Trump seems ready to settle this trade war
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Summary
Justin Trudeau steps down as Prime Minister of Canada on Nov. 25, 2019, and is replaced by his successor, Mark Carney, who is not only the new Prime Minister, but also the new Governor General of the Bank of Canada, who will replace him.
Transcript
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Canada did what? A podcast from Post Media uncovered the untold stories of the Canadian
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history you might think you remember with me, Tristan Hopper. From one Prime Minister's crazy
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camaraderie with communists to the war over metric conversion and the harrowing reality
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of the October crisis. Subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts.
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How do you take a sense of how the world is working, how Canada-U.S. relations are working
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in what is a moment of absolute chaos? Hello and welcome to the Full Comment Podcast. My name's
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Brian Lilly, your host, and we have been talking an awful lot about Canada-U.S. relations, about
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Donald Trump, his impact on the world, Justin Trudeau leaving the stage, and, well, we expect
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Mark Carney taking over. Conrad Black is someone who has been around the Canadian political and
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business establishment for decades, going back to the 1960s, and has known many of the great
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players. In fact, he wrote a book about Donald Trump called A President Like No Other. He knew
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Pierre Trudeau. He knows Justin Trudeau. He knows the folks involved. And what is his take on this?
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So, beyond the fact that he started National Post, used to own a good chunk of what is now
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called Post Media, wanted to reach out to him because of his experience on all of this. How does he view
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how the current government has handled things? How does he view how Trump is handling things? The
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Canadian media? How, what is happening when it comes to Ukraine? The relationship between the
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United States, Russia, and the attempt to push China off to the side, rather than allow them to
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continue to be an aggressor and a challenger to American power in the world. Conrad Black,
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Justin Trudeau is about to leave. By the time, we're talking on Thursday afternoon, by the time this is
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posted Monday morning. There's going to be a new liberal leader. We presume Mark Carney. We'll get
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into that in a moment. Who knows? But there will be a new liberal leader. But Trudeau has been managing
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this Trump file, the whole tariff issue, since the threats began on November 25th. So, I want to
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start with that. How would you rate his performance? How has he done so far? Because whether we like him or
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not, whether we think he should have left long ago or not, he has been the prime minister, and he's
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been the one managing the file until this point. Yeah. You're asking me how he's done on this present
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issue or overall overall? On the present issue. I think not badly, but I think he precipitated part
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of the problem when he said, well, if you proceed, you know, when he went down to have dinner with him
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in Palm Beach. Which I thought was a good move, but maybe you took the wrong message.
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You know, I'm not one of these people who criticized him for going there. I mean,
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the problem arises, you go straight to it, and nothing wrong with that. But when he said, well,
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something, according to Trump, he said, if these tariffs are imposed, our economy will collapse.
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Well, that's not the right thing to say in general. It's technically not the right thing to say.
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And I think it incited in Trump the view that Canada is a much less resolute country than it is.
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And so I think that was a tactical error. But beyond that, I think he's been fine. I think
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particularly he's been wise to not to argue the whole thing out in the public, you know. I mean,
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that was the problem of that Zelensky business. The conversation that they had there should not
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have been in front of the whole world, in particular in front of the Kremlin. But here,
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I think he's done a good job coordinating with the premiers, and he's been relatively judicious.
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Obviously, it was a somewhat contentious session they had on the telephone yesterday, and he said
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it was colorful or something like that. So I know-
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Some expletives, I understand. Who has ever heard of grown men swearing at each other?
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I don't, I doubt if they swore at each other. I think they would have used adjectives and
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references to other things. I do not believe that those, I know both those men, I don't
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believe they would swear at each other. Say, you know, you son of a bitch or something like that.
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It would be more about swearing about the dairy or some, you know, perceived protectionist measure.
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Some slightly coarse adjective to an object, you know, to an inanimate thing, these goddamn
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tariffs or something, that sort of thing. But Trump is not, he's a plain spoken and blunt
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man, but he's not particularly vulgar. I mean, he doesn't, he swears a lot less than people
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who are otherwise public statesmen who are otherwise generally more mild-mannered than
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Yeah. I mean, you know him better than, I don't know him at all. I know Justin Trudeau. I don't
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You know, the thing is, like a lot of these New Yorkers, he takes Yiddish words and uses
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them. Bernie was cloned and stuff like that. I mean, they're colorful words, you know, and
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you sort of know by the sound of them what they mean. And that's, but I, I don't think
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he would do that with Justin, but, but he, he, he's not a guy who swears a lot.
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Now, my view over the past little while, and I'd like to see if, if you share this, this
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viewpoint with me is that since Trump announced these threats, November 25th, uh, I remember
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he was about to go to the United States. Um, and, uh, uh, I was going for two separate
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trips, one to Tampa for a couple of weeks, one to Palm Springs in California for a few
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weeks. And the threat comes out on true social. We're going to put you at 25% tariffs. If
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you don't fix everything, you're done. Wow. Okay. We're going to the Forex right now. We're
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going to get some American cash before the, uh, the, uh, Canadian dollar tanks in the morning.
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Thank goodness that hasn't really happened. It's gone down a little bit, but not a lot.
