Boy, is my face red.
My Provincial government paid $25 million for a tourism rebranding campaign.
Might be a good idea. … If a sharp-eyed guy on the internet had not discovered that this promo photo came not from Alberta but “from Bamburgh Beach in Northumberland – home of the castle of the mythical round-tabling knight Lancelot.”
Canadian Press – Alberta mocked across Britain for ad that used England as stand-in for province
Peter Bailey, the sleuth that discovered the phoney photo, “badgered the provincial government with emails for weeks” until they finally admitted the beach was not in Alberta.
“It just brings more attention to our area, so that’s great.”
– Sheelagh Caygill of Northumberland Tourism.
Thanks Garth.
Rick McCharles 
Yeah, but at least we’ve got good health care.
Define good.
Ten days ago, Don Braid, local columnist for The Calgary Herald, blogged about the abysmal care that his wife received at the emergency. (Here’s the url: http://www.calgaryherald.com/Welcome+Hospital+Hell+hours+emergency+ward/1506017/story.html ). It’s something we all know about, it’s something we all wring our hands about, and it was nice to see it written about. Sparked a bit of an outroar, but nothing will happen.
Our politician’s pretend all is good, except that we need to cut back on health care. What a difference from the States. We just returned from San Francisco, where we observed bus ads for local emergency departments that guaranteed patients would be seen within a half hour after arrival. It was shocking not just to compare that half hour guarantee with Don Braid’s wife’s nine hours of intense pain before seeing a doctor but even more basically to imagine a health care system where you are seen as an opportunity (to make money, to be sure) instead of a burden.
So we are lied to already, and now we are lied to again, this time with English beaches standing in for Alberta beaches. I want to be here when Albertans get sick of the lies.
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