Canada's economy teeters on recession, and Media Party is “shocked”
Episode Stats
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Summary
While Justin Trudeau is busy alienating our foreign allies and corrupting our domestic legal system, guess what? Our economy has teetered to the brink of recession. Why should others go to jail when you're a biggest carbon consumer?
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Hello, my Rebels. Welcome to another podcast. You know, these podcasts are free. They're the audio
00:00:06.360
version only, obviously. But I really recommend that you get the video version, too. You can
00:00:11.820
watch it on your phone. You can watch it on the go. You can watch it on Roku or any of those smart
00:00:15.740
TVs. What's good about it is you get to see video clips and images and quote boards and all these
00:00:22.520
graphics and things we put together for you. I really recommend it. I mean, it's, of course,
00:00:29.060
the podcast is great, too. But I think you should sign up for a vid. And by the way, it's only eight
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bucks a month to get a premium subscription. You get my show. You get Sheila Gunn-Reed's show. You
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it. So it's really not much. And it keeps us going here at The Rebel. So I'd appreciate it if you do
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that today. We talk about two things. We talk about how Canada's slipping into a recession
00:01:02.640
for three out of the last four months. We've had negative growth. A recession is defined as two
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quarters in a row where the economy is shrinking. I think we're on the doorstep of that. I think
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we'll be in a recession by the summer. And Trudeau is really to blame for that. You can't kill a
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hundred billion dollar oil and gas industry, give away the story to Donald Trump in auto negotiations
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and think you're going to be fine. And of course, we talked to Manny Montenegrino about Jane
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Philpott's shocking resignation from Trudeau's cabinet. That's all ahead. By the way, if you're
00:01:35.580
listening to this, hey, can you do me a quick favor and give us a rating? Of course, I'm hoping you
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think it was a five out of five experience. But the odd doubter thinks it's only a four and a half
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out of five. All right, fine. So without further to do, may I invite you to listen to today's
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audio only podcast. You're listening to a Rebel Media podcast. Tonight, while Justin Trudeau was
00:02:00.300
busy alienating our foreign allies and corrupting our domestic legal system, guess what? Our economy
00:02:06.400
has teetered to the brink of recession. It's March 4th, and this is the Ezra Levant Show.
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Why should others go to jail when you're a biggest carbon consumer I know?
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There's 8,500 customers here, and you won't give them an answer. The only thing I have to say to the
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government about why I'm publishing it is because it's my bloody right to do so.
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Well, shocking news today. Jane Philpott, another liberal cabinet minister, resigned in disgust,
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saying she simply couldn't trust Justin Trudeau anymore. We'll have a lot more on that story
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with our friend Manny Montenegrino. But first, I want to talk about something else. We'll get right
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back to the scandal. You know, our economy in Canada is now on the brink of recession, and the
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mainstream media has been too busy with Trudeau's scandals to notice. Here's the Wall Street Journal
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the other day. They pay closer attention to our Canadian economy than do most Canadian reporters.
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Their headline, Canada's economy delivers worst quarterly growth in two years.
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Just a reminder, a recession is defined by economists as two consecutive quarters in a row,
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that's six months, with negative economic growth, as in half a year where the economy shrinks, where
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people spend less, buy less, build less, sell less, things hurt. We're teetering on the brink of that
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right now. Now, you'd know that if you watch my show, as I know you do. In fact, I pretty much
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predicted the timing even. Remember when I told you what had not been reported anywhere else in the
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mainstream media, a huge announcement by Donald Trump a few weeks ago, when he just announced a
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new Buy American executive order, shutting out Canadian companies from hundreds of billions,
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maybe even trillions of dollars worth of U.S. construction projects. And that's on top
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of what Trudeau has done to our economy, killing the three pipelines, Northern Gateway, which was
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already approved by the National Energy Board, Energy East, and the Trans Mountain Pipeline, which was
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also approved by the National Energy Board. I mean, Justin Trudeau just killed $30 billion in pipeline
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construction. And then another $30 or $50 billion in LNG, liquefied natural gas projects in BC.
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How on earth do you think you can do that to an economy and not have a recession? And we're doing
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that to ourselves. And then there's just his regular war on the oil patch, his carbon tax. And remember,
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you're calling for the phase out of oil companies altogether.
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I've said time and time again, and you're all tired of hearing me say it, you can't make a choice
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between what's good for the environment and what's good for the economy. We can't shut down the oil
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sands tomorrow. We need to phase them out. We need to manage the transition off of our dependence on
00:04:55.720
Yeah, you get rid of the oil patch. You fail to protect the auto industry from Trump's repatriation because
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you're picking a fight with Trump on feminism or global warming or whatever. And you're surprised when
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Canada's economy slows a lot more than expected, said the Financial Post. Really? A lot more than who expected?
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I've been expecting it. I think we're heading into a recession. I think we're heading there fast.
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There are too many things falling apart at the same time. But have you heard about any of this in the
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mainstream media? I'm guessing no. The CBC's weekly magazine show, hosted by Wendy Mesley,
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they had the latest conspiracy theory. Seriously, they did a huge feature on how Donald Trump Jr.
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is going to be arrested any moment now. And that will surely mean that then Donald Trump is going to be
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arrested. And it's, we're all going to be saved. It was a true conspiracy theory. It was kooky.
