What a pleasure it is here in the nation's capital to be the one from the only province on the Prairies where grownups are still in charge!

I speak, of course, of Alberta -- but I speak of my home province in the context of the goings on in Saskatchewan earlier today, where the premier according to the best-known candidate to lead Alberta's Progressive Conservative Party is "the real leader of Western Canada."

Understanding history requires a long view, and the picture that is emerging from the Reform Party upheaval, which began with that party's formation by Preston Manning almost 30 years ago, is of a movement that has failed in its fundamental goals of eliminating the Liberal Party of Canada and replacing it with a U.S.-style two-party system that would push Canadian political discourse ever further to the right.

Manning founded the Reform Party in the fall of 1987, and it has been with us ever since -- although it was later known as the Canadian Alliance and, after its reverse hostile takeover of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in 2003, as the Conservative Party of Canada.

Today is the fifth anniversary of the day the wheels fell off the Tory bus.

That is to say, today is the fifth anniversary of the day Alison Redford was sworn into office as Alberta’s 14th premier, the leader who was supposed to renew the Progressive Conservative Party one more time -- as Ed Stelmach, Ralph Klein and Don Getty before her had all been meant to do in their time.

Jim Prentice was supposed to play the same role too, but by then, notwithstanding his own blunders, it may have been too late.

 So all this means that yesterday was the last day steady old Eddie, Unlucky Premier No. 13, was at the wheel of Alberta's PC bus, and while it may have needed a coat of paint and a new set of spark plugs, it was still a perfectly serviceable vehicle.

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Today is the 45th anniversary of Peter Lougheed's historic election victory in 1971, which brought the Progressive Conservative Party to power with a comfortable majority, where it more or less remained with the general approval of Albertans until May 5, 2015.