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Alberta Advantage Podcast
by Team Advantage
Fresh from the birthplace of the CCF! Commentary and analysis on local and provincial politics from a left perspective.
Episodes
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Referendum and the Signified: Political Spectacle in the Form of Ten Questions, with Jeremy Appel
Jeremy Appel joins Team Advantage to discuss the impeding Alberta referenda. He makes he case that this vote is largely theatre to justify actions the UCP government already intends to make, and emphasizes that the immigration questions, rather than the separation question, pose the most…
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Anti-Imperial organizing in Calgary: An Interview with Wesam Cooley
Activist and organizer Wesam Cooley sits down with Team Advantage to discuss the pragmatics of organizing street actions in a city like Calgary. We discuss a bit of Wesam's personal history, the experience and theory he brings to his efforts, the challenges of coalition building in a radical...
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Prairie Unpopulism - How the west wasn't won (A Nenshi & Beck Story)
Team Advantage joins forces with Team Unmaking Saskatchewan to dig into just what is wrong with our provincial wings of the New Democratic Party. The liberal outsider in Nenshi and the establishment backed pragmatist in Beck both seem allergic to doing politics. Are left populism and robust…
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In Solidarity With Trans Children
In Alberta as elsewhere reactionary backlash is targeting trans people, particularly trans children. Team Advantage examines the framing of this backlash and explores how it may be rooted in the cultural construction of childhood and education. We also review the history of trans identity…
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Student Power with Dr. Roberta Lexier
In 2024 university campuses across Canada saw encampments and other protest actions. In a new book and podcast series Dr. Roberta Lexier places these actions within the broader history of student activism in Canada since the 1960s. In this discussion we ask her how student activism differes…
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Champagne Neoliberalism OR Effervescent Austerity
In the lead up to the federal budget, the government signalled that it would include sharp cuts, referencing the steep austerity of the 1995 federal budget. Team Advantage takes a look at what the budget actually contains, situates it in the current political moment and examines how it actually...
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Alberta Teachers and the End of Collective Bargaining: Text Resist to 55255
Alberta's teachers have been ordered back to work, and their right to strike, collectively bargain, or even present a legal challenge have been stripped away by Danielle Smith's UCP. How is organized labour in Alberta responding to this existential threat? Previous episodes on public education:...
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Escape from the Planet of the Mines - Canada's Resource Imperialism
Canada exists to put holes in the ground and extract surplus value for shareholders. In this episode, originally recorded in 2021, Team Advantage opens the Canadian trench-coat to find total corporate impunity. We discus how the Canadian state facilitates resource extraction within its borders…
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The Death and Life of Canadian Socialism - Live at the Progressive Publics Symposium
Every century or so the Canadian left gathers at the Royal Canadian Legion #1 in downtown Calgary to inagurate a new era of progress. In 1932 it was J.S. Woodworth and the gang in 1932 at the founding of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (which would become the NDP). On July 13, 2025 it was...
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Elbows to the Left – Is Canada Worth Fighting For?
Support our podcast! Rhetorical and real threats to Canadian sovereignty pose a tough question to critics of the Canadian state: Do we align with liberal nationalists in defense of the Canadian project or do we remain skeptical? In this episode Team Advantage traces a brief history of Canadian...
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Pension Paradox: How deferred wages go to work for capital, with Tom Fraser
Join our live show Friday June 13 6PM - Royal Canadian Legion #1, 116 7 Ave SE, Calgary - Free Entry - Register here! Public sector pensions are one of the hard-won victories of the 20th century labour movement, but they did not come through the neoliberal era unchanged. They are now managed like...
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Colonialism and Capitalism: Bryan Palmer on Canadian History
Support our podcast! Team Advantage sits down with Bryan D. Palmer on his stop through Calgary to discuss his new book, and discuss how labour and anti-colonial movements have historically challenged the Canadian state. We ask what it might take to forge a united front and what the present moment...