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But the weirdest part about it is, why is that on a Canadian news show on the Canadian Broadcasting
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Corporation? I mean, if you want to go full Trump derangement syndrome, I get it. Fill your boots.
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But you can get that on CNN or MSNBC or any U.S. late night talk show. Why wait a week for your news
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to be stale and then done by a clunky Canadian show? That's so weird, that show. But hey,
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anything rather than talking about the economy or even talking about a Canadian scandal that's
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actually real. I mean, in the past few weeks, we've seen Jody Wilson-Raybould quit as veterans
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minister. Then we saw Trudeau's right-hand man, Gerald Butts, resign in disgrace. Then we saw
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Trudeau's chief of staff, Katie Telford, brag that she has the media in the palm of her hand and that
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can make all these problems away. We saw, as the whole country watched, riveted as Jody Wilson-Raybould
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gave a meticulous point-by-point, day-by-day history of how Trudeau and his cronies met with her 10 times
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and phoned her 10 more times and emailed and texted her to try to get her to drop the criminal charges
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against one of their crony corporate friends, SNC-Lavalin, to cover for the corruption in
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Libya. We also learned that SNC-Lavalin spent millions of dollars on hookers and drugs for
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Libya's former dictator's son when he visited Canada. And then today, another bombshell,
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Jane Philpott, widely regarded as one of Trudeau's most competent ministers, with a lot of complicated
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files, just quit. And in a heartfelt letter that she surely wrote herself, said she just couldn't
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live up or live down to the ethics of supporting the cabinet. She just couldn't support Trudeau with
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a straight face. It was brutal. And do you think she's the last to quit? Yeah. So it's pretty
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conspicuous when you're in that news environment and the CBC says, gee, I think what Canadians really
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need to look at and think about now is Donald Trump Jr. Yeah, he's the real Canadians. Get mad
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about Donald Trump Jr. It's so sad. Now, to be fair, the CBC is actually an anomaly these days.
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Other media are actually showing surprising signs of curiosity. I mean, look at Mercedes Stevenson
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asking David Lamedi, Trudeau's new handpicked attorney general, if he has any qualms about interfering
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in a criminal case, to help Justin Trudeau win an election. I mean, that should be a pretty
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easy question to answer. And apparently it wasn't.
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But if someone approached you and said an election is at stake, would that be a persuasive argument
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Again, it depends on the context. The leading case from the UK...
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Sorry, just to stop you there, but an election could be a reason for an attorney general to
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interfere in a criminal prosecution. That would be appropriate.
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I'm not saying it would be appropriate or inappropriate.
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Holy moly. I wonder if watching that is what made James Philpott quit today.
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What else could explain the timing? Now, this is a pleasant change to see an actual question asked
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by a journalist. There have always been a lot of scandals out there with Justin Trudeau. The fact
00:09:09.540
that he's scandalous is nothing new. This is just the first time the mainstream media is actually
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talking about them. Here's the new cover of Maclean's magazine. Now, look, it doesn't mean
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much. Maclean's has a sliver of the readership it used to have. It's not an important magazine
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anymore. In fact, I think it's just down to a skeleton crew working there. But it's useful
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as a barometer for the media party, for the fancy-pants insiders, elite media. I mean,
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really, they just talk amongst themselves. But it's interesting. They now feel comfortable
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challenging the precious. I'm surprised. I mean, they've always supported him ideologically.
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And obviously, they still do support him ideologically. Canada's media aren't suddenly
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conservative. They don't suddenly doubt the theory of man-made global warming. They don't
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suddenly support private firearms ownership. They don't suddenly doubt the wisdom of a carbon tax or
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giving a public apology and $10.5 million to Omar Khadr. They're still the same. I think it's that
00:10:04.940
they still believe in all those things. But they realize now, finally, three and a half years into
00:10:10.780
it, that Trudeau doesn't really believe in those things himself. Like Maclean says, he's an imposter.
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He just says and does whatever it takes to get him through the day. He's been playing them for chumps.
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That's really what this cover means, the imposter. I think Trudeau is the same guy he's always been,
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a shallow, selfie-obsessed, trust-fund kid. The kind of kid who, when he was in high school,
00:10:35.700
probably asked to copy the homework off the smart nerds in exchange for being their cool friend for
00:10:41.420
a minute. But of course, he wasn't truly their friend. It was all part of his grift, his back
00:10:46.020
slapping, his sales pitch. That cover story, that imposter cover story of Maclean's, was written by Paul
00:10:51.820
Wells, seen here joking with Trudeau a few years ago. I think Wells really thought that Trudeau was
00:10:58.860
listening to him, really thought Trudeau was a passionate citizen who valued ideas and progressive
00:11:05.040
thinkings. I think maybe Paul Wells actually thought Trudeau was his friend, like the nerdy
00:11:10.400
kid doing his homework. Maybe he thought, I think he really likes me. And now Paul Wells has woken up
00:11:17.140
and is being disillusioned and realizes that he was tricked. Trudeau wasn't really friends with him.
