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It’s deja vu all over again.

Yes, the words of baseball great Yogi Berra come back to haunt us, 26 years later.

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Alberta’s books are in a real mess. Again.

The yearly deficits, where the provincial government spends more than what comes into the kitty. The piling up of debt. The interest payments on the debt gobbling up more and more dough.

“This just cannot continue,” says Premier Jason Kenney. No kidding.

So Kenney appoints a blue-ribbon panel of deep thinkers to dive into the province’s books. Murky waters indeed.

By August, these high-octane intellects will offer up a plan to get Alberta’s books back into the black and keep the plan on track, including getting rid of the debt.

Sound familiar?

Janice MacKinnon, a finance minister in the days of Saskatchewan NDP Premier Roy Romanow, heads up the brainy group and sings from a golden oldies songsheet most Albertans said they wanted to hear.

Photo by Greg Southam / 00087441A

“The tax part of the equation is really not what I think the focus of the government should be,” says the former Saskatchewan NDP budget boss.