John Bolton - He's A RADICAL He TALKS To People - Talking to ＂Talking To Albertans＂

00:00:00.000 hi it's john and welcome to the channel uh recording this on monday march the 30th not

00:00:08.440 quite sure when i'm going to upload it might be later today maybe on tuesday morning great to

00:00:14.360 have you along here with the big blue mug of coffee and my newfound friend talking to albertans

00:00:21.040 you can find him at talking to albertans on youtube or you can search for at john from alberta

00:00:27.760 although he spells john the wrong way just j uh no it's it's it's yeah on x i spell it the right

00:00:35.560 way and i also got my big blue mug of coffee and i figured it'd be a tribute to you except

00:00:40.940 mine says papa bear on it so maybe i think my wife got this to me when we were in banff well

00:00:47.200 john john said people got in touch with me on my email john bolton ab at gmail.com if you want to

00:00:53.280 get in touch said you should put like the alberta flag on there you'd sell millions so i don't

00:00:57.640 well then it might get a bit greasy i don't know yeah but it's a good way to brand yourself actually

00:01:03.400 you did a good job with it i got my big blue mug of coffee i asked derek an unacceptable friend

00:01:08.840 should i get rid of the mug he said no no the mug's great keep the mug everybody i see says

00:01:13.320 i love the big blue mug got my hat on for you today i am el burton so you can talk to me today

00:01:18.760 john and it's great to have you here and i'll put links in the description to john so you can

00:01:23.160 can find him on x in the different places that he is but i admire you for what you're doing i admire

00:01:28.100 you so much well you know i just doing my thing here but i admire you for what you do and i'll

00:01:32.640 talk about that in just a moment i met you for the first time bouncy castle j just for a few minutes

00:01:36.800 you got really busy talking to people obviously i remember you talking with dennis kalma

00:01:41.380 i did a great interview with him dennis is just a wonderful guy with so much great information he

00:01:46.340 wrote um let me get this document i pulled this out uh so many times but he wrote this and i know

00:01:52.360 you've done you've done stuff on this on your channel i'm well over halfway through that

00:01:57.780 yeah it's there's a lot there a lot of numbers and whatnot but i met you there and i met you at

00:02:02.360 the whistle stop just a little over a week ago um and you're doing something you know john you're

00:02:07.800 doing something that's considered rather radical these days did you know that conversation and

00:02:12.500 talking it's unbelievable but what you're doing is almost radical is that way is that what you

00:02:17.640 were thinking when you first started doing this and and and put your channel up talking to all

00:02:21.940 burtons yeah absolutely i was one of the first people in the lineup to sign the petition

00:02:26.700 yeah i was you know city tv came by and uh those guys put a camera in my face and actually at first

00:02:34.560 they're like hey we want to interview you right i'm like okay this i had my big blue flag i just

00:02:38.540 i carried that thing back then before my channel even and uh then i got my lines prepared and i

00:02:44.260 gave them a good like two or three minute interview and those guys chop it up and they

00:02:51.080 find the five times that i'm like mouth breathing a little bit and then that's what they use to

00:02:55.400 represent me so i'm like you know what i'm gonna start my own channel and that's what i did i i

00:03:00.200 took my gopro which i have all taken apart here and then i just like go around talking to people

00:03:05.240 and i'm like i'll do a way better job than what city tv did and and actually my channel gets more

00:03:10.360 views than theirs does not at all i don't i don't look at everything they do but yeah isn't that

00:03:17.000 That outstanding. Good for you. And we were talking before we started recording just about a half an hour ago, and we're saying it's amazing what you can do these days. You have a voice. I was saying we all got my phone here. We all have basically a television studio in our pockets these days, and you can get your voice heard out there.

00:03:34.320 And I feel it's remarkable that I can do this being a broadcaster for years. More people have heard me on my channel in the last year than my entire broadcasting career of 35 years. Pretty amazing. Isn't that amazing?

00:03:47.000 Your thoughts on the independence movement.

00:03:49.080 I know that you don't follow, you don't talk about federal politics.

00:03:52.420 You're out there talking to Albertans, mostly about the Alberta independence movement.

00:03:57.500 What are your thoughts on it right now?

00:03:59.580 And what are you hearing from people when it comes to independence and how we're moving forward here?

00:04:05.860 Yeah, well, I let people kind of guide the conversation.