00:11:23.400
Trudeau just needed someone to copy his homework from. Trudeau was just saying whatever it would
00:11:27.760
take to get Paul Wells to be really friendly to him. As in, Trudeau was a master at flattering
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the Paul Wells's of the world. He flattered their vanity. He made them feel special. He made them feel
00:11:38.540
cool. And of course, he was happy to parrot whatever policy blather they wanted to hear from him. It's not
00:11:43.160
like he had an opinion about ideas. What you're seeing here isn't any new Justin Trudeau. You and I have
00:11:50.280
known he was a shallow faker all along. What you're seeing here is not news about Trudeau. You're seeing
00:11:56.000
news about the media. They are disillusioned, or at least those who like to think of themselves as public
00:12:01.000
intellectuals of some sort. And Paul Wells certainly thinks he is. So let's recap. You've got a scandal, a
00:12:08.040
corruption scandal that proves everything Trudeau ever said about being progressive and modern,
00:12:12.780
let alone a male feminist. It's a lie. He's an old boy feathering the nest of his Montreal cronies,
00:12:18.960
worse than anyone else, frankly. And public opinion polls are starting to show that it's sticking.
00:12:25.140
He's not skating through this scandal as he did, for example, the revelation that he sexually assaulted
00:12:30.160
Rose Knight, a young woman in Creston, B.C. in August of 2000. He skated through that one.
00:12:35.480
People laughed at how foolish he was in India, dressing up like it was a costume party. But it
00:12:42.740
didn't detonate him. I mean, sure, it made him look shallow and childish and narcissistic and wasteful
00:12:47.920
and a little kooky. But it didn't make him look deeply corrupt. This scandal is. And it's not done
00:12:54.940
yet. Jane Philpott, big bomb going off today. There will be more testimony in Parliament in the weeks
00:13:00.560
ahead. I predict more resignations, too. You want to be the last one to get off a sinking ship?
00:13:05.480
I presume that Gerald Butts, when he testifies, will do his best to rebut Jody Wilson-Rabel. But
00:13:10.900
I'm pretty sure she's got some more ammo on him. And frankly, if Butts lies, maybe you'll see more
00:13:18.160
resignations from people who know he's lying. Sounds like Jody Wilson-Rabel took copious notes and had
00:13:23.720
plenty of unimpeachable witnesses. Sounds maybe like she even confided in people like Jane Philpott,
00:13:29.020
people she trusted. I don't think this scandal is going away. Of course, the liberals will try to change the
00:13:34.660
channel on this. The other day, Trudeau was literally tweeting about the moon, the lunar
00:13:39.760
gateway or something. Yeah, he's a space cadet. We know that. This week, it's more global warming,
00:13:46.260
global warming. They love that one. It's an old reliable. It just happens to be a winter of record
00:13:51.520
cold. But look, it's all they know. My point is, I'm not sure if they're going to get out of this one
00:13:57.500
scandal so easily. And people are starting to notice. But so far, no one has really noticed the
00:14:02.440
economy. But they're about to. What has driven our economy for the last few years? It's not oil
00:14:09.240
and gas. That's been shrinking on purpose. Notley and Trudeau and Butts all hate it. They want to
00:14:13.820
face it out. You know Butts on pipelines. I'm going to show you this video again. I'm so sorry,
00:14:17.800
but I want you to know this video so well. You memorize it. Remember this?
00:14:21.700
We think that the oil sands have been expanded too rapidly without a serious plan for environmental
00:14:28.500
remediation in the first place. So that's why we don't think it's up to us to decide whether there
00:14:34.200
should be another route for a pipeline. Because the real alternative is not an alternative route.
00:14:43.720
So yeah, take out $100 billion of oil and gas from the economy. Bungle your trade deal with Trump so
00:14:49.760
badly that he brings home the auto industry to the Midwest like he's been saying he would do for
00:14:54.480
years. He doesn't care if Trudeau hates him. Trudeau doesn't get a vote in the 2020 election.
00:14:59.900
Steel workers in Indiana and auto workers in Michigan do. So scratch oil and gas. Scratch the
00:15:06.320
auto industry. What's left? The overheated housing market in Vancouver and Toronto. That's where a
00:15:11.840
lot of the wealth is coming from these days. But look, a real estate bubble isn't truly building wealth
00:15:16.560
in a sustainable way. First of all, it makes everyone who rents poorer. And it makes it hard for people to
00:15:22.420
buy a home. It makes it hard to start a family. It delays adult children from leaving their parents'
00:15:27.500
homes, getting married, having kids of their own. It's like a massive brake pedal on life. Sure,
00:15:32.380
it's great for those who already own a home and have paid it off. But that's sort of the opposite
00:15:36.660
of growth, isn't it? And according to police, it's not people really saying, I'd like to pay $2 million
00:15:42.300
for a starter home in Vancouver. It's often mainland Chinese getting their money out of China,
00:15:48.760
using the city's real estate just like a safe deposit box, just buying up homes, sometimes
00:15:53.700
without even seeing them first. Sometimes not even living in them, just to stash money away from
00:15:58.460
the Communist Party of China. That and massive criminal money laundering too. Lots of Russians
00:16:02.820
doing the same in Toronto for the same reason. Better to put your money in a Toronto condo than in a
00:16:07.560
Russian bank. My point is, what's left? Public sector growth? Those are the takers, not the makers.
00:16:14.700
And the few makers who are left, well, Trudeau and his crew don't like them much.
00:16:19.140
Now they have to answer all sorts of feminist puzzles before they're allowed to hire anyone.
