SHEILA GUNN REID ｜ Liberals brand carbon tax skeptics as climate arsonists amid Canada's wildfire crisis
Episode Stats
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Summary
Environment Minister Catherine McKenna calls opponents of a carbon tax "arsonists" for opposing her carbon tax plan. Ezra Levant points out that a new poll shows most Canadians are in favor of increasing the amount of carbon sequestration in the province of Quebec.
Transcript
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DC is burning, the north is burning, and the mainstream media and the liberals, but I repeat
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myself, are taking this terrible opportunity to push their climate to religiosity, to blame
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the fires on those who aren't in charge and who aren't making any policies, and a new poll shows
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it is going to blow up beautifully in the liberals' faces, and I can't wait. It's August 24th, 2023.
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I'm Sheila Gunn-Reed, but you're watching The Ezra Levant Show.
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You're ready for freedom! Shame on you, you censorious bug!
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Former Environment Minister Catherine McKenna is being slightly unhinged again. I mean,
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it's nothing new. It's just been a while since she's done it quite publicly. She's just called
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anyone who opposes carbon taxes arsonists. Look at this. Bizarre tweet.
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Conservative politicians want to fight about a price on carbon pollution. You want to make it free to
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pollute while Canadians pay with their lives threatened, homes destroyed, and their communities
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obliterated. So what are you going to do? You are the arsonists. Real people are being charged with
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arson in relation to forest fires in this country, but Catherine McKenna is writing their defense
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arguments for them. You see, I'm the problem if I drive an SUV just a little bit too much, and you're the
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problem if you reject carbon taxes as a means by which to change the weather. You're the arsonist, but
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the fire bugs? Not so much. And BC, by the way, they've had a carbon tax for over a decade, imposed in
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2008, actually. So when are the fire suppression benefits going to kick in for that thing? And
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McKenna, she brought in one of her own carbon taxes not all that long ago. Well, five years ago in 2018,
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when she was Trudeau's constantly embarrassing gaff-prone environment minister that I dubbed
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climate Barbie, much to her horror. And again, I ask, when are the tithes to McKenna's church of
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climate change going to satiate an angry weather god so that he stops boiling us alive or burning
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our villages? There's no avoiding it. We must address climate change now to make life in Canada
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healthier in the future. Extreme weather is already making us less safe. Governments must act. We have
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to cut pollution and reduce the risk. One of the most effective climate change solution is to use more
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clean electricity to power our lives. Today, more and more Canadians are using electric vehicles and heat
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pumps for heating and cooling. Businesses are switching too, with everyone from steelmakers to
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delivery vehicles going electric. When we generate our electricity using clean sources like hydro, wind,
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and solar, we're on track to real climate solutions. In Canada, almost 85% of our electricity already comes
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from clean generation. We can build on this success, but that means we need to invest in growing the
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electricity system. As demand for electricity grows, we have to make sure supply remains affordable, reliable.
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And just how many people, how many Canadians, cash strapped, struggling to get by Canadians, did
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Catherine McKenna just call arsonists because they don't think taxes change the weather?
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Oh, about 60% of Canadians, at least according to some very recent polling released by Ipsos on behalf
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of the Montreal Economic Institute. Now, to be fair, the Montreal Economic Institute, they're a bunch
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of free market advocates, but let's not confuse Ipsos for a bunch of conservatives, okay? They have an
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entire page dedicated to their social credit ESG score. They're not exactly a bunch of hard blue Tories over
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there. But let me show you these poll results because they're really bad for the liberals and
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good for common sense. People, even in deep liberal strongholds and traditional left-leaning or liberal
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voters like young people, well, they are all being mugged by the reality of Trudeau's inflationary policies,
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including his carbon taxes and his war on oil and gas. Let's get into it.
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Canada and Quebec's energy needs on behalf of the Montreal Economic Institute.
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A sample of 1163 Canadian residents aged 18 years and over with an oversample of 408 residents in
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Quebec was interviewed between the 1st and 4th of August, 2023. Let's get into some of the results here.