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But since then, what I felt has happened is that there have been far too many Canadian
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politicians who want to run and get in front of a camera or a microphone and denounce Trump
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rather than look to find a way to say, okay, do you have a, an actual grievance? Do you have
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a problem that we can fix? Is there a way so that Canada wins? Do you agree with that? Or do you
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think that most Canadian politicians have been, you know, looking to do the best for the country
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rather than trying to use anti-American, anti-Trump sentiment among voters to, to boost themselves?
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I think it's been a mixed bag, Brent. I think that, um, uh, for example, Doug Ford dissolved the
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Ontario parliament and had an election sort of running as captain Canada, you know, I'll defend
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and, and it, it, it, nothing was really happening. Trump extended the deadline during the election
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period, as it turned out. And, and that wasn't the issue here. The issue was, has Ford's government
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done a competent job? And, uh, you know, there was, you didn't see a lot of signs out in people's
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lawns and it was not the kind of weather where people like going out campaigning very much. And
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it was a kind of under-recognized election and, and, and, but there was no great issue against him
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and he was reelected. Uh, but the idea I'm, I'm going to, you know, arm myself with a mandate to
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fight tooth and nail against these tariffs, it fizzled. I mean, if he was saying that wasn't much
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publicized, but, uh, I think that, um, it is very injudicious of Kearney to be out campaigning
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for the liberal leadership, criticizing Trump personally and, and, and making really rather
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snide remarks about him personally and criticizing the American political system. And that has
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absolutely nothing to do with running for liberal leaders. So I think it's a hokey
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sideshow and, and I, I doubt it impresses people very much. In the case on, on, you see,
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Trump's technique is he always starts with a sort of shock and awe surprise to, to try and get an
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edge in any discussion or, uh, controversy he's going to engage in. And then, and then he, he
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conducts himself with, uh, an unpredictable level of, of syncopated changes, but he is careful not to
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become the guy saying, I dare you to cross this line, uh, Ben, and then I dare you to cross this
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line and so on. So these delays that he's making are, are, are not going to go on forever. I, he
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doesn't actually want a tariff war. And, and, uh, in my opinion, the weakness of the arguments that
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some of his spokespeople are making indicate that they want to settle this fairly quickly. I mean,
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I saw Peter Navarro follow Doug Ford on Fox news. Uh, I think it was last night, but it might've
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been Wednesday night. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, it was very weak what he said, you know, I mean,
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complaining about fentanyl coming from Canada, it is, um, one 500th of the quantity that comes in from
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Mexico at, but it's, it's rubbish. I mean, the fact is every country has the right and the duty to put
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whatever level of security it considers appropriate on its own border. That was Trump's complaint about
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Biden. They let millions of people come in and didn't even take their names. Weren't aware they
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were coming in other than in general, as they saw, you know, they, they saw the impact of it and,
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and ultimately all the American cities. And it's up to the United States to, to put whatever level
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of security at once on both its borders. And, and you see the number of people entering the country
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illegally in the United States is declined by 96% in six weeks. I had occasion to say to President
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Trump a few days ago, he phones me occasionally, like he does hundreds of people. I'm no great
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intimate of his, but he's got hundreds of people all over the world where he phones from time to time
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just to get opinions, just to get different views, you say. And I said, look, you know, we're not
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East Germany here where, you know, we don't have a wall preventing people from leaving or, or preventing
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goods from leaving. And, and if you have a complaint about what's coming from this country into your
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country, I mean, it's your border, you deal with it. And, and, uh, you know, I said it very politely
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naturally. And then he, I, it's all a pretext, I think. And, and it's not going to go on very long.
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He, look, he's not, he's not angry at Canada and he doesn't want a war of any kind with Canada.
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I mean, I hope not. I, uh, look though, I, I, I will look at the numbers and I'll say that,
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you know, we do have a fentanyl problem in this country that we should have taken seriously
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without Donald Trump telling us to do it is conservative leader, Pierre Polyev has pointed
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out more than 49,000 people have died in this country from fentanyl overdoses. Uh, we've seen that
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the triads and the cartels are laundering their money in Vancouver and Toronto. Sure. Um,
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this is a major problem. Indeed in a Canadian bank in the United States.
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Yeah. And we are becoming an export country. I mean, the Globe and Mail did this. The Canadian
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media is a bit bizarre at times. Uh, look, I'm part of it. I've long been a part of it,
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but I've also long been a critic. Uh, the United States says we have a problem with fentanyl from
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Canada. And then the Globe and Mail is like, Oh no, no, no, we're not exporting fentanyl to
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America. We're sending it to Australia as if that's any great thing. Like, no, we should not
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have super labs here. They're exporting fentanyl to anywhere and we should be taking care of this
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issue. But we've had a government that has had a very bizarre view on narcotics in, in my view of
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the world. Um, that, you know, was leaning towards handing out opioid pills, was leaning towards
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decriminalization of all hard drugs. That has not helped us in this discussion. I don't think.
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Let me ask you this. You would know this better than I, but am I right that to some extent,
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uh, we've suffered from these people who poured across the Southern border of the United States,
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then crossing into Canada and operating, uh, a drug export business back into the U S there.
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Is this a myth or is this going on? My impression is that it's happening to some extent.