00:04:09.920 And occasionally when I see it starting to kind of taper off, but they're still interested in talking to me,

00:04:15.040 then i i might throw in a few things right that are kind of interesting to me but uh i what i'm

00:04:22.460 what i'm noticing is well let me back up a bit so in a good election cycle we might get like say

00:04:27.980 60 voter turnout would you say that's fair like yeah and that might be on a little bit on the

00:04:34.020 high side at times but yeah 60 isn't too bad yeah yeah it's bad but it's it's what you would would

00:04:39.220 would expect in an upcoming election right yeah and so i started asking people uh in my two videos

00:04:45.200 that are coming up here soon i got to edit them still but i'm like hey did you do anything

00:04:49.380 political before this were you ever involved did you ever donate to a campaign even yeah and and

00:04:54.200 so many people are saying no i am finding some who are like yeah i was a municipal candidate or

00:04:58.920 something like that right but the vast majority of them seem to be like the disengaged class and

00:05:04.220 My point is, you know what, if we get the 40% of Albertans who haven't been voting, they feel like the government is just so far gone from them.

00:05:13.380 They gave up a long time ago.

00:05:14.940 We just need another 20% and then we win.

00:05:18.220 And there's your majority.

00:05:21.780 Yeah.

00:05:22.360 Do you think at this point, and we often hear people saying, you know, we've got maybe 30%.

00:05:28.420 I seem to think it's a little higher than that, that want independence.

00:05:31.860 We need this to be too big to rig.

00:05:33.760 we really need that. The Clarity Act, which this whole process is based on, which was agreed to

00:05:39.880 back in 2000 after the 95 referendum in Quebec, isn't really clear. If you read it, it's not a

00:05:46.640 very long document. But do you think we can get to that point where it's too big to rig? Are you

00:05:51.180 feeling that from the people when you're talking to them? Well, I mean, too big to rig would be

00:05:57.120 like 95 percent or something like that right yeah it could be uh no realistically i don't see that

00:06:03.140 happening but uh i mean i i definitely think we could get over over 50 and i definitely think

00:06:10.700 that with a strong we do need to start thinking about a leader and i'm glad you're kind of bringing

00:06:15.400 this conversation up in your videos yeah with a good leader and a good plan and a solid campaign

00:06:21.240 we can probably get uh into the 60s and 70s maybe but well like for example uh jason stefan

00:06:30.200 or is it yeah yeah yeah right jason they're they're brothers i get them mixed up i'm sorry

00:06:36.040 yeah it was the mla anyway jason jason jason okay he comes out i read his article in uh the western 0.97

00:06:42.440 standard and now the the mainstream media is cutting it up and and trying to make dick downplay 0.70

00:06:47.480 it but like there's an example you know if we start getting more mainstream and then same thing

00:06:53.520 with uh the debate with keith wilson coming up people who've been complaining about the government

00:06:58.560 saying oh we don't have accountability and you know that's so corrupt and all this stuff well

00:07:03.020 they're going to say well here's a real opportunity you can vote for this and you know and we can win

00:07:10.640 mla stefan is basically telling people sign the petition the petition doesn't mean you're

00:07:15.260 really doing anything to change things, but you're giving people an opportunity to change

00:07:19.720 things. And that's what he's saying. I've heard word that he may have an upcoming news conference

00:07:23.800 where he signs the petition. That would be something. I don't know. We'll have to see if

00:07:26.960 that happens. That would be pretty awesome. But if you're talking to Albertans, you're talking

00:07:31.100 to people as well who are not in favor of independence. You know, as much as you want

00:07:36.100 to hear from the friendly people, people want to know from you what you're hearing from those

00:07:40.820 people? And if you're getting any pushback, any, I guess, hostility from people, because we've seen

00:07:47.300 some of that when it comes to the petition signing. Yeah, well, it's definitely changed.

