Which version of Smith will lead the province?

Look out, Canada, here comes a reinvigorated Danielle Smith.

Or as Premier Smith put it in her victory speech Monday: “Hopefully the prime minister and his caucus are watching tonight.”

Smith’s statement wasn’t just a shot across the Liberal government’s bow but a promise — a threat, really — to immediately start a fight with Ottawa over the proposed introduction of an emissions cap on oil and gas as well as regulations on power plants fuelled by natural gas.

“As premier, I cannot under any circumstances allow these contemplated federal policies to be inflicted upon Albertans — I simply can’t and I won’t,” Smith said.

Smith certainly campaigned on standing up for Alberta with Ottawa — as did NDP Leader Rachel Notley — but during the campaign Smith’s combative style was muted.

The megaphone came out again Monday night with the UCP’s win with 49 seats to 38 for the NDP.

But one of the big unanswered questions from election night is who did Albertans elect as premier?

Was it the moderate and reasonable Smith who determinedly focused on bread-and-butter issues during the campaign and included this line in her victory speech: “It is time to put partisanship, division, and personal and political attacks in the rearview mirror.”

Or will we see a return of the angry and divisive Smith of the UCP leadership race who campaigned against science, public health mandates, the RCMP and the Canada Pension Plan?

Was the rational Danielle Smith of the 28-day election campaign the new face of a chastened government?

Or was that a facade, a Potemkin premier, if you will?

Although Smith campaigned on fixing the health-care system, investing in infrastructure and helping Albertans pay their bills, she very deliberately did not campaign on her more controversial projects.

Those include replacing the RCMP with an Alberta Police Force, withdrawing from the Canada Pension Plan to set up an Alberta plan, replacing the Canada Revenue Agency with an Alberta version and starting to aggressively use the province’s Sovereignty Act in never-ending fights with the Liberal federal government.

Smith didn’t campaign on them because they’re complicated, expensive and, according to numerous opinion polls, unpopular. But she did not disavow them.

“They’re not in our campaign because I think we’ve got so many things that we have done that we’re excited about. We’re bringing in $10-a-day daycare,” Smith said during the first week of the campaign, deflecting attention away from her own controversial ideas to focus on, of all things, the federal government’s daycare initiative.

Smith, though, will be under pressure from her right-wing base to move on her promises. Withdrawing from the CPP, however, is not simply a matter of a referendum, as Smith has suggested, but would need the approval of seven provinces representing two-thirds of Canada’s population. You might as well try to amend the Constitution while you’re at it.

Then again, Smith took a 42,000

Although Premier Danielle Smith campaigned on fixing the health-care system, investing in infrastructure and helping Albertans pay their bills, she very deliberately did not campaign on her more controversial projects

vote win in the UCP leadership race last October as a mandate to introduce a Sovereignty Act.

You can only imagine how she will view winning 926,000 votes Monday.

And remember Jason Kenney rolled out a referendum in 2021 suggesting Albertans could scrap the federal equalization program. They can’t. That referendum passed, but equalization keeps rolling along.

Kenney’s goal was to keep churning division within Alberta-federal relations to excite his base and further his own political goals. You have to wonder if Smith has the same motivation in mind for her own pet projects.

Or will she temper her libertarian and populist tendencies because of the election results?

It was much closer than it appeared at first glance.

The UCP won 49 seats and 52 per cent of the vote compared to 38 seats and 44 per cent for the NDP. But those numbers belie reality. The NDP not only won all 20 seats in Edmonton but a majority of seats in Calgary — 14 out of 26 — while toppling some of the government’s top cabinet ministers.

The NDP now has the largest opposition in Alberta history.

The UCP’s vote skewed heavily toward “rural” ridings outside the major cities, a result that does not reflect the reality of Alberta as a heavily urbanized province.

Then, there’s the minutiae of the results in closely fought ridings, particularly Calgary.

Trevor Tombe, a Calgary-based economist who did double duty as a numbers cruncher Monday night, concluded that just 1,300 votes in the closest races made all the difference to the outcome. This really was an election balancing on a razor’s edge.

That will no doubt be a frustrating fact for New Democrats, who will spend the next four years wondering “what if …”

Notley has vowed to stay on as NDP leader. It’s hard to imagine the party surviving without her.

Smith, of course, revelled in her victory Monday.

And, naturally, politicians and pundits across the country will be pontificating on what this means to federal politics, especially to federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre in his Smith-like campaign against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

But it would be simplistic to apply the Alberta results to the national scene.

Alberta is a very complicated place, as the election details illustrate.

Then there’s the matter of UCP internal politics. Smith-averse UCPers have been saying for months she would need to get at least 50 seats to be confident in her position as party leader and premier.

She might end up facing the same internal tug of war that undermined Kenney.

Only this time fringe elements, most notably the Take Back Alberta group that credits itself with toppling Kenney and installing Smith as leader last year, will be confidently declaring themselves as premier-makers — and demanding that the Smith of 2023 revert to the Smith of 2022.