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To some extent that is happening. And then the Americans do have a fair complaint on
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the increase in illegal cross. I mean, there never used to be any illegal crossings going from Canada
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into the United States. And then we open up the, uh, temporary foreign worker program,
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the foreign student program. And suddenly you've got within one year, 43,000 Indian nationals
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being stopped going from Canada into the United States, declaring asylum and all these things.
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And the Americans start saying, Hey, wait a minute, what did you do? Oh, well, it's our own
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internal immigration changes that we made that led to this. So they're not without complaint.
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I think it's overblown in terms of how they're reacting to it. Uh, but you, you, you mentioned
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Peter Navarro. I mean, I interviewed Navarro years ago, several times on his book, Death by China.
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Um, he is a hawk. He is a big tariff supporter. Uh, you've got, uh, folks that believe that tariffs
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are the best way to deal with things. You're someone that's done business on both sides of
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the border. What, what is your view on, on, on, on this new love affair with tariffs, whether it's
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Navarro, Lutnik, Lighthizer, any of them has it in his mind that he, he, he started out saying
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and looking at it and, and, and, and, and he has actually looked at it quite carefully and he sees
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that with, uh, with, I, I believe the total was 80 different countries, which is essentially all of
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the countries that have a significant export economy. Um, that the tariff placed by those
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countries on the United States is much higher than, than the power placed by the United States
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on those countries. So he, he feels that is an inequality. The U S is talking is being picked
00:16:07.960
that he's going to equalize it. And that's fair, but that's not Canada in the United States,
00:16:13.120
right? Yeah. I mean, that, but that, that's not us in the Americans. That's like Germany or India.
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Sure. Yeah. Go India is one of the worst offenders as he points out. And, um, and he feels that as,
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as with the slackers in paying their fees at NATO, you know, I'm paying, you know, maintaining their
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defense budgets and Canada is one of the worst, as you know, that everyone just got accustomed to
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taking advantage of the U S and letting the U S do the heavy lifting. And he, he, and he wants to
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change that. But then, then a second, a kind of a, an overdrive clicked in on his judgment of the
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tariff issue. And he got it into his mind that it could be a big, uh, revenue producer for the federal
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government and help reduce the budget deficit. Uh, because, you know, he he's, he's there where
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he's pledged to reduce taxes. He's, he's pledged to, uh, build the military sufficiently to ensure
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continuing U S Naval superiority over China and, uh, and, uh, equals or greater sophistication in
00:17:21.000
hypersonic missiles. So these things are expensive. Uh, and, and he's given all sorts of promise
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them verbally, but he will follow through them. And these tax exemptions on tips and, uh, you know,
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uh, first responders. As far as a vote getter, can you think of anything better than no tax on tips?
00:17:41.080
Brilliant. No, it's brilliant. It just retail politics, right?
00:17:45.820
Oh, he's a great politician. And Art Laffer is right up to a point. And we, you know, the, the
00:17:51.260
Johnson, Lyndon Johnson tax cuts showed it and the Reagan tax cuts showed it. If you cut taxes,
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uh, activity goes up so much that you do get most of that back in revenue or even more.
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I used to run a chart showing that the Canadian tax cuts increased revenue every year when John
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Cratchin was doing it. Of course, of course they did. So, so, so, so, you know, from his standpoint,
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he sees, I want, I have to raise the defense budget and, and, uh, and I want to cut taxes. We think
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economic growth and deregulation will, will help bring all that revenue back. But, uh, and, and,
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and it, Doge is going to cut costs somewhat. We don't know how much, but they're, they're already
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what Ian, 200 billion or something. Uh, you know, it's, it's about 10% of the deficit or something.
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And, and they just started and, uh, but he's now got it in his mind that maybe tariffs would help if
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we just make tariff levels equal with everybody, either they bring theirs down. So our sales go up
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or we bring ours up. So our revenues go up. Um, and to the extent that leads to higher costs
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domestically, that will be, you know, that'll be counterbalanced by reduced energy costs as we're
00:19:00.120
getting increased the supply of oil and so on. And so he's got it in there as a budgetary thing too.
00:19:05.380
Now, I don't know how accurate that is. I, I've never, uh, I, I have never known tariffs to be a
00:19:12.340
serious percentage of a, of a government, of an, of a fully, uh, full range economy like the United
00:19:18.920
That's because you're too young. You got to go back to what? 19, 30 something entry. I mean,
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between, between the civil war and the first world war, the great issue in every American election
00:19:30.460
was the, the Republicans wanted high tariffs to raise profits and create employment. And the
00:19:37.660
Democrats wanted low tariffs to keep prices low for the working class that voted for them.
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So you add the two and you, if you've looked at it, the, the popular vote until a democratic party
00:19:47.860
got into bimetalism, which was really funny money and the country didn't like it. The popular vote was
00:19:54.880
very close between those parties. I mean, for example, in 1880, Garfield defeated, uh, Hancock,
00:20:04.120
the democratic candidate by 9,000 votes of nearly 10 million. I mean, very close elections.