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Half. 51% of Quebecers are in favour of extracting Quebec's own oil resources, while 3 in 10, 30% believe the
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province should continue to import 100% of the oil it needs. What I find here is fascinating, but not
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just in this result, but in results throughout this polling data. Young people, traditional liberal voters,
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people who are traditionally against fracking and things like that are actually in support of Quebec
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developing its own oil resources. 57%. Actually, it was the young people who are
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the most in favour, perhaps because they want those well-paying jobs. Let's keep going. Over 6 in 10,
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actually 63% of Canadians are in favour of increasing incentive measures for carbon sequestration to be
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equivalent to those offered by the American government. A four point increase compared to 2022. Now,
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I don't even think that people are in favour of carbon sequestration here. Carbon sequestration,
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or taking the carbon from the atmosphere and just sort of hiding it in the ground until they figure
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out what to do with it. I don't think they're in favour of that. They're in favour of any alternative
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that doesn't require Canadians to pay extra money for their carbon emissions, because they can't pay any
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extra money for their carbon emissions. And we'll get to that polling data further in this video.
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And I'll show you where Canadians say we just can't pay any more money. But I don't think they're in favour
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of carbon sequestration. I think they're in favour of saying anything, anything, please,
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but taxing me more. Let's keep going. Almost 8 in 10, or 78% of Quebecers prefer to import oil from
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Western Canada, consistent with last year. This warms my heart, but also makes me sad simultaneously,
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because Justin Trudeau wants us all divided. He wants us Albertans to think that we are
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butting heads all the time with everyday Quebecers. And I don't believe we are. We are butting heads with
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politicians in Quebec, and we are butting heads with the federal government who wants us to believe
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that Quebecers have a certain sentiment about us and our oil that they just don't have. Quebecers
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want oil from Alberta. Albertans want to give it to them. The only thing dividing us is the federal
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government and their anti-oil policies. And again, it's younger people, traditional liberal or left
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leaning voters, 72% of them want oil from Western Canada. That's a devastating number for Justin Trudeau and
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his liberals who continue to block pipelines from Western Canada. This next polling data demonstrates
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the wholesale adoption of the concept of ethical oil as an alternative to conflict oil across the world.
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In light of the war in Ukraine, 6 in 10, 63% of Canadians believe their province should extract its own
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natural gas in order to export some to Europe and reduce its dependency on Russian gas. So this just
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isn't about developing our own resources for us. We see our own resources as a vehicle for freedom.
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And I think that is absolutely terrific. Now, this next number. These are Catherine McKenna's arsonists.
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Those people she accused of being responsible for the fires, even though
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her friends are still in charge in government, both in BC where the fires are, but also
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in Ottawa, making climate policy since 2015. Somehow the people with no power are the ones responsible
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for the policies of the current government. Okay. But anyway, I want to show you just how many people
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she accused of wholesale arson. Six in 10 Canadians, 61%, can't or don't want to pay more in taxes to
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fight climate change. 61%. And it's not that they just don't want to, they're saying they can't,
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they don't have any money left to pay the climate tithe to Catherine McKenna's cult of climate change. They
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just don't have the money left. And again, the young people. Oh, the young people. This is such
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a devastating number for the Liberals. Over half of young people polled ages 18 to 34, 54% have gotten off
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the carbon tax crazy train. 54% say they don't want to, or simply can't pay any more money for
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no benefit with result to climate change. Six in 10 or 62% of Quebecers believe that independent
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private producers should be allowed to sell electricity directly to companies to complement
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hydro Quebec's offer. That's an interesting one. Indicates a strong adoption of the free market,
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which everybody loves. Well, not everybody, but me. Two thirds or 67% of Canadians are in favor of
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developing new oil and gas infrastructure leading to ports in British Columbia or Eastern Canada in
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order to allow these Canadian resources to reach new markets in Europe and Asia. This is wholesale
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adoption of pipelines in all directions to export Canadian oil. And yet one of the Liberals flagship
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policies is a ban on tankers and a ban on pipelines. This is big, big trouble for the Liberals. And again,
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look at these numbers from the young people. 68% of young people ages 18 to 34 want to build those pipelines
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in all directions. It's a bold strategy for the Liberals as they plummet in the polls to attack
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Canadian resources when so many Canadians as evidenced in these poll results want to see fossil fuels
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developed and then export it, not only used by Canadians for Canadians, but then export it around
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the world as a vehicle to combating tyranny. And yet our current environment minister, Stephen Gilboa,
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he's working with the tyrants in China on climate policies. More on that with Post Media's Lauren Gunter,
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Well, folks, checking the traffic docket, surely some mistake here. I'm looking at a certain Chrystia
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Freeland who proclaims that she gets around by either walking or cycling or taking public transit.