00:16:25.500
Project's decisions will be based on science, evidence, and Indigenous traditional knowledge.
00:16:30.820
We're also taking a bigger picture look at the potential impacts of a proposed project.
00:16:34.900
Instead of just looking at the environmental impacts, we'll look at how a project could
00:16:39.660
affect our communities and health, jobs and the economy over the long term. And we'll also do
00:16:45.240
a gender-based analysis. Yeah, thanks but no thanks. Who would invest in Canada rather than in Donald
00:16:54.740
Trump's America? Like him or hate him, you know he's not going to make you do a gender analysis of
00:17:01.280
your steel mill before letting you open it. My friends, as Margaret Thatcher once said,
00:17:07.040
socialism only works until you run out of other people's money. Alberta is broke. It looks like
00:17:12.280
it's heading back into a second NDP recession. The rest of the country is tipping into a recession.
00:17:17.300
Trudeau and Morneau had already been spending tens of billions of dollars a year in deficits.
00:17:22.360
What are they going to do now? Oh, and here comes Donald Trump's buy American trade barriers and
00:17:27.880
his tax cut. Let me close with a few lines from the who could have seen this coming story that
00:17:34.020
the Financial Post ran. Canada's terms of trade, a comparison of the prices of exports versus the
00:17:39.720
prices of imports, saw its biggest drop since early 2009. The report said it fell 3.6% in the fourth
00:17:46.620
quarter, which was mostly due to a 34.3% decline in crude exports. Oh, well, who needs crude exports
00:17:53.540
anyways? Am I right? I mean, let's get down to zero. That's what phase it out means. The lower GDP
00:17:59.760
figure for all of 2018 reflected a slowdown in most categories, including weaker results for
00:18:04.540
household consumption, business investment, and housing investment, which contracted 2.3%.
00:18:09.740
The agency said the drop in housing investment coincided with rising interest rates and stricter
00:18:14.940
mortgage rules coming into force. In December, economic growth contracted 0.1% for the second
00:18:21.960
consecutive month and the third decline in four months. Third decline in four months, eh? We're
00:18:28.820
almost in a recession, aren't we? But hey, gang, there's great news out there. The one policy
00:18:34.240
success for Justin Trudeau, the one thing he was really passionate about all these years, the one
00:18:38.660
thing he really cares about and can talk about without using notes, this.
00:18:43.280
The current approach on drugs is not working. I'm in favor of legalizing it. Five or six times in my
00:18:51.100
life that I've taken a puff of protecting our children from marijuana. So yes, five or six times in
00:18:58.260
my life that the continued prohibition of marijuana, that's a lot of smoking. I've never done it except
00:19:06.860
Yeah, that's great news, man. Let me read from the report. Household spending on marijuana
00:19:13.660
at an annual rate totaled $5.9 billion in the fourth quarter, with illegal pot accounting for $4.7 billion
00:19:20.980
of the total, and illegal weed representing $1.2 billion. Cannabis accounted for 0.5% of the total
00:19:28.380
household spending. The report said of the quarterly numbers, and non-medical cannabis accounted for 11.2%
00:19:35.120
of spending on alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis. That's your good news, people. That's your good
00:19:39.980
news right there. There's pot to be bought. So everything's declining in Canada. Real work is
00:19:46.520
declining. Real things, construction, oil, gas, building cars, it's all going to hell. We've got
00:19:53.980
some inflated housing in the big cities for now, part of which is just money laundering for
00:19:57.900
Russian and Chinese tycoons. But don't worry, my dudes. Just smoke some pot and do your part for
00:20:05.560
the economy, and it'll all be super. Oh, brother. Stay with us for more on today's shocking news
00:20:27.900
Welcome back. Well, bombshell after bombshell in the case of Justin Trudeau, SNC-Lavalin,
00:20:35.560
and his apparently illegal attempts to obstruct the course of justice by pressuring former Attorney
00:20:43.960
General Jody Wilson-Raybould into dropping criminal charges against the corrupt Quebec-based engineering
00:20:50.740
firm. Well, the bombshell today is the sudden resignation of Jane Philpott, widely regarded
00:20:58.280
as one of the most competent of Trudeau's ministers. You can see on your screen a lengthy, heartfelt
00:21:06.640
letter by Jane Philpott, who just says she can't stick around, she can't be part of it. Instead of
00:21:13.460
letting me paraphrase, let me read it to you verbatim. I've been considering the events that
00:21:19.200
have shaken the federal government in recent weeks, and after serious reflection, I have concluded that
00:21:23.500
I must resign as a member of cabinet. In Canada, the Constitutional Convention of Cabinet Solidarity
00:21:29.520
means, among other things, that ministers are expected to defend all cabinet decisions. A minister
00:21:35.140
must always be prepared to defend other ministers publicly, and must speak in support of the government
00:21:39.620
and its policies. Given this convention, and the current circumstances, it is untenable for me to continue
00:21:46.200
to serve as a cabinet minister. Let me just read one more paragraph.
00:21:50.020
Unfortunately, the evidence of efforts by politicians and or officials to pressure the former Attorney General
00:21:56.800
to intervene in the criminal case involving SNC-Lavalin, and the evidence as to the content of those efforts,
00:22:03.300
have raised serious concerns for me. Those concerns have been augmented by the views expressed
00:22:09.600
by my constituents and other Canadians. Let me just read one more part, and then we'll turn it over
00:22:15.760
to our friend Manny Montenegrino, who's joining us on an urgent basis.
