This weekend was the Alberta Liberal Party’s annual convention held in the city they are expecting a big breakthrough in next election – Calgary (no, that’s not my patented sarcasm, I’m serious).

I drove down with Daveberta which allowed me to get a good three hour information session on SU politics. Other bloggers in attendance include PTimH, David Swann, and Darryl Raymaker.

The convention was extremely well organized with, I must say, I great selection of food (mmm…pie…). The workshops focused on election readiness in anticipation of the upcoming provincial election, expected in early 2008.

Surprising even myself, I managed to wake up in time for the Saturday breakfast and listened to Keith Brownsey who is certainly a member of the church of Warren judging from his repeated urgings to go negative early and go negative hard. His recommendation of a TV buy to show 5 or 10 second video clips of Stelmach stumbling over his words makes sense to me; just like the Tories are trying to define Dion before he can define himself, it would make sense for the ALP to use the same tactic. Even a cheaply produced add with a limited buy would generate enough earned media to make it worthwhile.

Saturday evening entertaining included a trip to Heritage Park (I presume so that we could see what the city looked like the last time there was a provincial Liberal government). That was followed up with the unnoficial youth CPAC hospitality suite.

All the media reports I saw were quite positive of the convention and it certainly seems like the party has its act together – candidates are being nominated and the debt is being widdled down quicker than Ed Stelmach’s credibility. The real litmus test will be the two by-elections expected this spring, including Ralph Klein’s old seat in Calgary Elbow which is certainly winnable for the Liberals.