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So what was the deputy prime minister doing in Alberta the other day cruising down the highway
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in a fossil fuel vehicle doing 142 kilometers in a 100 zone? Yes, what indeed. And who better to address
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this than our friend Lauren Gunter who just wrote a column entitled Cruising Chrystia,
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just another example of liberal green hypocrisy. Well, Lauren, thank you so much for joining me
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here on the Ezra Levin show. How are you doing? I'm doing well, and you? I'm doing great. Well,
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Lauren, does it surprise you? Does it surprise anyone that what the liberals say and what they do
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are two alien things? They're all about the green agenda, fighting climate change, reducing the carbon
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footprint. And forget about Chrystia Freeland. Lauren, I've gone to so many pressers where
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Prime Minister Trudeau shows up, typically eight vehicles, typically Chevy Suburbans and Ford Expeditions
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that also fuel eight cylinder vehicles. And whether it's summer for the air conditioning or winter for the
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heat, they keep those vehicles idling. You would think if they're, you know, professing this green agenda,
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they would at least get their butts behind, oh, I don't know, an EV or at least a plug-in hybrid,
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but no, one law for thee and one law for me. What do you say, my friend?
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I know that's absolutely what's happening. And, you know, that was confirmed in another way on the EV side.
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About six months ago, Blacklock's reporter had gone through all of the, had done a bunch of access to
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information, gone through all of the usage logs at the EV plug-ins at Environment Canada buildings
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across the country. And, and most places were going three to six months without a single electric vehicle
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plugged in to recharge at Environment Canada buildings. So, I mean, it's all for show. This, that is, that's the
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problem with this government. It's woke, but it's all about virtue signaling. They don't care really
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about doing anything substantial. It's all about how do we look, how do we feel about ourselves
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in, in, in these important issues? And, and how do others feel about, how do our voters feel about us?
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We don't care whether we're crashing the economy. We don't care whether we're actually reducing
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emissions and we're not really. We just care that we are sending the right signals out to people so
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that they know we're concerned. We care. And that, and that's all there is that this is with Freeland is
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the same thing. So, you know, here she is. I, I, I suggested today in my column that what's missing
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here with Freeland is not that, you know, she was increasing her carbon footprint by driving fat.
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The faster you drive, the higher your carbon footprint, the bigger it is. That's not it. And I, and, and I
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know she had boasted a lot in PEI about a month ago about how I only live 300 meters from a subway in
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Toronto. My father is so surprised. I don't own a vehicle. What I wanted one of those reporters in PEI
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to ask her was, yeah, okay. You don't own a vehicle, but there's your husband. And do you drive that?
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You know, because it used to be common for families to have one vehicle. It was the family car that is
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the, the, the Freelands have a family car. I bet you they do. And I bet you that she says that she walks
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300 meters to the subway, but we know also that she uses a government executive car and a driver an awful
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lot. So you and I don't have that luxury. If we wanted to give up our vehicles, we would really have
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to change our lifestyles. She gives up her vehicle and there really isn't a change. She's just allowed
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to boast that she doesn't have a vehicle. So yeah, it's exactly hypocrisy, but she put me in mind of a couple of,
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of, uh, Western, uh, provincial cabinet ministers of the past, uh, a guy in BC in the fifties, who was named
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fly and Phil Gilardi. Uh, he was the, he was the first highways minister in BC and he used to get stopped
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all the time by the Mounties or by local police forces for speeding. And he would always tell them,
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well, you know what? I'm the highways minister. We've been paving a lot of roads here. I'm just out checking to see how
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the pavement is, if it's any good, but he got his nickname. Cause he also had a private pilot's
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license. And one time a Mountie stopped him and he showed that Mountie his pilot's license and the
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Mountie was a little puzzled apparently, but he said, look, I'm not driving too fast. I'm just flying
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too low. And so he became known as flying Phil Gilardi. And then in Alberta, we had a cabinet minister
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in the eighties back in the Getty government who was a doctor in Hinton and he would rush into Edmonton
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for sessions all the time. And he got some, he got stopped so many times he got known as Speedy Reed.
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So I think we have to call her Christia Freeland Cruisin' Christia or Fast and Furious Freeland or
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something like that. She has to have a nickname that goes with, with this driving record.