00:22:21.700
The solemn principles at stake are the independence and integrity of our justice system.
00:22:25.340
It is a fundamental doctrine of the rule of law that our Attorney General should not be subjected
00:22:28.720
to political pressure or interference regarding the exercise of her prosecutorial discretion in criminal
00:22:34.800
cases. Sadly, I have lost confidence in how the government has dealt with this matter and in how
00:22:40.840
it has responded to the issues raised. Last sentence,
00:22:44.680
It grieves me to leave a portfolio where I was at work to deliver on an important mandate,
00:22:49.240
but I must abide by my core values, my ethical responsibilities, and constitutional obligations.
00:22:54.960
There can be a cost to acting on one's principles, but there is a bigger cost to abandoning them.
00:23:01.680
What a devastating letter. And joining us now via Skype from Ottawa is our friend Manny Montenegrino,
00:23:10.380
the CEO of ThinkSharp, former national chairman of a major law firm, and I should say lawyer to
00:23:16.540
Stephen Harper. Manny, great to see you again. What a bombshell. What do you make of that letter
00:23:23.880
It was foreseeable. In fact, Ezra, if you go to my Twitter account, I post it as my pin,
00:23:31.560
I think three weeks ago, I said she would do this. What's amazing is the fact that this
00:23:39.560
prime minister, Gerald Butts, and his team are tone deaf. They really don't know what's going on.
00:23:45.840
And Ezra, as I said in one of my interviews with you two, three, four weeks ago, or three weeks ago
00:23:53.140
when this occurred, I said, this is a constitutional crisis. And they tried to deal with it in their
00:24:00.020
typical political way. But when you have a one sitting attorney general making the strongest case
00:24:08.920
ever for obstruction of justice against a sitting prime minister, and the sitting prime minister
00:24:14.760
doesn't do anything, that is a constitutional crisis. And they try to manage this as they've done.
00:24:20.420
Everything else was managed poorly. And now you'll see the effects of it. And this government will
00:24:27.840
not last, in my estimation, for much longer. Manny, I saw your private email exchange that you posted
00:24:35.620
online where you predicted Jane Philpott. What was it about her that made you think she would be the
00:24:42.420
one to go next? Well, that's a great question. I think, and we talked about this, Ezra, these are
00:24:49.500
two very principled women. These are two professional women. One is a doctor, and one is a lawyer. And when
00:24:56.380
you get to that stage, and you know, the prime minister has never been in a profession, never
00:25:01.180
understood the concept that's required to reach those high levels. These two women certainly understand
00:25:09.220
their duties, and they're just exhibiting them. So this is not, so you could see it. And if you watch
00:25:15.880
the, what is also, and I don't understand, for the prime minister to be boasting to be a feminist,
00:25:24.380
to not be able to read these two strong women and not understand who they are, what they did in their
00:25:32.220
lifetime, what commitment they gave to their profession, and have them at your cabinet table and
00:25:37.060
listen to them. I made these decisions three weeks ago. I don't know these women. I understood them. I looked at
00:25:43.640
their profession. I looked at their duties, and I understood that they would. I don't know them. How could you be
00:25:48.860
sitting at a table for three years and not know these women? This is the opposite of what a feminist is. This is a
00:25:56.340
person that just does not, and listen, it also goes to men. I mean, but he touts himself as a feminist. But these are very
00:26:03.740
strong women. Ezra, when I was managing my law firm, I had strong women. I made them partners.
00:26:12.040
It's very obvious to see the strength and integrity of women. And by far, they wear it a lot more proudly
00:26:21.900
than some men do. And so it's not a shock. I tweeted it three weeks ago privately. Someone asked me, and I
00:26:28.540
said, here's what's going to happen. I've been calling this as it unfolds day by day. But we have
00:26:34.020
a constitutional crisis. Can you imagine a sitting attorney general calling out a prime minister for
00:26:40.580
obstruction of justice? And now we have, I cannot see the RSMP after this resignation, not having a full
00:26:49.080
investigation. Yeah. Because remember, Jody Wilson-Raybould has not been freed from all of her
00:26:56.640
confidentiality limits. For example, what she learned and discussed when she was demoted to
00:27:02.740
veterans minister. She has not been released to discuss that. So I'm sure that Jane Philpott knows
00:27:09.640
some things that we don't know. Of course she does. She's a member of Canada. Can I show you a video
00:27:14.860
clip from the weekend? This is David Lamedi. He went on Global TV. He was interviewed by Mercedes
00:27:21.340
Stevenson. And let me throw something at you again. I'm just speculating. And so maybe I'm asking you to
00:27:26.340
speculate too. But I think that Jane Philpott, who, like you say, was sensitive to this issue to begin
00:27:33.600
with. My personal theory is she saw the new attorney general that Justin Trudeau handpicked. And she
00:27:41.560
saw this little exchange. And she thought, if that's what we're doing, count me out. This is my theory.
