EDMONTON – After meeting with Mark Carney to discuss pipeline construction, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has vowed to hold her breath until the Prime Minister gives her absolutely everything she asked for during negotiations.
“Is Carney watching? Are you sure? Okay, here I go,” Smith said, before taking the deepest breath she possibly could and sealing her lips real tight.
Smith, who has threatened to enable Alberta’s separatist movement if Carney doesn’t repeal a variety of environmental and regulatory laws, lasted seven seconds before noticing that Carney was looking down at his phone.
“Aw, jeez. Alright, I’m gonna do it again,” Smith said. “And I really, really, really, really mean it this time” as she plugged her nose to drive home the effect.
The premier then wrote “Give me a pipeline or I’m going to pass out and bonk my head real bad and it will be all your fault, Mark,” on a piece of paper while slowly turning purple.
Smith’s latest negotiation tactic builds on similar methods used during her administration, such as asking the media’s questions back at them until they get frustrated and leave, saying “nuh-uh!” whenever Alberta’s teachers point out that their classrooms are overcrowded, and responding to criticism from other premiers with “I know you are, but what am I?”
“We’ve seen the Premier use nearly every negotiation tool in the book, from stamping her feet to throwing her favourite toy across the room,” a University of Calgary political scientist said. “If holding her breath fails, then she may have to try something even more radical, like refusing to eat her dinner, or compromising.”
Experts advise against mimicking Smith’s negotiation tactics, warning that significant oxygen deprivation can cause a loss of mental faculty that’s actually noticeable in some people.
“The Premier should be careful,” a physiologist said. “Short-term results might not be worth permanent damage to her bloviating capability.”
At press time Smith was packing up her favourite stuffies into her backpack and declaring that she was “running away.”