00:20:10.380
So are tariffs now just part of the, the new system? Do we need to get used to this? And I'll give you
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this example ahead of the premier's trip to Washington, which I went down and, uh, I, I followed the
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premiers and I spoke to several Americans. I was looking and I'm seeing Democrats and Republicans
00:20:30.580
talking about the idea of a universal tariff. Now, not this 25% thing, which is hugely problematic for
00:20:38.120
our economy. Uh, but perhaps the American, uh, government goes to a 10% universal tariff on
00:20:45.680
everyone. And I even spoke to, uh, Senator, uh, Kevin Kramer from North Dakota, who is very tight with
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Trump, but also very much a friend of Canada who said, yeah, there's some merit to this. And this
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could be a potential way for new revenue. It seems like there is a, a, a reawakening of this idea,
00:21:04.720
an openness to this idea that we may find abhorrent, but that they're saying, hmm, this could work for us.
00:21:12.760
There, there's no doubt the administration is, and the president himself are seriously considering
00:21:18.800
this as a way to raise revenue. Now, of course, in the Canadian side of things, the unspoken
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element is, you know, you can always deal with the tariff to some degree by adjusting your currency.
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Now, now we've got to be a little careful there. Our dollar is quite low compared to the American
00:21:37.080
dollar now and the historical range are too low. Yeah. So we, we've got to be careful tanking it
00:21:42.620
further, but, um, or we'll go under 60 cents us, which is, uh, that, that, that's, that's not a good
00:21:50.880
thing for us, but, um, but the United States could reduce the value of the dollar against, you know,
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the Euro and the yen, for example, a little bit, if it wanted to, it has the room to do that. So,
00:22:05.780
so they may be thinking it's, it's hard to tell, but, um, I think the new secretary of the treasury
00:22:13.680
is a very able man, best sent. And, uh, uh, and, and I, I, I think they're experimenting a bit. So
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to some extent they're taking a tactical position. We don't want people picking our pocket, even
00:22:26.380
friends of ours like Canada. And by the way, what I as a Canadian object, who is us being put in the
00:22:31.580
same box with Mexico has a real grievance with Mexico and not only over the illegal immigration,
00:22:38.160
but over the systematic attempt of, of Mexicans to induce American companies to shut down factories
00:22:45.940
in the U S take a subsidy to rebuild those factories, 10 miles inside the Mexican U S border
00:22:52.280
Mexican side, obviously, uh, get a tax holiday on their income, exploit cheap Mexican labor and ship
00:23:00.020
the product under, under the free, you know, NAFTA back into the United States. I mean, that's not
00:23:05.900
fair trading, but we don't do that. Uh, I I'm absolutely furious with, uh, both Trump and
00:23:11.560
especially in the Lutnick who I, I thought was going to be a smarter man and steady sounded like
00:23:16.300
a carnival barker and a hype man. Um, and he's excited to be in Washington. Yeah. But, but saying
00:23:22.700
that, you know, we're stealing the, uh, auto jobs and that the auto plants moved to Canada because
00:23:28.260
there were no unions. I mean, look, General Motors would not exist if it wasn't for Sam McLaughlin's
00:23:34.100
money going down on the train from Oshawa to Detroit to help William Durante built GM.
00:23:40.720
That's how GM was built. Canadian bag man sent cash.
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It was the McLaughlin Buick. Do you remember that? That was.
00:23:47.680
Yeah. So I mean, and look, the, the, the, the, the industries grew up side by side.
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And so that infuriates me. I understand what you're saying about the Mexican side though.
00:23:58.120
Uh, our auto workers, you know, were under Walter Reuther until Bob White took them out.
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You know, Canadian auto workers that became an independent union. But if they think we don't
00:24:07.560
have a auto workers union, if Navarro thinks that he's a, he's a, you know, he's.
00:24:11.780
No, that, that, that was Lutnick, not Navarro. Navarro's smart.
00:24:14.220
Lutnick is actually a pretty smart man, I think, man. And quite true Canadian too.
00:24:18.560
Yeah. He's made a ton of money, but some of his, his statements lately have been driving
00:24:22.780
me nuts. Speaking of driving me nuts, I got to ask you about Mark Carney. Um, he's going
00:24:27.320
to be taking over soon. We believe as liberal leader and prime minister, um, you know, we've
00:24:34.000
got a lot of concerns about, um, tariffs, American tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum. And
00:24:39.980
yet, um, his big plan is make the big polluters pay. And when you say, well, what's a big polluter?
00:24:46.880
He says a steel mill. Okay. So you want to shut down Algoma and you want to have DeFasco's
00:24:53.300
Arcelot Mattel, uh, shift production to Detroit and Ohio. Uh, so you're, you're going to lose
00:25:00.440
jobs in Hamilton and Sault Ste. Marie, uh, you know, steel mills in Regina, Edmonton, South
00:25:06.420
Montreal. They're all going to be in problems, in trouble. Uh, how can we say that it's bad
00:25:11.840
for, for Donald Trump to do this to us? And then a whole bunch of Canadians get excited
00:25:16.600
at a Canadian politician wanting to do the same thing.
