A Petition Asks That Calgary's Airport Be Renamed In Honour Of Stephen Harper

Even more people want to prevent that, though.

An online petition was launched this week to rename the Calgary International Airport to the Stephen J. Harper International Airport.

Via thepetitionsite.com

The petition has already gotten more than 2,600 signatures.

"Since Prime Minister Harper has represented Calgary and is know as a Calgarian, Prime Minister Harper should be honoured with the permanent recognition," R. Curtis Mullen, the person who started the petition, told BuzzFeed Canada.

But now another petition has sprung up specifically to prevent that from happening, and it's doing even better than the original.

Mark Blinch / Reuters

The "Prevent Renaming the Calgary International Airport" petition has 3,300 signatures as of Tuesday morning.

BuzzFeed Canada has reached out to the person behind the petition for comment.

Meanwhile, conservative pundit Ezra Levant has launched his own effort to rename the airport for Stephen Harper.

There are four other Canadian airports named after prime ministers.

Thinkstock

• The Toronto Pearson International Airport.
• The Montréal–Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport.
• The Saskatoon John G. Diefenbaker International Airport.
• Ottawa's Macdonald–Cartier International Airport

All of them were renamed long after their namesake prime ministers had died.

Stephen Harper, on the other hand, is very much alive and still technically prime minister until the new guy gets sworn in.

Mullen said he knew place names typically aren't named after people until after their deaths, but he cited Justin Trudeau's campaign pledge to practice a new kind of politics.

"This would be a fantastic time to show the country he will be doing things differently," Mullen said.