Bruce MacKinnon: Alberta separatist movement all hat and no cattle

It’s high time for a national referendum on whether Alberta should honour its status as a federal territory.

Every day, the outcry among pundits, legal scholars, economists, and political scientists grows louder: Alberta separation poses an existential threat to Canada.

An existential threat is one that jeopardizes the very survival of a nation as it currently exists. To be sure, existential threats can come in many guises, but the most notable and critical are economic, geographical, constitutional, and, of course, military.

Albertans seemed poised to vote in favour of remaining in Canada, with early results in the province’s historic independence referendum showing a clear majority opting to strike down a proposal for a future secession vote.

As of 10:25 a.m. MT, with 83 per cent of polls reported, 75.4 per cent of voters had voted in favour of remaining in Canada, with 24.6 per cent voting to commence the process of potentially separating from confederation. Of the more than 1.8 million votes cast so far on the 10th question — the one relating to separation — 1.414,509 had voted in favour of remaining while 459,621 supported having a second vote on whether to separate.

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