00:25:20.680
Look, I, I have to say, I think Carney politically would be a disaster. I think it would be a vote
00:25:25.940
for suicide. Uh, he, he is an extremist on the ecological issue and he, he is, uh, too left
00:25:35.920
wing for the position he seeks to hold. And he was not a successful governor of the bank
00:25:41.180
of England. He made a complete mockery of the idea of an independent bank governor that
00:25:46.360
Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were so proud of. He, he immersed the bank of England in project
00:25:52.900
fear, which was this campaign to terrorize the British voters out of voting to leave the
00:25:58.720
European union. He made dramatic and frenzied statements about the consequences, uh, to Britain
00:26:06.360
if this happened, which his successor is governor of the bank of England has walked back and
00:26:16.120
Completely. And, and, but in any case, it's none of the governor of the bank's business to
00:26:20.620
get into what amounts to partisan issues. And, and also, um, he turned the bank of England
00:26:28.040
into an agency for radical, uh, environmentalism and encouraged, uh, punishment of countries that
00:26:37.380
were not, or companies, I should say, that were not supporting, uh, what he regarded as adequately
00:26:43.420
sustainable, uh, uh, targets for, for, for, for, I mean, he turned it into an advocacy and
00:26:51.020
enforcement operation in ecological matters. And I blame David Cameron and, uh, in particular
00:26:58.020
for not cracking down on this because that is not the central bank's business. Their, their
00:27:03.100
business is monetary policy and, uh, and, and that's what they should do any more than for
00:27:08.380
argument's sake. The, uh, minister of agriculture should, should be, uh, uh, negotiating defense
00:27:15.400
agreements with, uh, NATO countries or something. And so you don't think Carney would be good for the
00:27:21.040
Canadian economy in dealing with Trump, even though it's not any personal animus. I barely
00:27:26.140
know the man and he's obviously an intelligent man. I can say, I do, do know the man. He's a
00:27:32.580
very smart guy, but he, I, my view is he has the wrong policies. That's it. I think, I think he would
00:27:38.140
be in policy terms. That's a straight policy question, not a personal one. Uh, I think he
00:27:43.240
would be a disaster, a terrible disaster. All right. We need to take a quick break. When we come back,
00:27:48.360
I do want to ask you about Pierre Polyev's plan that he's laid out, but also get into, um, Trump's
00:27:54.300
comments about 51st state, Greenland, Panama, things of Ukraine, all of that more in moments.
00:28:02.900
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00:28:58.460
What are the new technologies that will change aviation?
00:29:02.880
Well, hydrogen would be one for sure if we got there. I mean, hydrogen is not just a, uh, alternative fuel.
00:29:08.340
I mean, hydrogen would change, would change it significantly if we ever managed to break the back of that.
00:29:13.500
Today, I'm speaking with Caelan Rovinescu, the former president of Air Canada and a trailblazer in global aviation.
00:29:22.980
Join me, Chris Hadfield, on the On Energy podcast.
00:29:28.700
Conrad, I've asked you about, uh, Mark Carney's position.
00:29:32.040
I've asked you about, uh, Justin Trudeau's handling of this.
00:29:35.840
As you look at Pierre Poliev and the conservatives, and they've tried to pivot away from talking about,
00:29:40.880
it's funny, people said, oh, you've got to stop talking about the carbon tax.
00:29:43.840
And then, you know, first half of the liberal leadership race was everyone talking about the carbon tax
00:29:51.040
Um, but he did pivot and he did come up with a Canada first plan.
00:29:56.460
When I look at it, it's far more detailed, at least in what we see in public, than what we've seen from the federal government.
00:30:10.460
I thought the speech he gave at the Quebec, uh, conservative conference in Quebec city a little over a year ago
00:30:17.220
was, uh, one of the most interesting and original policy statements from a party leader I've heard in this country,
00:30:24.620
going back to Walter Gordon's famous, uh, conference at Kingston,
00:30:29.140
when, when the liberals were out of office and Mr. Diefenbaker was the prime minister.
00:30:34.600
And, and I thought, I thought, I think he's, he's very, uh, original and, and, and, and quite thoughtful in these things
00:30:45.940
Uh, I mean, I, I think, I think they've got, they've got a genuine plan.
00:30:53.960
I, I think, I think those who are representing him as harsh and reactionary and Trump North and all this stuff.
00:31:02.440
And not, I mean, I, I have a better opinion of Trump than most Canadians do, but, um, I think that's all rubbish.
00:31:09.180
He's, I think he's, I think he's sort of the man for the hour.
00:31:12.080
I think he's thought it through carefully and, and, uh, he's what a five or six term MP though.
00:31:18.920
And, and he is, uh, I mean, though he has a French name, he's really an English Canadian, as you know,
00:31:23.780
but he speaks French very well, which Cardi does not.
00:31:26.880
And so that, you know, that's a matter of some electoral implications.
00:31:30.040
I think, as I think, I think Pierre, if elected prime minister would, would hit the ground running with a well thought out plan.
00:31:38.820
And, and, and we would reverse a number of trends that are now very worrisome and have been well entrenched the last few years.
00:31:45.300
I mean, we're, we're slipping competitively all the time in the scale of per capita income per country.
00:31:52.860
I mean, when I was a young man, which I admit it was a long time ago, it was between us and the Australians who was next to the United States.
00:31:59.900
I mean, I'm leaving out the petro states and the tax haven states.