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Imagined Alberta: Western Canadian National Fantasies
WARNING: This episode begins with slam poetry. Team Advantage subjects themselves to some favourite books of UCP ministers and Western Standard columnists in search of the intellectual basis for justifying an independent Albertan nation. We find bad poetry, absurd race science, and convenient...
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James Wilt on the Winnipeg Police
Support this podcast! The Winnipeg Police Service is 100 years old - a century they've used to repress dissent, censor media, bungle investigations and devour city budgets. Author James Wilt joins Team Advantage to discuss his new book, Dogged and Destructive: Essays on the Winnipeg Police which...
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Vote Harder! Justice Warriors 2 w/ Matt Bors and Ben Clarkson
It's election season in Bubble City, the ultra-protected enclave that keeps the rich safe from the mutants of the so-called Uninhabited Zone. When veteran officer Swamp Cop embarks on a dangerous undercover mission, politics just might wind up coming between him and his beloved partner, Officer...
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Canada's Hot Union Summer: what comes next?
This past year saw a sequence of labour unrest: Teamsters locked out of both CPKC and CN railways, Westjet mechanics striking over Canada Day long weekend, Air Canada pilots reaching a last-minute deal, grain terminal workers in Vancouver striking, and dockworkers getting locked out in Montreal....
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Posties on Strike! On the Picket Line with CUPW
The 55,000 members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers have been on a nationwide strike since November 15th after negotiations at the bargaining table stalled with their employer Canada Post. Workers are fighting to protect pensions, improve working conditions, and a wage increase that keeps...
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Kenney vs Jeremy Appel
In this live recording, Jeremy tells us how Kenney has shaped Alberta politics, and expounds on his ideological commitments, his flair for conspiracy and his effective use of political stunts. We also learn of Kenney's taste in music and get Jeremy's response to the toughest question he's been...
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Sous les pavés: Student radicalism from the '60s to today
Gaza solidarity encampments on university campuses in the U.S. and Canada are experiencing violent police crackdowns. How do the student movements of the past inform what's going on now? Team Advantage digs into the history of student radicalism and speaks to encampment supporters about their...
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COVID-19 in 2024
What can we learn about the ongoing pandemic and how it's been handled? How's the whole global public health infrastructure, campaign for clean air, and renewed push for workplace going? Does this bode well for future pandemics and crises, and how can we learn from what's happened so far to shape...
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Zionism Sucks
Israel is on a genocidal rampage through Gaza. Team Advantage, joined by intrepid independent journalist Jeremy Appel, examine the historical roots and basic assumptions that underlie Zionism, and discuss a few light topics, like discourse-policing, denouncing Hamas, antisemitism, and...
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Why does Canada love Ukrainian Nazis?
In late September 2023, Canadian Parliament clapped for "Ukrainian hero" Yaroslav Hunka, who fought with the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Galician), a unit in the Nazi German military. Why did Canada let so many Ukrainian Nazis into the country after WW2, and how did this wave of...
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Wildfire Season Concludes
The area burned by wildfires in Canada this year exceeded 18 million hectares and burned 1,740 megatonnes of CO2, roughly three times Canada's human-made emissions from 2022. As fire season winds down, Team Advantage examines this new, fun, half-year-long weather phenomenon, and considers the…
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Notley Loses Again! Alberta's 2023 Election
Support this podcast! Rachel Notley led the Alberta NDP to their second major electoral defeat in Alberta's latest general election. What does this election say about Albertans and our political culture? How might we make basic social democratic values popular? How should we organize as we...
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Clearing the Plains in 2023: Alberta's Drug Poisoning Crisis
Support this podcast! What link is there between pushing Indigenous people off land, into reserves, into residential schools, and into forced treatment? How are conversations about "public safety" and policing being mobilized to harm vulnerable people? How has the politicization of the opioid...
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Can Socialists Like Hockey?