00:27:47.540
Take a look at this, Manny. Sure. But if someone approached you and said an election is at stake,
00:27:52.540
would that be a persuasive argument to you? Again, it depends on the context. The leading
00:27:57.640
case from the UK... Sorry, just to stop you there, but an election could be a reason for an attorney
00:28:02.120
general to interfere in a criminal prosecution. That would be appropriate. I'm not saying it would
00:28:06.740
be appropriate or inappropriate. That should be an easy answer to say no to. But he dodged it for about
00:28:13.100
a minute. My personal theory is she saw that and said, I'm out of here. Yeah, Ezra, I warned you once.
00:28:19.400
I don't want to speak that man's name. Listen, one more warning. He's done more harm to the whole
00:28:28.940
legal profession than any person that I know. Absolutely. But that is certainly, that would
00:28:35.920
enrage anybody seeing the new attorney general do a complete opposite of what his duties are.
00:28:44.020
But I'm going to add something else. The justice committee or the conservatives in the justice
00:28:50.120
committee tried to get Gerald Butts before the committee and they struck it down. Now, the power
00:28:56.400
was at the prime minister's office. The biggest problem of this government is a prime minister
00:29:01.840
office and Gerald Butts basically treating cabinet ministers like servants. So he was not permitted to
00:29:12.480
speak to the justice committee because it was shut down by the liberals. So the conservatives tried to
00:29:17.960
and the NDP tried to have him. But now Gerald Butts writes a letter. He quits, resigns, but he writes a
00:29:24.100
letter and says, I need to speak to you. That would enrage me if I were the minister, the Treasury Board,
00:29:31.740
and knowing that this person got the cover by the Liberal Party not to go because we're protecting the PMO
00:29:39.180
and he will now wants to speak. I think that as much as David Lamedi's insane
00:29:46.520
review of the law, that probably had a lot to do with it. I mean, my view is, listen, this is historic.
00:29:58.780
Never has it happened in Canada. The majority government is going to fall apart in three years.
00:30:03.940
It's not happened. And it didn't happen because of a mistake. It happened because of a continued
00:30:11.940
PMO mistake after mistake after mistake. You have, I mean, Ezra, you want to go quickly through
00:30:18.320
that India trip. How did that ever happen? A tweet, welcome to Canada tweet that's now cost us
00:30:24.920
three to five billion dollars and put our whole asylum program into jeopardy. The tweet,
00:30:31.240
the Saudi Arabia tweets, which cost billions of dollars. And in my view, may have caused the
00:30:37.160
SNC-Lavalin because they lost a billion dollar contract. This PMO has been running like a fourth
00:30:45.140
grade committee. And so, of course, they're going to screw this up as well because they don't know
00:30:53.980
how to manage anything correctly. And to think, and I'll predict, I think this government will fall.
00:30:59.680
I think Trudeau will be gone. I think there's another tweet. And I said, he'll be gone by the
00:31:05.020
Ides of March. So we've got about another 10 days, but he cannot survive. When you have cabinet ministers
00:31:11.200
saying, I don't have confidence in you, he has to step down. The RCP has to take over. The Liberal
00:31:16.620
Party has to regain its party and it will, it'll put new people in. And then we'll get rid of this real
00:31:23.600
dark nightmare that Canadians have been faced for three years.
00:31:26.740
Well, that's the thing. The more people, and especially Jane Philpott, who's not regarded as
00:31:31.920
a schemer or, you know, she's not a rival to Justin Trudeau. It's not like she's doing this to
00:31:39.020
position herself for something. So I think her move has to be taken at face value. I think if another
00:31:47.420
joins her, well, that would be three then. And I think you're right. Let me ask you, do you think
00:31:54.860
Justin Trudeau is going to be thrown out? Or do you think he's going to take, quote, a walk in the
00:32:00.140
snow and say, you know what? I didn't sign up for this. I've made some mistakes. Maybe the Harper ads
00:32:05.260
were right. Maybe I'm just not ready. I'm not having fun anymore. I like having fun. I like being
00:32:10.920
a mascot. I love the soft press. It's hard now. I'm just out of here and I'll go work for the UN or
00:32:17.720
something. Do you think he's going to be thrown out or will he jump out?
00:32:20.460
Well, he won't jump out because, you know, he doesn't, again, I don't think he has great
00:32:25.780
judgment. Right now, I imagine there are 50 people clamoring and saying, you have no option.
00:32:31.060
You've got to leave. You have no option. You've got to leave. And I think it's going to take some
00:32:35.920
time to get that message across. I think there'll be about six, seven ministers that say, look,
00:32:41.100
we're doing the right thing, but we agree with the two ministers left. You make the right decision
00:32:46.660
or we're all gone. So that's going to take some time for him to process it. There is nothing
00:32:53.140
of a future of this, of this liberal government. I think they will replace and get some new people
00:32:59.980
in there and they'll give themselves another shot. But there is, there is no way he can continue.
00:33:06.520
You can't have cabinet ministers say that I don't have confidence in the prime minister.
00:33:10.500
Uh, and, and, and, and, you know, there'll be others. There'll be others.
00:33:15.180
Well, this is very interesting. Permit me one last observation and then I'll let you close the
00:33:19.580
segment. And by the way, Manny, thanks for agreeing to talk with us on very short notice. This literally
00:33:24.440
just broke about an hour ago from when we're talking. So thank you for, for agreeing. No problem.