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Oh, I like the alliteration there with Fast and Furious Freeland. That's a good one, Lord. But you know,
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something you said earlier, I think it's an example of how these liberals take great license
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when it comes to telling the truth. You said she doesn't actually own a car, but her husband
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evidently owns a car. That reminds me of John Kerry denying he had a private jet. It's his wife that
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owns the private jet. I don't know if Christia Freeland's husband has a car, but my question as a
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reporter standing in that scrum, my question would have been, okay, you don't own a car,
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but does your husband own one? And do you ever drive it? Because that, that makes it,
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puts a whole different perspective on all of this. Is it, you know, she can claim that she's
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this, this climate crusader, this, this monastic figure on, on the green front, but she isn't really.
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And, and that's what bothers me most about her. I mean, remember back in the last November,
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she said, Oh, you know, I was looking through my monthly credit card bill. I know it's hard for,
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for Canadians to balance their budgets, but, but I noticed we were using the Disney streaming
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service still. And so I said to the kids, Hey, you're getting older. Do you really watch Disney
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anymore? Well, she had no clue what is on the Disney platform. Disney platform now is as big as the
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Netflix platform. It has Marvel. It has national geographic as the Fox, uh, the whole Fox studio
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archive of movie. It has hundreds and thousands of movies. So it is as big on viewership now as
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Netflix is, but to her, it was just Mickey mouse and the little mermaid or something. And, and she was
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proving how, how intuitive in touch she is with the ordinary Canadian by saying, Oh yes. Well, we,
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you kids are too old for that. Now you don't watch that with, this is how we can balance our, but
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you know, that sort of fake, uh, every man, every woman, uh, play that she does all the time. It just
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grates with me. I, I don't care. She speaks. I speak. I would be known as, you know, fast and furious
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Lauren. Uh, I, cause I do drive with a heavy foot, but, uh, but for, you know, Lauren, but I don't
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pretend to be a green crusader. I don't, I don't say I don't own a vehicle. I like, I let, I like to
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let my SUV on a cold day. I like to let my SUV idle in the driveway because maybe it'll warm the
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atmosphere a bit and the temperature will go up. It won't be minus 35 anymore. So, uh, you know,
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Lauren, I'm an auto aficionado. If I had my way, we'd have the German Autobahn system. I mean,
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one of the few good things Doug Ford did was raise the speed limit in certain Ontario highways,
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uh, in the last couple of years to 110, uh, kilometers an hour, but you know, I'm, I'm so
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happy you picked up on the idiocy of Chrystia Freeland talking about the Disney plus subscription.
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As you rightly said, um, a lot of the catalog that Disney owns right now, it's adult entertainment.
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I mean, you know, you know, it's not just Mickey mouse cartoons, the mainstream media seem to give
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her a pass, but, and I could never prove this Lauren, but I would bet the ranch,
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she never canceled that subscription. I bet you that is still coming in. I wish there was a way
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to prove or disprove that, but I got to ask you the nitty gritty about this speeding ticket
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in white Rose. Star Wars is the whole Star Wars catalog. So, you know, I've got a 28 year old son
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who loves Star Wars. We have Disney plus. I'm not getting rid of it just because he doesn't watch
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uh, Donald Duck anymore, you know, cause he's watching Star Wars. Yeah. Um, she takes liberty.
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She does, uh, as Yoda might say with the truth. Um, but Lauren, I, um, what in the nitty gritty
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perspective of that speeding ticket, 142 kilometers an hour. I don't know the, um, the provincial highway
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traffic act in Alberta, like I do in Ontario. I can tell you if that was on an Ontario highway,
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if she was just going eight kilometers an hour more, that would be classified as stunt driving.
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She would have the car impounded a serious fine. I think it might be $10,000, a huge demerit points,
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but I guess we, I don't know if that exists in Alberta, but, but there is demerit points to this.
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And, and here's the question. Evidently, she's already paid the fine. Did she pay it or did the
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taxpayer pay it, Lauren? I, I don't know that she was doing 132, uh, in a 100. But they bumped it
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down, didn't they? 10 kilometers. No, no, it, there's, there was some confusion about, cause part
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of that highway, the speed limits 110, part of it. Oh, I see. Okay. She was on the section that was on
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100, but she was 32 K over in Alberta. If you are 51 K or more over the limit, it's
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a court appearance. It's impoundment of your vehicle and a court appearance. So she was
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getting fairly close to, um, uh, to having to go to court over this. But the thing, if it is,
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I don't know whether we paid for her fine or she did, she's now been rightly embarrassed. She walked
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it back this morning. She said, she's so sorry for what she, she's not sorry for what she did.
