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He and Jean simply disagree on some of the fundamentals, Kenney shrugs, and now is as good a time as any to discuss those differences.

Jean doesn’t seem quite so sure about the race being the epitome of respectful, but says he’ll leave innuendo and mud-slinging to others.

“It truly only serves the NDP. That’s what they want us to do. They want to have conservatives fighting each other and I’m not going to do that,” he says.

Both he and Kenney agree public fighting has no value for a young party just beginning to get its legs.

Schweitzer’s on the same page, and says, quite frankly, Albertans are done with divisive U.S. and Ottawa-style politics.

“I didn’t spend all this time and effort over the past two years to unite conservatives and unite Albertans to only divide them in this race,” Jean says.

Chinks in the united armour

The problem is, the UCP has cracks. And they’re growing.

Those splits were inevitable — it’s a party trying to mend a broken relationship after years of sometimes bitter and personal political feuds.

Yet the leadership race began before the unity vote even took place. Naturally, many MLAs picked sides, aligning themselves with Jean or Kenney.

Before the ink was dry on the agreement in principle to merge the Wildrose and PCs, Jean declared he would be seeking the top job.

On the day of the vote, while Wildrosers were still casting ballots, Strathmore-Brooks MLA Derek Fildebrandt — who has since resigned from the UCP caucus over a string of spending scandals and a court case — vowed never to support Jean for leader.