WAGNER: Ted Byfield wrote the Report on Alberta

In the early 1990s, I remember one conservative activist saying Alberta Report was the “political Bible” of southern Alberta. In truth, it was the most important media voice Alberta conservatism ever had.The influence of this magazine is impossible to precisely measure. Nevertheless, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that its influence was significant and extensive.Early in 2008, the magazine trade journal Masthead published the results of a reader poll under the heading, “Canada’s 20 Most Influential Magazines of All Time.” Alberta Report was ranked 13th out of 20.Masthead also wrote the following about the magazine: “A lot of people hated Alberta Report. They called it homophobic, sexist and racist; Western ideological madness at its very worst. A lot of people loved Alberta Report. They called it honest, fearless and engaging; a lone voice for Christian conservatives in a country ruled by atheist liberals.”Ken Whyte, former editor-in-chief of the National Post, worked at Alberta Report early in his career. He “once called founder and owner Ted Byfield ‘a right-wing, redneck radical.’ A lot of journalists have said similar things. Ken Whyte has also called Alberta Report the best place he ever worked. A lot of journalists have said that, too.”Critics have noted the influence of the magazine. Writing in a 1995 book about the Reform Party of Canada, sociologist Trevor Harrison pointed out that “Alberta Report has been, since its inception, western Canada’s most prominent and consistent organ for the dissemination of conservative values.”No less a person than former Alberta premier Peter Lougheed wrote an appreciation of Alberta Report in 1999. He praised the important role it played during the conflict between the province and Pierre Trudeau’s federal government over Alberta’s oil and gas resources in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The magazine consistently explained why Alberta had to fight Trudeau’s energy policies. According to Lougheed, “Week after week the Alberta Report made it clear to Albertans, and also to Canadians, that the federal government was attempting to destroy the right of ownership of oil and gas by Albertans.”This was noticed by the federal government for as Lougheed noted, “we discovered many Ottawa politicians, bureaucrats and journalists at the time were reading the magazine intensely, and collectively coming to the conclusion that Albertans were united in taking such a strong stand against this attack upon their resources.”When it came to the major national issues involving Alberta, Lougheed wrote, “the support by the Alberta Report was strong and its impact was very significant and positive.”Due to this influence, the CBC could not ignore Alberta Report and it eventually produced a stage play written by one of the magazine’s former employees, Frank Moher.Moher was the book review editor of Alberta Report from 1983 to 1986. When he began working for the magazine, he did not have any developed political views, although he appreciated its pro-Western slant. Over time, however, he developed fashionably left-wing views and began to resent its conservative perspective.After leaving the magazine and moving to BC, Moher wrote a fictional play called Prairie Report based on Alberta Report’s editorial room. The main storyline involves the takeover of Prairie Report magazine by an eastern businessman who wants to change its pro-Western editorial direction.In his introduction to the play, Moher pays tribute to the influence of Ted Byfield. He writes that “Ted has harvested his bounty; he has managed to accumulate enough power over the years to begin reshaping the political agenda, at least in Alberta, and to use his ubiquitous identification with all things western to place his very profile upon the land.”Apparently, the CBC had been paying attention to Ted Byfield for a few years, as Byfield himself explained in a 1988 column entitled, “Why can’t the CBC leave a nice guy like me alone?”:"One of the penalties you pay as proprietor of the last domestically owned general news publication in western Canada is the necessity of being recurrently ‘explained’ by the CBC. Twice in the last couple of years I have been featured on CBC programs. I was the subject of a half-hour television documentary (dangerous ideologue) and a lengthy ‘treatment’ on the national radio show, Sunday Morning (religious fanatic.) Now I notice that the CBC is prominent among the sponsors, and plans a national review on television, of yet another explanation, this one a stage play about this magazine called Prairie Report where I am once again featured (peevishly pompous bore.)"Without any doubt, Alberta Report was an influential media voice in Alberta. It played an important role in the province’s politics, and also had a national impact by helping to jump-start the Reform Party of Canada.Hopefully the hole left by the demise of Alberta Report in 2003 can now be filled by the Western Standard. Albertans desperately need a reliable and trustworthy source of news and opinion — a source not captive to the leftist groupthink of the mainstream media.