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She did. She had to go somewhere in a hurry. It happens. Like I, I make a practice in Alberta of
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looking for oil field service trucks when I'm out on the highway, because those guys don't get paid
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if they aren't on site. And so lots of times in a hundred K zone, they're hitting 145, 150. I get
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in right behind them. They're going to take the ticket. I'm happy. I will admit to that.
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Uh, so that's, I'm not going to, I'm not, I can't be a hypocrite and say, Christy, you shouldn't
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have been driving that fast. It's very dangerous here. You know, it, we had good highways. It was
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great conditions on the weekend. It was clear. There's no smoke. There was, it was sunny. It
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was dry. Go ahead. You know, somewhere to go. So I'm with you, Lauren, and it's not even a safety
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issue. The engineers will tell you that these highways are designed for far greater speeds than
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the speed limit indicates. But you know, speaking of, uh, car travel and fuel costs and what have
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you, what I really found offensive was just a couple of days ago during the retreat in Prince
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Edward Island, I was listening on radio to the media scrum of Ms. Freeland. And there were some
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good, valid questions being asked. One journalist said PEI is suffering right now. Their biggest industry
00:24:10.000
is tourism. And because of the cost of gasoline, um, people that from other Atlantic Canadian
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provinces that would come to PEI, they can't afford to as well as other parts of Canada for
00:24:23.120
that matter. I guess the, you know, the innuendo being what about taking off those carbon taxes
00:24:29.740
and other revenue, uh, creating tools in a liter of gasoline and her answer, Lauren, and I just
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found it downright offensive was we believe in Prince Edward Island. We believe in Prince
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Edward Island tourism. What the hell kind of answer is that? Yeah. And, and you know what
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their response is going to be? It's going to be to give more money to promote tourism in Prince
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Edward Island, not to make tourism more affordable. So people will go on their own, which they would do
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if it was cheaper to live in Canada. Their, their point will be they'll, they'll find $123 million
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to add to tourism PEI's budget so they can advertise more widely, uh, so that people who aren't paying
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carbon taxes can fly to Prince Edward Island, you know, from Europe or wherever they are. But it,
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you know, it's interesting. The Fraser Institute has a study out this morning, excuse me, that shows
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of the 141 major metropolitan areas in North America, the highest, the, the, the Canadian city
00:25:39.660
with the highest employment income was Ottawa. And it's only at 53 out of 141. Edmonton is second
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at 54 and Calgary's at 73. Now the two thing, the things that those top two Canadian cities have in
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common is big government, big provincial government, big federal government and governments pay
00:26:02.760
exceedingly well. Of course, as we all know that the, the, the, the average government employee now
00:26:07.780
makes far more than his or her private sector counterpart. That's why the two highest paid
00:26:14.300
cities in, in Canada are big government cities. But what it tells me too, is even there, we're in the
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middle of the pack. We don't even come close to most of the major American cities and Toronto,
00:26:28.200
Montreal and Vancouver are all in the bottom 10%, the bottom 10%. And that's because we have huge
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government, high taxes, crippling regulations. We, we just have stifled economic growth in this country
00:26:42.460
to such a degree that we are now projected to be the slowest growing industrialized country in the
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world. Out of 38 industrialized countries between now and 2040, we will probably have the slowest
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growth. And that's all because this government a sends the wrong signals that it doesn't like
00:27:00.600
resource development. It doesn't like industrial development and B all of its policies add cost
00:27:07.340
to your life, my life, to business decision-making everything adds more cost. And so international
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investors are now just walking away from them. And Lauren, does it come as any surprise? Because
00:27:19.200
to your point, in the last several months, we've seen the leaders of Germany, of Japan coming cap in
00:27:25.280
hand, begging to buy liquefied natural gas from Canada, one third of a trillion dollars worth for
00:27:34.380
each country. And Prime Minister Blackface says, there's no business case. Oh, that's a line of
00:27:42.560
idiocy right up there with the budget will balance itself. What did you, how do you connect the dots
00:27:47.740
there, Lauren? You know what there's no business case for. There's no business case for wind or solar.