00:07:53.660 You know, the last video I tried to make where I just walked around randomly in public,

00:07:59.300 people were kind of avoiding me. And that was a big noticeable change. It was hard for me to get

00:08:06.620 a good conversation going with anybody and i think that now people are realizing hey you know what if

00:08:12.660 i go talk to that guy with the big blue beautiful flag i'm going to get put on youtube and um this

00:08:18.220 is a real thing and they're yeah people are scared you know they are what you need to understand this

00:08:24.160 i worked in broadcasting for 35 years and one of the scariest words for a news person

00:08:29.400 is the word streeter now a streeter is when you go out to the street and you ask people for their

00:08:35.520 opinion and news people hated doing that because nobody wanted to talk to them and it was only a

00:08:41.600 microphone so i am really impressed that you get to talk to so many people because streeters are 0.99

00:08:46.940 very hard to do and basically that's what you're doing john yeah well i i like it too but yeah i

00:08:53.100 am a little bit nervous about my safety a few times yeah um like people are starting to get

00:08:59.300 now my competitive advantage for the streeters is i'm a big guy and generally people don't want

00:09:04.560 to fight with me but i kind of expected someone to come up and challenge me and it's like i got

00:09:10.500 stuff to lose i got an expensive camera and my teeth and you know is this where we're at

00:09:16.000 but i don't think we're quite there yet i don't know i think cory morgan did a video just the

00:09:21.440 other day talking about the fact that violence could be coming sooner before later you know

00:09:25.560 we've seen an escalation is this as we go on uh you know we've got this court case coming up when

00:09:30.520 it comes to the petition signing uh just about eight days from now or so and whether we'll be

00:09:36.220 able to continue they're continuing to collect uh signatures on that but i will be happy to see

00:09:41.940 the petition signing done that means the people won't have to be out there on the street putting

00:09:47.020 themselves out in a situation where they might have people come up and we can move into the next

00:09:51.380 process when we're actually talking about the referendum and trying to convince people to come

00:09:55.980 to our side. Now, something that I've been very impressed with you about, and it's a thing that

00:10:00.800 comes up all the time. You know, I did a, there was a town hall here in Queensland in Calgary

00:10:06.320 back on January 10th. That was the night when everything went crazy. All of a sudden, you

00:10:09.800 started seeing lineups. We had 15 people lined up outside. Dennis Kalman was there, Evan Chippia,

00:10:14.120 Corey Morgan was there. And one of the things that's a problem was the Indigenous thing. Then 1.00

00:10:19.700 there was the landlocked thing and other obstacles to getting independence you have gone out to talk

00:10:27.380 to people who are indigenous and well done to you what are you hearing from the indigenous people

00:10:32.720 you have spoken to well so first of all they reached out to me and this is kind of a slightly

00:10:38.440 different format from what my videos are usually like where i just walk up to random people uh so

00:10:44.500 these are people who mostly met me through x or follow me on youtube and they're like hey i

00:10:49.420 i'm indigenous and i support this and i'm like all right let's just do a walk and talk and i i

00:10:55.520 i'm starting to enjoy that format a little bit better um but um they they support it but i think

00:11:05.220 that um they're still kind of expecting the treaties to stay the same and there's a lot of

00:11:10.960 talk in the movement about people saying actually we need to renegotiate everything and so you know

00:11:18.160 But hey, I mean, I just let people talk and say their opinions and I try to keep the conversation going.

00:11:25.140 Yeah, I think that, is it a stumbling block? I don't know.

00:11:29.620 I think what we try to tell people, the people who want independence, is that this would probably be the first time that Indigenous people would have a place at the table to maybe make a better deal for themselves.

00:11:40.540 And a lot of people, Albertans, think that the Indigenous people haven't been given what's been promised.

00:11:47.680 although a lot of money is put into it from a federal level but you know we still talk about

00:11:52.440 clean drinking water in places across Canada as well so it's good that you're out there talking

00:11:56.280 to these people have you is there is there what's the biggest surprise you've got so far when you're

00:12:01.180 out talking to people what's the thing that you went whoa I never expected that um well that's a

00:12:07.320 that's kind of a hard one I guess like just the sheer and a lot of canvases experiences too is

00:12:12.740 is like the sheer vitriol that just some random people have yeah you know like you know just do

00:12:20.700 you really have that just trigger of poison just ready to explode and sitting in the back of your

00:12:26.420 head just at a moment's notice oh there's somebody i should hate boom you know and then you just

00:12:32.180 caring about your day like i i can't wrap my head around that there are people like that who exist

00:12:37.700 in our society and I've probably interacted with them many times at the grocery store and

00:12:43.040 you know I'm not wearing any any hat and then if I wore the hat then it's the end of the world

00:12:47.860 but like I try to lead by example kind of backing up to about like how you talk about violence like

