So declared our main news splash on Thursday, announcing the birth of two new regional editions of HuffPost, in Alberta and British Columbia. As other major media organizations across the country lay off staff and shutter their presses, HuffPost's expansion west is good news -- great news -- for readers who are rapidly running out of sources of local news and opinion. Meanwhile it's starting to feel a lot like Christmas -- which is a parent's way of saying it's Back to School time. I need advice on how to a contrive a sympathetic and sorrowful look on my face when my kids and I bump into the stacks of school supplies at the mall. My impulse is to shout, "YES!"

Huffington Post's big western Canadian debut this week. After all, for anyone interested in the emergence of real, substantial alternatives -- in both reporting and editorializing -- to the stagnant status quo of the western establishment press, it's hard to deny that the web's where it's at. The political backdrop accompanying this western release could not bode more auspicious either, considering the substantial partisan evolution both British Columbia and Alberta are undergoing at the moment.

We believe Albertans are ready to embrace the exchange of ideas. This is a province that's being shaped by a young, connected, diverse and intelligent citizenry, a citizenry that needs a punchy, politically savvy, smart online publication that sparks ideas and stirs the imagination but that doesn't always take itself seriously.