00:27:53.940
Yeah. There's no business case for EVs. So, you know, this government likes to point it out and
00:28:00.680
directly to your point about exporting liquid natural gas. This government likes to point to
00:28:07.560
Norway as an example for electric vehicles. Norway put a lot of money into its charging grid. You can now
00:28:17.460
drive in the middle of nowhere in Norway and there's a class three charger so that you don't have to go more
00:28:23.680
than 50k without a charging thing. I mean, they put a lot of money into subsidizing people's purchases
00:28:28.880
of EVs. They have a huge EV network now. And this government says, oh, look, see, see, see. We need to
00:28:35.220
do that too. Oh, it's so marvelous and wonderful. You know how Norwegians pay for that? By selling more
00:28:41.060
oil to other countries and then taking credit because their oil is fairly clean. It's cleaner relative to a
00:28:48.960
lot of the other like burning coal to make electricity. They sell their oil to coal burning
00:28:55.760
countries and take credit for the savings on emissions. This government, our government in
00:29:01.400
Canada will not do that. There's such Boy Scouts on this that they refuse. So if we were to sell
00:29:07.420
liquid natural gas to China, which is building in the process of building 300 additional coal-fired
00:29:14.580
power plants right now, 300, more than the rest of the world combined. If we were to sell LNG to China,
00:29:21.980
we wouldn't take the credit for having stopped the construction of coal-fired power plants. I mean,
00:29:28.620
that's how asinine they are. But the Norwegians do exactly the same thing. And then they take the
00:29:34.540
credit for the emissions they saved and the money that they got from selling the oil and they pay for
00:29:39.080
their EVs. We're trying to do way more than the Norwegians on the environmental front without
00:29:44.260
anywhere near the money because we don't want to sell oil or natural gas. It's inexplicable,
00:29:50.600
Lorne. I think we might be the only energy-producing nation on the planet that has an anti-energy
00:29:56.860
marketing scheme. It's absolutely baffling. But even that example, looking at Norway, look in the
00:30:03.940
middle of nowhere, there's a charging station. The point is, we're the second biggest country in
00:30:09.120
the world. There's a lot more nowhere in Canada. So, I mean, the idea of putting these charging
00:30:16.800
stations in the middle of nowhere is like, I mean, I'm just thinking of what the investment would be.
00:30:24.760
And right now, the cupboard is bare, isn't it, Lorne?
00:30:27.660
Absolutely. It absolutely is. They're talking now about this clean electricity regulation. It
00:30:35.480
will be net zero electric grid by 2035. The latest estimate from their friends in the environmental
00:30:41.720
movement is that we would have to build the equivalent of another 150 generating stations in
00:30:48.760
Canada, powered by wind, solar, bug farts, whatever thing it is that they're going to use.
00:30:57.660
And we have to build 150. There are about 150 to 200 now. We'd have to double our capacity at least
00:31:05.940
to get to this net zero. Do you see any of these places being built? Do you see any nuclear power
00:31:13.940
plants being discussed for regulatory approval? No. So this gets back to my original point about how
00:31:21.300
woke they are, but it's all just virtue signaling. They bring in these regulations that scare off
00:31:27.560
investors. People are not coming to Canada now to invest in a natural gas plant because they're
00:31:32.480
afraid the government's going to shut them all down. But then they don't actually do anything
00:31:36.120
concrete on the other side to live up to their commitments. And so we're stuck in no man's land
00:31:42.680
where we have these woke promises that are scaring away investment and nothing to replace what's being
00:31:50.760
scared away. They are, they are without question in my mind. And I'm now an old man. They are the most
00:31:58.140
incompetent nincompoops in government that I have seen in my lifetime. And I first started working in
00:32:04.360
politics 55 years ago. Oh, and I see that criticism coming from even veteran liberal MPs like Dan
00:32:13.100
McTague who knows the energy file, like the back of his hand, he says exactly what you say. Um, you
00:32:20.000
know, and who knows, maybe they're just waiting, uh, Lauren for the discovery of dilithium crystals
00:32:25.200
to make us, you know, but last question, my friend, how damaging is that? I don't know if we can call it
00:32:32.340
a scandal, a speeding ticket, but how damaging is this for Christian Freeland? Uh, if I don't know when
00:32:39.640
the next election is going to be called, I think probably next year, uh, not this year and not as
00:32:46.380
far away as 2025 when it must be called, but at the end of the day, when Christian Freeland runs for
00:32:52.140
reelection in her safe, comfortable downtown liberal riding, uh, is she a shoe in to get reelected or does
00:33:00.560
something like this cost her? No, no, it doesn't cost her at all. Uh, of course she's a shoe in to get
00:33:05.920
reelected in her riding. She's also, I think still, despite this, this is a very minor, uh, this is a
00:33:12.480
very minor scandal. It'll go away in two days. Uh, but, uh, she's also, I still think the front
00:33:18.720
runner to take over from Trudeau. I know, but I think she is all the, all the grownups have left
00:33:28.160
the building. Well, you know what, Lauren, if your prediction is correct, I am now once again,
00:33:33.680
subscribing to better the devil, you know, Lauren, thank you so much. Your column is great. I urge
00:33:41.160
our viewers to check it out. Cruz and Christian, just another example of liberal green hypocrisy.