00:32:07.380
Where people actually build stuff and make stuff.
00:32:16.740
We've got to be competitive and this country is a treasure house.
00:32:19.600
We have everything except tropical fruit here, our precious metals, base metals, forest products, agriculture, energy of all kinds.
00:32:29.040
And, and, and, and we have a population of over 40 million, greater than France, the greatest days of its glory, but Renoir and Victor Hugo.
00:32:39.120
And we don't have cultural figures like that, but we have that population and, and we're underachieving.
00:32:45.960
And, and, uh, you know, we've just got to raise our game here.
00:32:48.900
I mean, we've, as you would know, Brian, we've had in the last 10 years, approximately a $350 billion deficit.
00:32:57.240
That's to say money, more money leaving the country that, that was generated here than money invested from outside.
00:33:07.360
Now, unfortunately, I hear a lot of Canadians say to me that, but I, I, I can't, I can't vote for Pierre Polyev.
00:33:19.800
And so I was interested to hear you say that you don't see that.
00:33:29.020
I've known him personally more than 20 years and I see a very different man than other people do.
00:33:35.860
That's a, that's a, I've known a long time, not quite as long as that, but yeah, almost as long as that.
00:33:43.140
So, so you don't see him as this angry elbows up, uh, you know, kill the opponent person all the time.
00:33:52.660
Well, but I also think a lot of the media, the guy who was a bit like that was Justin's father.
00:33:59.880
And I mean, even though I did agree with him in many ways, I'm from Quebec and I wanted to, you know, he, he was the man to defeat the separatists and he did it.
00:34:07.400
But, but, you know, Pierre Trudeau was not Mr. Generosity, you know.
00:34:11.620
I've heard stories about Pierre Trudeau calling up you to, uh, you know, tell, tell you to fire that SOB who worked for you, uh, Jim Munson.
00:34:21.420
Uh, so, so I, I worked for CFRB, which of course you owned, uh, many years ago, long before I worked there.
00:34:28.780
But I, I, I heard stories that Pierre used to call up and, and demand you fire people like Jimmy Munson.
00:34:34.520
No, well, other politicians have done that too, you know.
00:34:39.440
The worst I ever had for that was when Margaret Thatcher phoned me at two o'clock in the morning and demand, which is funny.
00:34:46.520
I, I don't go to bed early, so it wasn't so inconvenient as would be for most people, but she was shouting down the phone.
00:34:53.120
I had to hold the phone out here, you think, say, demanding I fire the editor of the Daily Telegraph because he had fired her daughter.
00:35:00.680
So I said, well, look, uh, prime minister, I can't get to the bottom of that right now, but will you leave it with me until noon later today?
00:35:08.940
So that was the end, and, uh, you know, we, we, we sorted it all out, but, uh, yeah, fire.
00:35:14.680
I said to Max Hastings, are you out of your mind?
00:35:17.300
He said, well, she did something she should have done.
00:35:19.340
I said, but come on, Max, it's like prime minister.
00:35:26.700
Um, let me ask you about this, about people in the media before we move on to the international side of things.
00:35:32.960
Um, some of our media commentators in this country have been losing their collectivist little minds, as I like to say, over Donald Trump.
00:35:52.540
I, I mean, he's saying we've got to get out of, uh, NATO.
00:35:55.940
We got to kick us out of NATO, uh, ban Trump from the G N president to come to a G seven G seven.
00:36:04.280
Steven Marr is saying we've got to start conscription to stop the pending us invasion.
00:36:10.740
There's a huge chunk of, of the so-called respectable commentary at class.
00:36:17.520
I will never be part of the respectable commentary at class.
00:36:23.780
Uh, I will have influential people read me, listen to the podcast and all of that, but
00:36:29.780
The respectable side has lost their mind over Trump.
00:36:33.780
No, but the Trump derangement syndrome is a well-known phenomenon now.
00:36:39.560
And of course it's mainly Americans, but there are foreigners, including Canadians like this
00:36:43.860
And, uh, they, they are, uh, and I know as you do a great many of them.
00:36:48.860
And, and they, what they remind me of is nothing so much as people who is, as if there was a
00:36:56.780
And when the name Trump is mentioned other than in the context of playing bridge or something,
00:37:01.780
uh, the door flies open and this cuckoo bird flies, reaching absolute nonsense.
00:37:13.400
He's obviously, uh, you know, whatever, you know, reservations one might have about him.
00:37:19.560
He's a very formidable man, a very important present and, and, and a great figure in the
00:37:25.500
He's by far the most influential and important person in the world right now.
00:37:30.000
And, and his record is not difficult to defend.
00:37:33.380
I mean, uh, in six weeks, uh, illegal entries down 96%, recruitment in the armed forces up
00:37:40.320
20%, uh, spending cut $250 billion of sheer waste, just nonsense, you know?
00:37:47.360
Oh, there's many things I like about what he's doing.
00:37:53.980
So let me ask you about this a little while ago, as I mentioned down in Washington, I reconnected
00:37:59.540
with Steve Bannon, who used to head up Breitbart.
