Article content continued

As Kenney’s predecessor, she called the tanker bill “a stampede of stupid” and urged senators: “Toss C-48 in the garbage where it belongs.” Those lines are still repeated in the Senate.

But while Notley pressed the case with genuine force, I’m not sure she alarmed the more ossified federal specimens.

With his hotter rhetoric and vows to retaliate, Kenney did begin to genuinely worry the Trudeau Liberals and their proxies.

They know he has firm conservative allies in at least five other provinces. They realize that under sufficient provocation, Kenney will cut oil shipments to east and west.

And, as the premier said Thursday, if the Liberals still fight for C-48 and the original C-69, they will be credibly accused in the fall election of killing jobs and prosperity.

Photo by Justin Tang / THE CANADIAN PRESS

But this is not over.

The full Senate still has to endorse the committee recommendation to drop Bill C-48. That vote will come after the Senate reconvenes May 27.

Kenney launched his own lobbying campaign, saying he will write to all senators urging them to back the committee decision. He will try to pull all six Alberta senators into line at a lunch meeting next week.

The federal government will employ the usual arm-twisting among senators, especially the so-called independents who were appointed by the Liberals.

But the Trudeau crew have to ask themselves — how would it look for senators to overturn the verdict of their own committee?

Dictatorial, that’s how.