The nascent Wildrose Independence Party made a giant leap forward towards electoral viability with their selection of Paul Hinman as interim leader. Paul’s experience and temperament make him the perfect fit to establish and build this new party. The mainstream media will likely ignore this new and significant development, but that is nothing new when it comes to Hinman. While Paul was rarely one to draw much fanfare and broad attention in the public eye, he was one to get results..I first met Paul at a small function in 2005 when he was sitting as the lone MLA for the Alberta Alliance Party. I had attended as a skeptical libertarian who felt that the party was too socially conservative for my involvement. I had no intention of joining the party at that time, but after a long chat with Paul I found myself with a new membership, which led to my being involved heavily with the party for nearly a decade to follow..Hinman had found that elusive balance between social conservatism and libertarianism. While Paul is an observant Mormon, his political philosophy is guided heavily by Frédéric Bastiat who held individual rights to be paramount within society. While it seems so simple, it remains so complex to so many that a person can maintain socially conservative views without feeling that the state needs to impose those views upon others. Paul won me over and it is just that sort of ability to convert which could very well transform the Wildrose Independence Party into a big tent organization which could change the Alberta political landscape..Paul Hinman has a well established history of political upsets. Nobody expected the Alberta Alliance Party to win a seat in the 2004 general election. Ralph Klein still reigned supreme in Alberta and no fourth party had managed to break through and win a seat in 28 years. It was a narrow win, but Paul managed to unseat a Progressive Conservative Party incumbent in Cardston-Taber-Warner, much to the surprise of the Alberta political establishment. Paul then won the Alberta Alliance Party leadership in what was a small but hostile leadership race. While relegated to a corner of the legislature and without formal party status, Hinman managed to punch above his weight and hold the PC government to account from a conservative perspective, while the Alberta Alliance Party continued to grow..Internal rifts are always rife within conservative movements. A group broke away from the Alberta Alliance Party in hopes of returning to more socially conservative roots and began petitioning to form the Wildrose Party. It split a movement which was still too small to handle such a division. Hinman negotiated a merger of the disparate groups which involved his sacrificing of his hard won role as party leader in order to bring things back under the united entity of the Wildrose Alliance Party. The degree of humility and pragmatism demonstrated in that move was striking..The Wildrose Alliance Party was dismissed as a rural rump by the mainstream media and political establishment. Hinman had lost his seat by an agonizing 39 votes in the 2008 Tory sweep and pundits used that loss to dismiss Hinman’s prior win as a one-off political anomaly. Hinman proved them all dead wrong when he defeated Diane Colley-Urquhart in an urban Calgary seat in a 2009 by-election. Once again Paul was the lone sitting MLA in the legislature, but he was soon joined by some PC MLAs who had crossed the floor, which gave the Wildose Party formal party status under Danielle Smith and made them a truly serious political player..Paul Hinman is a workhorse. His upset wins were the result of his tireless campaign door knocking while still juggling the leadership and management of a growing party. There is no doubt that Paul will apply that work ethic and experience to his tenure as leader of the Wildrose Independence Party. There is a lot of work to be done and there can be no herd of cats more difficult to manage than a group of independence-minded folks..I expect that Hinman will be dismissed yet again by the political and media establishments. While Paul is capable of compromise, change, learning and growth the Alberta establishment appears to be incapable of it. The Wildrose Independence Party has scored quite a coup with the acquisition of Hinman, though few may quite realize it yet. The biggest mistake that has been made by every opponent of Paul Hinman over the years has been to underestimate him..Cory Morgan and a columnist for the Western Standard and a business owner in Priddis, Alberta.