00:38:02.360
That's how I got to know Steve, but he went into the white house as Trump's chief strategist,
00:38:09.920
And I said, okay, you still know the guy you're, you're not tight anymore, but what's going
00:38:15.200
And, and he tied together Canada, Greenland, the Panama canal into this Western hemispheric
00:38:22.280
defense strategies and invoking the name of Alfred Mann, who was this naval strategist
00:38:28.060
from, uh, but he was the influence of sea power upon history.
00:38:34.120
That, that, that, he's a very, very important guy, but extremely important, but that has
00:38:41.160
Do you put any stock in that theory that, you know, because we can't defend our Arctic
00:38:45.960
that, uh, you know, we, we haven't built Gray's Bay, which is the commercial port.
00:38:51.000
We haven't built a proper deep water naval port in the Arctic.
00:38:54.900
We didn't launch the great icebreaker, John Diefenbaker that Stephen Harper promised.
00:38:59.700
We didn't build any of the 10 nuclear submarines for the Arctic that Brian Mulroney wanted to,
00:39:11.880
They're, you know, Alaska is part of the United States and their Navy is active up there.
00:39:16.140
But as in other military matters and Alliance matters, we should be pulling our weight and
00:39:21.740
So in that respect, I think Trump and the British who are, who are, who are doing all right.
00:39:26.000
And, you know, some of those who are closer to the Russians, uh, geographically like the
00:39:30.180
Poles, those NATO members that are pulling their weight, have a grievance with us and we
00:39:35.420
But, uh, on the, I mean, Admiral Mahan doesn't have a thing to do with this.
00:39:40.600
And Steve Bannon says that he does, that's horse feathers.
00:39:44.240
But, uh, I mean, he, he was, the influence of sea power upon history was one of the most
00:39:49.300
influential strategic books I've ever written, but, but it, it has nothing to do with our
00:39:55.880
Now, do you put any stock in the 51st state idea that Trump is floating or is that?
00:40:01.560
Well, I did point out to him that in the first place, since we have more people in
00:40:05.880
California, we're entitled to more senators in the state of Delaware.
00:40:09.140
But I, I, I told him that, uh, it would have to be six states, but Canadians weren't
00:40:18.060
They didn't want the corrupt American justice system that no one knows better than Trump
00:40:26.200
But, but, but on the other hand, there's room for collaboration beyond what we have now.
00:40:30.740
So, but, um, uh, I think what's happening here is there's separate questions.
00:40:38.400
I mean, if I can break them out very briefly in the case of Panama, he is justly concerned
00:40:43.600
that American flag ships are being overcharged.
00:40:47.120
American Navy ships are being overcharged to go through the canal and that the Chinese are
00:40:52.980
And, and he is, he is, that that's the big one.
00:40:56.500
I think he's forcing the Chinese and he is going to force them.
00:40:59.360
Uh, I mean, Roosevelt did that in Mexico and the Japanese were buying up a lot of land
00:41:03.960
and buy California warned the president of Mexico.
00:41:07.080
He wouldn't stand for it, but he didn't do it publicly.
00:41:16.760
Denmark doesn't have the money to do what needs to be done there, which is partially Arctic,
00:41:21.720
you know, protecting our position in the Arctic and partially the, the ultimate mineral wealth
00:41:29.940
So I, I, I, but I don't know that the way the president of the U S has pursued this is,
00:41:36.040
is the right course, you know, just announcing in public he wants to buy it.
00:41:40.480
I mean, I think there are better ways of dealing with that kind of thing, but, uh, but that's
00:41:46.140
You don't have to take it away from Denmark, but Denmark is a, it's a fine place, but it's
00:41:50.860
only 5 million people and they don't have the means to do what needs to be done in Greenland.
00:41:55.620
Which is why China has been coming in and, and they, they foolishly, foolishly being,
00:42:04.000
Well, you see, the, the, the biggest part of that puzzle is in Ukraine.
00:42:11.760
He is the only Western leader who has said all along, we've got two objectives there.
00:42:19.300
I mean, Ukraine has a perfect right with some revision of borders to recognize Russia's
00:42:24.740
historic position on the Russian partial composition of a population, about a sixth of
00:42:32.500
So there's an argument for revision of borders, but Ukraine having decided it does not want to
00:42:42.260
And, and in any case, we don't want to yield back the largest single piece of our great
00:42:50.540
And, and, and, uh, and we don't want the Western Alliance to be exposed as a paper tiger.
00:42:55.520
So we've got to, we've got to protect basically Ukraine with some concessions to Russia.
00:43:01.280
And secondly, we've got to create the conditions where it is in Russia's interest not to be
00:43:07.220
in a smothering of them embrace with China and, and be back at an independent entity.
00:43:14.460
And so that, that's what I think most people don't get is that the attempt to reach out
00:43:19.360
to Putin is like almost everything else Trump is doing right now related to China and countering
00:43:28.700
Well, China, China's the only possible rival it got.
00:43:31.880
Now in the end, China is, is no match for the United States.
00:43:35.780
It is not as powerful a country and it never will be.
00:43:38.160
But if you got heaven forbid, if you got the Chinese by agreement with the Kremlin shipping
00:43:46.080
40 or 50 million surplus Chinese up into Siberia and exploiting those resources and paying a
00:43:52.520
royalty to Russia, uh, we would be facing a much more powerful China.
