Put away that Facetwiberrier, Mr. MLA

Yet another way that provincial MLAs are no different than university undergrads: they are compelled to text/Facebook/Twitter all time, in this case, during Question Period. And dammit, the Speaker of the House is not going to take it any longer! He's publically chastised members for being on their PDAs during QP.

What kills me about this story are the people speaking against this policy on the record, complaining that the government needs to be in contact with citizens to be effective. But—and this is very important—the ban applies to Question Period only, when MLAs should ostensibly be paying attention. One could argue that Question Period is a waste of time anyway and people might as well be catching up on tweets, but the Speaker can't subscribe to that point of view and must discipline the MLAs. After all, if even the Speaker can't take Question Period seriously, then who can? And really, the constant Twitbookexting is not the actual problem. Instead, it is a sign of how little respect is accorded to Question Period in the first place. So the problem isn't really the technology—it's the fact that no one respects Question Period enough to put the damn phone away.

Oh, yeah, and if this government really wanted to be in touch with Albertans, it wouldn't have kept quiet about environmental charges faced by Suncor regarding dumping sewage in the Athabasca River or passed Bill 18, which will creates strict new regulations about who can see and rent movies, banning unrated movies from video stores, meaning that a lot of foreign film and documentaries won't be legally available for rent. (You know you rents these movies? Me. And I am definitely not under 18.)

This province. GAH.