00:33:47.560
And wow, there really is so much of that. Lauren, thank you so much for your time. As always, my
00:33:52.520
friend, that dude, thank you. Well, friends, this is the portion of the show where we read your viewer
00:34:06.800
feedback on the work that we do here at rebel news. And normally we contain the viewer feedback
00:34:11.260
that we read to the show that you've, you know, given us the feedback on. So this is Ezra's show.
00:34:18.680
We would take the viewer feedback from you on Ezra's previous show. But since I'm pre-recording
00:34:23.760
this because Ezra is on a special mission and I, if you're watching this future, Sheila is on a
00:34:32.040
mission to screen her documentary church under fire, Canada's war on Christianity somewhere in the
00:34:38.140
beautiful province of Alberta with my friend and filmmaking partner, Kian Simone. By the way,
00:34:43.240
if you want details, if you want to come to one of our screenings, if you are here in Alberta,
00:34:46.500
go to churchunderfiremovie.com and you can, you know, find out where I am in the future.
00:34:54.580
Not right now. Anyway, our viewer feedback actually comes from something else that I,
00:35:02.580
I said while in the course of my work here at rebel news, it's from a clip from our live stream.
00:35:09.100
The other day we have more often than not daily live streams. It's called the rebel news daily
00:35:15.880
roundup and it airs at 11am mountain time. And we were talking about Alberta's premier,
00:35:23.880
Jason Kenney being a little less than self-aware about why he's no longer premier. He actually blamed,
00:35:33.320
I think me, although he described rebel news as alt-right and we're definitely not, I mean, we're
00:35:39.720
Jewish owned and operated and there's a certain connotation that if you are alt-right that you are
00:35:45.440
sort of playing footsie with neo-Nazis, it's definitely not us. I think we're just mainstream
00:35:52.300
conservatives who aren't tribalist in that we believe in holding all politicians to account,
00:35:57.960
but especially our own politicians, Jason Kenney. And Jason Kenney was doing a bit of whining. Anyway,
00:36:05.480
here's, here's what he said. And I, I think I've been credited through 25 years in elected life, 30
00:36:13.000
years in, in public life for being a pretty good communicator, a fairly persuasive, but I found it
00:36:20.100
almost impossible to persuade or even speak to some segments of the population in COVID. You know,
00:36:26.720
there were, and I'm, I know this is a non-partisan series, but I'll, I'll break this down and into
00:36:30.900
more political terms, which is to say there are large segments of the population that have broadly
00:36:36.740
come to distrust mainstream legacy media outlets. And I think mainstream legacy media are partly,
00:36:45.320
have some responsibility for this. Yeah. And, and so what's happened is you've had the rise of
00:36:52.320
alternative media, both on the left and the right. Um, and, and often their business model is the
00:36:58.680
monetization of anger. So I found during COVID that, uh, if I stood up at a news conference and said,
00:37:05.340
uh, folks, we're going to have to bring in some really difficult and painful restrictions
00:37:11.100
because we're running out of hospital beds. And, uh, we need to make sure that, uh, if you get into
00:37:19.560
a car accident or loved one has a heart attack, that there's a bed for them. So we're going to
00:37:24.560
have to slow a viral spread, um, in order to preserve emergency, you know, critical healthcare
00:37:32.320
capacity. So if I went out and said that a lot of people would hear it, they may not like it,
00:37:36.960
but they would understand at least what the motive was. And it was necessary. We have my quibble
00:37:41.700
about the policy, my quibble about the healthcare system, but they would understand
00:37:46.640
what we were trying to do and why, but I found in COVID, there was a whole segment of the population
00:37:51.320
that opted out of mainstream institutional legacy media who were only in one case, listening to,
00:37:58.040
uh, alt-right media and who just kept seeing stories about nurses doing TikTok dances in empty
00:38:05.240
hospitals. And that COVID was fake or massively exaggerated. And so those folks never heard what
00:38:11.720
I had to say. And, and, and so they thought that, that these restrictions were done completely
00:38:16.900
arbitrarily or for malicious reasons. So, uh, you know, that's an extreme example, but it's one
00:38:23.360
that certainly worries me. And then I said that he was completely lacking in all self-awareness
00:38:28.740
because all we did was report on his many, uh, problems with consistency, wherein he locked
00:38:37.460
people down, but had a boozy party on, uh, what we call sky palace here in Alberta. It's a private
00:38:43.780
sort of a venue, a top, a building on the legislature grounds. All the senior cabinet ministers were
00:38:50.600
there while it was illegal together. And Jason Kenney flip-flopped on so many things. For example,
00:38:56.420
he said he didn't know what a vaccine passport was, but then when he didn't know what a vaccine
00:38:59.820
passport was, he knew it was definitely, definitely illegal. And then, uh, he brought in his own
00:39:05.980
and he called it the restriction exemptions program. So he could be like, see, I didn't bring
00:39:14.200
in a vaccine passport. Just like when the NDP brought in a carbon tax and then called it a carbon
00:39:20.320
levy. And they're like, see, we didn't bring in a carbon tax, but it's the same thing. Um, and so,
00:39:25.460
you know, like, of course we held Jason Kenney to account. I expect the liberals to lie to me.
