
Part of the problem is that (a), these folks’ hot buttons tend to be matters that fall under federal jurisdiction; and (b), they want to reopen matters that have been settled law for decades in some cases. No matter how much they wish it were otherwise, the provincial government has no say in whether abortion is legal, for example. It’s the same with gay rights. Yet gay rights, and the issue of gay marriage, have been decided at the Supreme Court (cites available upon request); and so Alberta has to go along with that–the provincial government cannot legislate contrary to what currently exists. (Well, it could, by invoking the Notwithstanding Clause, but to do so would probably be political suicide.)
So with a Tory victory, these people have very little voice in the Legislature. Yes, they can make their feelings known (it is a Charter right, after all); but we shouldn’t bog down with debates over why they cannot get what they want. Hopefully, the government can move forward and get business done without entertaining tangential arguments that more properly concern federal matters.
Isn’t “with” an overoptimistic assumption?
Good point; how will the Wildrose Opposition work in opposition to the PC government? I suspect the answer is the same as it would be for any other party.
why is everyone using “ND’s” to refer to the NDP? and why is their leader talking about pee? 
For the most part, it’s a white, English-speaking community. For no particular reason that I can see, we have a large number of expat British. But otherwise, the majority is born-in-Canada white English speakers.
But not everyone. Given that we are next door to the largest Aboriginal reserve in the country, there are many Aboriginals locally. We also have some Indians (from India), some black Africans, some Dutch, and assorted others. And perhaps surprisingly, we have some French-speakers–there is a chapter of the French-Canadian Association of Alberta locally (I believe that is its name). One of the local diners was run by an ex-Montrealer who made the best poutine west of Ontario; I ate there a number of times, and often heard a torrent of angry French coming from the boss that made the counter people wither.
Religiously–and this is important, as the more extreme Wildrose views accorded with certain religious beliefs–there are a great many Mormons and Fundamentalist Christians. There are the more mainstream Christian denominations–Presbyterians, United Church, Anglicans, Roman Catholics–but I’d guess they are outnumbered by the Mormons and Fundamentalist Christians. Still, there is an Islamic mosque in town, and I’m sure there is a Jewish synagogue, but I don’t know where it is.
But I think Lethbridge is best summed up by what happened at a standup comedy show I attended some time ago. The comedian had come from Toronto, but she was originally from Jamaica, and was black. Her opening remarks were about how lily-white the audience was, and that they didn’t have that back in Toronto. That city was diverse, and where was Lethbridge’s diversity?
An audience member hollered back, “Hey, we’re diverse–we’ve got both Mormons and Fundies!” His remark got the biggest laugh of the night.
I love the name of the riding Sherman is standing in: “Edmonton-Meadowlark”. Much better than mere numbers.