00:43:57.720
We'd be facing a China that unlike the present China would be resource rich and that would make
00:44:05.400
And, and, and the, the price Russia would pay is would be basically be a royalty collecting
00:44:11.980
formerly great power like Turkey or Spain or something.
00:44:19.920
Is the way that Trump is going about this with Ukraine, with Canada, is he making it so that
00:44:26.380
he's alienating people and allies now feel like they can't trust the white house.
00:44:36.000
I mean, I thought, uh, Macron and Starmer got on very well there last week.
00:44:44.980
I spoke to him earlier this week and he said he had excellent visits with both of them.
00:44:52.940
I don't want to get into the cards argument, but I, I, I, he had one goal and that was to
00:44:57.580
So yeah, you, you, look, he said he would sign it with Besson when he went to Kiev.
00:45:01.960
That's what the treasury secretary went there for.
00:45:04.060
Then he said, no, I'll sign it at the Munich security conference.
00:45:09.360
As you saw, Trump greeted him at the front door of the white house.
00:45:12.340
He came out the door outside, greeted him outside in the cold, you know, without an overcoat
00:45:16.800
and welcomed him in a very, you know, jovial conversation.
00:45:23.640
And then, and then, uh, with all the cameras on, uh, Zelensky got into these things that
00:45:31.680
You don't do it with Krem, you know, uh, Putin sitting in the Kremlin watching you live
00:45:39.040
And, and, um, I'd look, I think they've sorted all that out now.
00:45:47.800
One, nobody was talking about peace in Ukraine until he was re inaugurated six weeks ago.
00:45:52.660
Nobody, not a word, not Biden will, as long as it takes, you know, we'll just keep sending
00:45:57.800
them ammunition and weapons and until there are no living Ukrainians to pull the triggers
00:46:02.540
And, and, uh, and, you know, now we're, we're obviously very close to a peace and that's
00:46:08.060
But the second thing is he's the only one who can produce the peace.
00:46:19.940
And, and he can also say to Putin, if you don't take this, I'm giving Zelensky weapons
00:46:25.860
that will bring this war home to civilian Russians the way you've done it to Ukrainians.
00:46:30.780
And don't give me any of your bunk about nuclear weapons.
00:46:35.200
And you're not going to use them because you're not insane.
00:46:37.700
Because if you do, an awful lot of Russians are going to die.
00:46:43.300
Um, I, I, I've looked at the map and where the minerals are, where they aren't.
00:46:47.500
And I know that men, you know, many of them are within Russian controlled areas right now.
00:46:51.680
And when I look at what they've talked about out of the white house, about the peace deal,
00:46:56.600
and I look at where the minerals are, I think, okay, that's Trump's way of saying to Putin,
00:47:02.080
you're going to give that land back because I just signed on to own those mineral rights.
00:47:11.900
That, and we will have substantial numbers of important Americans, not random tourists,
00:47:20.260
but, but a large group of sophisticated American specialists in that country.
00:47:26.160
And if they are put in harm's way by your aggression, you are deliberately provoking us.
00:47:31.780
Uh, you see, that's where I part company with Zelensky.
00:47:34.600
I mean, I know he's fought a brave battle areas.
00:47:37.720
I don't know all this business about corruption and I don't know anything about that,
00:47:40.840
but he's put up a hell of a fight and led a brave people in a, in a gallant task.
00:47:45.340
As Mr. Churchill said of the Finns and the Greeks in 1940 and 41,
00:47:51.380
they've shown the world what free men can do, you know, and you've got to respect that.
00:47:55.540
But, uh, but Zelensky, you know, has to realize that with Americans in country in that minerals deal,
00:48:03.180
with British and French, uh, peacekeepers in significant numbers, durably in Ukraine,
00:48:11.300
They're both close allies of the U S and with article five still in effect,
00:48:15.460
meaning that if America, if British and French forces are attacked in Syria by Russia,
00:48:23.480
And, and the United States would reply to an attack on Britain and France.
00:48:33.520
The Russians just piled into his country and, and, uh, you know,
00:48:38.560
but Joe Biden's initial response was since that, that half whip chief of the chairman of the joint chiefs,
00:48:45.400
they had, uh, chief of staff of the army, uh, Millie, uh, said, uh, well, you know,
00:48:50.340
they'll take over all Ukraine in a month and Kiev within about 10 days.
00:48:57.740
And what great triumph of military intelligence levels, uh, you know,
00:49:02.820
and, and instead of that, he will have British and French forces.
00:49:07.020
There are American specialist mining engineers there, uh, and,
00:49:15.180
If the British and French find themselves exchanging live fire with the Russians.
00:49:23.680
Russia's in no position to attack the British and French, uh, let alone the Americans.
00:49:29.280
What did the Polish prime minister say the other day?
00:49:32.160
He said, uh, uh, we faced the prospect that 500 million Europeans,
00:49:36.880
have to ask 300 million Americans to defend against 140 million Russians.
00:49:43.000
Um, there's, there's a lot of bizarre things going on.
00:49:46.440
Uh, Conrad Black, fascinating times, fascinating discussion.
00:50:02.920
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00:50:05.960
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00:50:11.020
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