00:33:30.000
You know, um, one of Stephen Harper's, uh, important legacies was putting in place legal checks and
00:33:38.420
balances to catch precisely this sort of thing. He's the one who set up this legal scheme for the
00:33:44.960
director of public prosecutions to take it out of the politics of cabinet. In a way you could say
00:33:50.460
he was protecting it, building a fence around it. But I guess that fence is sort of electrocuted
00:33:54.940
because the liberals are zapping themselves. They couldn't keep their hands out of the cookie jar
00:33:58.640
in a way it's Harper's revenge. What do you think of that? Oh, well, that's true. But let's,
00:34:04.240
let me tell your viewers legally what happened. Of course, there's always been a separation between
00:34:10.400
the judiciary and, uh, the, the, the government. Uh, and that has been part of common law and part
00:34:17.780
of parliamentary government for hundreds of years. Uh, the prime minister Harper, who, uh, who, uh,
00:34:24.120
you know, I proudly served, uh, he understood that, you know what, things are going the wrong way.
00:34:30.100
Let me put a legal obligation, not just a constitutional historical obligation. So he
00:34:37.080
changed the law. And what was important was not to, not the separation of, uh, of the public
00:34:44.040
prosecutor, but the, the important thing, Ezra, is he put in the law that if the attorney general
00:34:50.780
overrules the public prosecutor and decision, that must be gazetted, i.e. made public.
00:34:56.980
Mm-hmm. So that was a little, so basically not only do we separate it in law, but we're saying
00:35:03.780
to you, if you make the change, you have a statutory obligation to make it public. And that's when
00:35:10.400
it broke because you had the chief of staff, Katie Teflard say, don't worry, we'll line up a bunch of
00:35:18.440
op-eds to kind of shelter your quote legal, because there must have been a discussion where the attorney
00:35:24.400
general says, you understand my obligation. I now have to tell the world that I reversed the decision
00:35:31.180
of the public prosecutor, and everyone's going to see this as political interference. I don't want to
00:35:37.040
do it. Yeah. And the PMO sat there and said, don't you worry. We'll get 20 op-eds, 30 op-eds, 50 op-eds
00:35:44.780
to say that what you did was legally okay. We will do that for you because you're worried that publicly,
00:35:51.820
you're going to tell the world that you were politically interfering. That's a little bit
00:35:56.960
that the Prime Minister Harper and a very detailed, one of the, I mean, one of the brightest men you'll
00:36:02.980
ever meet, one of the most ethical men you'll ever meet. It was just an honor to serve him. And
00:36:07.960
Canada was blessed by having him as a Prime Minister. We see it now today with the complete opposite of
00:36:15.340
this Prime Minister. Well, just amazing. Manny, once again, we're in your debt. I like to say
00:36:20.360
when you come on the show, it's a masterclass in law and politics and, and media too, frankly. So
00:36:27.820
we're always grateful for your time and expertise. Thanks, my friend. No problem. All right. Take
00:36:31.640
care. Right on. Take care. There you have it. Manny Montenegrino, formerly a senior managing partner
00:36:37.360
at a national law firm, of course, a lawyer to Stephen Harper when he was Prime Minister,
00:36:41.500
and he is now the CEO of Think Sharp. He joined us via Skype from Ottawa. Stay with us. More ahead
00:36:48.020
on The Rebel. Hey, welcome back on my monologue Friday about Trudeau doing well when he's
00:37:02.880
underestimated. Betty writes, maybe before the next election, Trudeau will resign, saying he wants to
00:37:07.940
spend more time with his family. That way he won't be around to lose the election.
00:37:11.500
Being Prime Minister is just too much work for him. You know, Betty, I have been saying that. I'm not
00:37:16.540
saying it's my for sure prediction, but I think it's a greater chance when people think that he'll
00:37:22.760
say, I don't need this. It's not fun anymore. I like being liked. I don't like being hated.
00:37:28.100
You know, it's funny because when you're a conservative, when you're a dissident, when you're,
00:37:32.700
when you're taking an unpopular position, you have to live with the fact that not everyone's going to
00:37:37.140
love you. Stephen Harper, I think was quite fine with the fact that the fact that a good number of
00:37:41.980
people didn't like him. Here at The Rebel, we get smashed around so much by our enemies. You just
00:37:46.300
have to be okay with that. If you're not okay with that, don't work for The Rebel. Go be a weatherman
00:37:49.660
or a sports reporter or something uncontroversial. Justin Trudeau has never really been in the political
00:37:57.140
controversy in his life. He's never really had a tough time. He's never been on the wrong side of a
00:38:02.020
fight because the media are so gentle with him. This is the first time in his life that he's having
00:38:08.420
a tough go. That cover in McLean's magazine, calling him an imposter by his best buddy, Paul
00:38:14.500
Wells. That's got to sting when all these passionate women that he appointed as part of his gender
00:38:20.420
quota, when they're quitting saying he's unethical, that's got to sting. Now, don't get me wrong.
00:38:25.500
You're not going to see unethical women like Miriam Monsef or Ikra Khaled or Christy Duncan
00:38:31.300
and Catherine McKenna quit on him. They're loyal to the end. But the actual competent women of
00:38:35.660
achievement, they're quitting. That's got to sting. I mean, it's one thing when a conservative shoots
00:38:41.820
an arrow at him. But when Jane Philpott, diehard liberal, well-respected, says, yeah, you're a
00:38:49.160
little too corrupt for me, he's not used to that, is he? I think there's a 25% chance he'll quit.