00:39:30.100
That's just all they ever do. I expect them to have radical leftist ideas and act like tyrants.
00:39:37.320
That's what their side tends to do. Ours is supposed to believe in freedom and small government
00:39:41.480
and personal, uh, autonomy and the rights of the individual. But Jason Kenney didn't in practice.
00:39:48.620
He said he did, but when he was forced to tangibly support those ideas and those,
00:39:56.360
that philosophy, when it was necessary, when it really mattered, it's easy to be a civil libertarian
00:40:04.340
when there are no civil liberties bonfires around you. It's hard to do it in a time of crisis. And
00:40:09.960
Jason Kenney failed completely and, uh, made it my fault for some reason for pointing out that he
00:40:15.540
failed. Anyway, Joseph Temple, 1667, makes an astute observation here in the YouTube comments.
00:40:25.820
He says, Jason Kenney never wanted to be premier. He wanted to be prime minister. I think you're right.
00:40:32.720
We were but a stepping stone, weren't we? He just saw Edmonton as a springboard to launch him back
00:40:38.560
into federal politics. He was largely seen as the successor for Stephen Harper. It is true.
00:40:44.520
But I think he blew that up for himself because if you don't have the support of Albertans,
00:40:51.100
you don't get to be the conservative prime minister of this country. That's how important we are
00:40:57.400
in conservative politics. As such, all of his decisions were based on what was good for Jason
00:41:03.620
Kenney's long-term political career and not what was best for Albertans. That's why he's all washed up
00:41:10.660
and extremely bitter too. Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. You know what? I don't know anything
00:41:15.100
about Jason Kenney personally. I don't dislike him personally. Um, I know he's got a real problem
00:41:20.920
with consistency and I've got a, I've got a sneaking suspicion. He's got a real problem with introspection
00:41:26.800
because he's still trying to deflect blame outward. When I wasn't up in Sky Palace, I wasn't
00:41:33.180
locking down churches. I wasn't fencing off churches. I wasn't driving churches underground.
00:41:38.560
I wasn't arresting pastors like they were El Chapo on the street or protesters in front of the
00:41:44.500
legislature. I wasn't instituting vaccine passports and calling people names for disagreeing with me.
00:41:51.560
That was Jason Kenney. He wanted to be the premier of all Albertans, but what he really wanted to do
00:41:59.220
was be the boss of Ottawa and, uh, Albertans were it along the way and I didn't do that. He did. And
00:42:05.960
maybe he needs more time in the wilderness to figure that out because I don't, I don't think we
00:42:12.020
want to hear from him for quite some time. Follow Daniel Smith's lead. When you do something stupid
00:42:16.980
and betray Albertans, disappear for five or six years and then come back and say, sorry,
00:42:23.640
we might just forgive you, but don't blame us for what you did. Well, everybody, that's the show
00:42:30.320
for tonight. Thank you so much for tuning in. Thank you to everybody who works behind the scenes in
00:42:34.860
Toronto and across the country and even around the world to bring you the show whenever you want to
00:42:39.560
see it. And, uh, big thanks to the boss for trusting me with the big show tonight. And as my boss