Culture wars, long-term injury, workplace violence, sexual assaults, nationalistic militarism, and the appropriation of working-class aesthetics... is it possible to like hockey from the left? Can sport unite the working class? Is hockey a serious game for serious men, or a silly game for silly...
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Take Back Alberta (from Woke Jason Kenney)
A group known as Take Back Alberta appears to have seized control over sizable parts of the United Conservative Party and secured the leadership of Danielle Smith. What is this group? What motivates them, and who are their key figures? PressProgress writer Stephen Magusiak joins Team Advantage to...
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Recession Ahead? w/ Jim Stanford
Support this podcast! Watch our livestream! Sign up for our newsletter! The Bank of Canada is explicitly trying to increase unemployment by raising the cost of borrowing money. Is excessive employment the cause of inflation, and if not, what are the consequences of this policy likely to be?...
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TORIES: Calgary Laundry Workers vs Ralph Klein
Building a Community Movement for Better Transit feat. James Wilt: Saturday, March 18th | University of Alberta. RSVP: michaeljanz.ca/transitcamp2023 A few short years into Alberta PC Premier Ralph Klein's deficit-slashing austerity regime, Calgary's hospital laundry workers were given…
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Declaring Sovereignty
Alberta, under the incredible leadership of Premier Danielle Smith, has declared sovereignty — or rather, proclaimed itself "sovereign within a united Canada," whatever that means. What even is sovereignty? How might it to relate to Indigenous sovereignty? Who even wants this?
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Danielle Smith Thought
You see, the woke establishment wants to control what media Albertans see, what vaccines we take, the resources we develop — and even what we are allowed to grow and eat. Independent journalist Jeremy Appel joins Team Advantage to explore Danielle Smith Thought. Follow Jeremy @JeremyAppel1025 and...
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The Free Trade Debate: Then and Now
In the 1980s and 1990s, free trade and economic integration were intensely debated topics and the subject of debate in national elections, and generally opposed by the political left. Most recently, right-populist political formations — like Trump and Brexit — have resurfaced the issue of free...
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Canadian vs U.S. Unions
Support this podcast! Watch our livestream! Sign up for our newsletter! What explains the drastic differences between labour unions in Canada and the United States? Why is U.S. union density roughly one-third that of Canada's, despite the similarities both share? How have different political and...
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Inflation Fantasies
What's inflation and why does it happen? If labour costs go up 1% but consumer prices go up 4.8%, who's pocketing that difference? Why do the CEOs of big corporate banks seem to care so much about inflation? Team Advantage explores the hottest economic phenomenon of 2022.
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Shift Work! feat. Emily Leedham
What's better than a newsletter? A weekly national roundup of labour news, that's what. Reporter Emily Leedham joins Team Advantage to discuss Shift Work, a curated newsletter summarizing strikes, lockouts, and new organizing initiatives— all while engaging the next generation of workers and...
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Faculty on Strike!
The first faculty strike in Alberta's history has begun, with members of the Concordia University of Edmonton Faculty Association braving frigid temperatures and taking to the picket line on January 4th. Why is the Concordia University of Edmonton purchasing mansions when their faculty are…
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Austerity in Saskatchewan: Roy Romanow's NDP
What happens when sensible social democrats pick up the pieces after a terrible, no-good conservative government ruins the province? Team Advantage examines the reign of Saskatchewan NDP Premier Roy Romanow from 1991-2001, who oversaw the closure of rural hospitals and fostered the skills of a...
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100 Years of the Communist Party of Canada
Support this podcast! Watch our livestream! Sign up for our newsletter! What is the history of Canada's second-oldest political party, and how does it inform their politics today? In this in-depth examination of the Communist Party of Canada, Team Advantage serves up a broad historical overview…
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The Postwar CCF
Support this podcast What happened to the CCF in the post-war period? The 1940s saw the CCF soar in popularity, with the party forming official opposition in Ontario in 1943, and public opinion polls showing nationalizing industries to be widely popular among the Canadian population. How did the...