00:38:56.240
Maybe I'm hedging my bets, but I think there's a chance. Daniel writes, interesting to think what
00:39:04.200
would happen if Justin Trudeau's new minister of justice decides to give SNC-Lavilland that deal
00:39:08.300
now. The liberals would never hear the end of it, and they may not get reelected. I'm going to stop
00:39:15.120
you there for a second, because that's their only way out, in my view. I think they've broken the law.
00:39:19.420
Well, I think they've broken section 139.2, the criminal code obstruction. They may have broken
00:39:25.140
other sections as well, including intimidation. But how, see, you're thinking like a conservative.
00:39:31.100
A conservative would say, uh-oh, if you do the nasty, you're going to get in trouble. But no,
00:39:35.600
no, see, a liberal thinks, yeah, so what? Yeah, of course we did. We did it to save jobs.
00:39:42.420
Are you against saving jobs? Are you against kids? We did it to stop global warming. We did it to stop
00:39:47.860
the war in Yemen, or whatever they'll say. Like, they'll say anything. You know, they'll say,
00:39:52.980
they'll admit it's a judo move. Instead of pushing back, they'll just, yeah, of course we did it.
00:40:00.260
It would be shocking if we didn't do it. It'd be shocking if we didn't interfere to save jobs.
00:40:04.460
Well, you don't like jobs anymore? Or do you hate Quebec? Which is it? Do you hate jobs? Or do you
00:40:07.660
hate Quebec? Because you're sure full of hate, Mr. Conservative Islamophobe,
00:40:10.700
gay-bassing, racist, Westerner, rebel convoy oil man? So that's exactly the move they will do.
00:40:20.300
The only thing that'll stop them, I think, is what we saw today, is someone on the inside who says,
00:40:25.860
I just can't stomach this. And I'm amazed that you have two politicians who'll do that. You know,
00:40:31.360
when was the last time you saw a politician resign on principle? I remember the defense minister in the
00:40:38.320
United Kingdom who missed the warning signs of the Argentine invasion of the Falkland Islands.
00:40:44.540
Was it Hazeltine, his name? I can't remember. That was when I was just a young lad. But he resigned.
00:40:50.700
He resigned. He said, I should have seen it coming. I didn't. What can I do but resign? That's an
00:40:55.840
honorable resignation in the face of a failure. That's very rare in our political culture, isn't it?
00:41:01.920
But how much more rare to resign not because you've done something wrong? Jane Philpott,
00:41:10.260
from all reports, has never done anything wrong. She's too liberal for my taste. But I cannot dispute
00:41:16.740
that the woman has ethics and competence. For her to resign on principle because the government itself
00:41:23.620
is ethically rotten. In the year of an election when she was a shoe-in in cabinet, that's an even
00:41:32.280
higher level of integrity. I can't believe I'm praising these liberals. These are words I never
00:41:36.880
thought I would say. But it's one thing for a cabinet minister to resign in disgrace over a failure as the
00:41:43.320
British defense minister did 30, 40 years ago. But it's another thing for someone to say, I've seen
00:41:50.080
things that I can no longer stomach, and I must quit because I can't defend. That's a level of integrity
00:41:55.960
I am shocked to see here. Would you agree with me? I'm not saying I agree with Jane Philpott on policy
00:42:02.140
one, two, or three. I'm just saying in terms of ethics, you got to take off your hat to the lady.
00:42:08.760
Robert says, Rosemary Barton, cats, bubble bath. Holy crap, that's hilarious. Well, I got a little
00:42:15.180
carried away yesterday. But my example today was the same thing, really. Wendy Masley did her show
00:42:22.320
about Donald Trump. He's going to be arrested. Donald Trump Jr. He's going to be arrested any
00:42:26.220
moment. And then you see the dominoes will fall. I mean, that's a bigger conspiracy theory than this
00:42:30.940
whole QAnon thing. And they make a lot of fun of Alex Jones of Infowars. His conspiracy theories
00:42:36.820
were never as Byzantine as those pitched by the kooks at the CBC. Wendy Masley, Rosemary Barton,
00:42:43.300
they'll talk about anything other than the precious one getting in trouble.
00:42:48.680
On my interview with James O'Keefe about Project Veritas' latest investigation involving Facebook,
00:42:52.720
Liza writes, I'm grateful for James O'Keefe. O'Keefe, he is a warrior. You are so right. And
00:42:57.900
you know, I have the pleasure of meeting him about once a year. I bump into him somewhere.
00:43:01.620
I saw him just after New Year's this year. He's doing so well. And you know, he's just got that
00:43:06.980
discipline and that patience. And boy, he's been metaphorically punched a lot. And he just,
00:43:13.580
you know, like that old song, he gets knocked down, but he gets up again and then they're never
00:43:17.160
going to hold him down. He is, he's got a tenacity, resilience, a bounce backiness. I love
00:43:22.720
that guy. He's great. May we at the rebel have the impact and courage that he shows from Project
00:43:30.980
Veritas. As you can see, I'm a super fan. Well, my friends, what a momentous day. I'm curious what
00:43:37.920
tomorrow will bring. Until then, on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, you at home,