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ORPHANED: Alberta's Oil and Gas Wells
What happens when a symbol of prosperity becomes one of decay? There are thousands of idle oil and gas wells stranded throughout the Canadian west, orphaned by companies that went bankrupt and refused to clean them up. These orphan wells are a symptom of an industry in crisis, with the financial...
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What's Ideology?
Support this podcast What is ideology? How does it function? Is it something that affects only our opponents— because they're blinded by ideology, forced into believing a cult-like worldview? Could it be that ideology is also present among experts and people who consider themselves "objective,"...
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Politicizing the Economy
Support this podcast What have you done to help The Economy today? We live in a world where growing The Economy seems to be everyone's primary concern— nurturing it, jump-starting it, stimulating it. What is this notion of The Economy anyways, and where does it come from? Team Advantage delves…
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Vote Communist! with Elizabeth Rowley
Elizabeth Rowley, leader of the Communist Party of Canada, joins Team Advantage in a busy community hall in Calgary. What does the Communist Party propose in its program this election, particularly in terms of a response to the pandemic and growing inequality? Learn more about the CPC by…
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Stacking Crises on Crises
Support this podcast Team Advantage convenes to discuss a few pressing matters— like the pandemic, forest fire smoke, climate change, mass graves of Indigenous children, refugees, and billionaires in space. Given how these crises are being handled, what can we expect from the future? Cover art of...
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Future Senator-Elect Kinney: Our Red in the Red Chamber
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney has decided that Alberta should hold a Senate election— and Progress Alberta's Executive Director, Duncan Kinney, has answered the call. Duncan joins Team Advantage to discuss the rich history of Senatorial activism, declares his support for Fully Automated Luxury Gay...
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TORIES: Lougheed, 1971-1985
Support this podcast Peter Lougheed is often fondly remembered as Alberta's "good" Premier across the political spectrum. But what was so great about Alberta's first Progressive Conservative Premier, who kicked off 44 years of uninterrupted rule? Team Advantage digs into Peter Lougheed's fabled...
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Avi Lewis Runs for Office
Support this podcast Filmmaker, climate activist, educator, and federal NDP candidate Avi Lewis joins Team Advantage to discuss his leap into electoral politics. Was the reaction to his work at the 2016 federal convention what made him decide to toss his hat in the ring? How does he expect to...
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Stampede: Misogyny, White Supremacy, and Settler Colonialism
Support this podcast For ten days every summer, Calgary's corporate office workers dress up like cowboys and enjoy a western-themed festival of settler colonialism. What work is the Stampede doing when it draws on the myth of the frontier— especially today, when it is largely funded by fossil…
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Nora Loreto: Take Back the Fight
Support this podcast Did you know that the Canadian state once funded the National Action Committee on the Status of Women Canada, funding salaries and projects that allowed for shelters, child-care and daycare centres, women's drop-in centres, bookstores, and crisis lines? Writer and activist…
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Jokes?! Sean Devlin and Airports, Animals
Guest host and seasoned newsletter-writer Clinton Hallahan sits down with writer, director, filmmaker, prankster, organizer and comedian Sean Devlin. In addition to joining The Yes Men in their exploits and storming the stage to frighten Stephen Harper, Sean Devlin is a seasoned stand-up comic…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Fresh from the birthplace of the CCF! Commentary and analysis on local and provincial politics from a left perspective.
HOSTED BY
Team Advantage
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Alberta Advantage Podcast have?
Alberta Advantage Podcast currently has 201 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Alberta Advantage Podcast about?
Fresh from the birthplace of the CCF! Commentary and analysis on local and provincial politics from a left perspective.
How often does Alberta Advantage Podcast release new episodes?
Alberta Advantage Podcast publishes regularly with 201 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Alberta Advantage Podcast?
You can listen to Alberta Advantage Podcast on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Alberta Advantage Podcast?
Alberta Advantage Podcast is created and hosted by Team Advantage.
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