00:12:54.100 one of my goals personal goals is to inspire people to just be polite and courteous and

00:12:59.220 respectful and really learn the arguments and you don't have to be perfect about this but

00:13:04.840 we can't get rage baited no no not at all and and the thing that i've discussed here many times on

00:13:12.120 the channel and i've spoken to a number of people when i've done interviews with them is there is a

00:13:17.300 certain amount of passion there and it's and it's it's fueled by patriotism right they've they

00:13:22.980 believe in their country so much they've always believed in the flag and they're loyal to canada

00:13:28.160 and and that's a hard thing to get through how do you think moving forward in the independence

00:13:33.620 movement we can break through that because i think that's the hardest nut to crack when it comes to

00:13:38.020 people moving over to the independent side well and i'll tell you i gotta be careful not to reveal

00:13:43.980 too much information here but a guy that a guy that i met on x said he was a former soldier who

00:13:50.940 served in afghanistan and he was uh really excited he reached out to me he's like john i want to be

00:13:57.200 on your video i want to talk about gun rights i want to talk about you know all these issues and

00:14:01.900 i'm like great this is like an awesome topic and we talked back and forth and after about

00:14:07.740 three or four days we had some issues lining up a date then he deletes his ex account

00:14:13.200 and and tells me not to talk to him again and and that's it and i'm i'm never gonna pray i don't

00:14:19.940 care what your issues are yeah but i'm speculating now like maybe he was afraid you know and i guess

00:14:26.980 like being a former soldier he told me he served in afghanistan and i'm like okay you got something

00:14:32.300 to lose and well if too many of us who are afraid to lose don't speak up then uh then we already

00:14:38.420 lost yeah good point well i know i know a few people who are very big in the independence

00:14:44.460 movement and they want to remain anonymous they really do i mean it can be a frightening situation

00:14:49.340 i'm sure for some people they may be worried about their employment things like that could

00:14:52.920 could be a problem but yeah um it's not so i don't think it's surprising that people do that

00:14:58.360 i'm not too concerned about that myself um but i can see how some people might be um i mean i'm

00:15:04.620 self-employed so yeah well there you go yeah no one's coming for me we talked i i guess i am as

00:15:10.960 well we talked about cancel culture it's hard to cancel somebody who's self-employed right it

00:15:15.240 really is yeah um you you were out yesterday i want to talk about this you went out yesterday

00:15:22.240 to drop off some flags you know what's fascinating is that people ask me people people ask me about

00:15:28.520 flags and I say you know I came from Ontario you would never see somebody waving an Ontario flag

00:15:33.820 you can't see it right now because I've got the background here you're seeing of to Jack Lake out

00:15:38.220 near Banff but I've got the you watch my videos I've got an Alberta flag up there and I find it

00:15:44.200 amazing people love the Alberta flag you were out yesterday I want to talk to you a little bit about

00:15:48.180 this delivering some flags um to chris scott at the whistle stop cafe you wanted to do something

00:15:53.940 from him what's that about and are you moving forward with this kind of a kind of a program

00:15:59.160 when it comes to flags no no i i was watching my video that i made uh at what i wouldn't who

00:16:05.940 more deserving than chris scott for all the things that he's done for the community and uh and and

00:16:11.400 he's doing so much i mean look there's a lot of people who deserve it so i should you know but

00:16:15.440 he's right at the top of the list yeah and uh i don't even really know i only met him that day

00:16:20.540 when you and i were there i didn't even meet him he was too busy the place was crazy i talked to

00:16:26.000 him for like 30 seconds while he was flipping hamburgers yeah but then i'm like okay those

00:16:29.920 flags are all tattered and i made a comment i'm like we should all chip in five bucks and then i

00:16:34.680 was like you know what i'll just send out a message to see if i could raise a couple hundred bucks and

00:16:39.140 we we ended up raising what like six hundred dollars so we bought we bought a whole bunch

00:16:44.440 of flags we had we had more than we needed and then so what i did is i gave them out to some

00:16:48.800 of the canvassers uh i i i took a stack uh al burton took a stack and uh but chris scott has

00:16:57.120 a whole new like lineup of flags and we put them on his patio too it's so good stuff good stuff

00:17:05.600 you you drive by they see that yeah you did a video uh i think it was from the whistle stop this

00:17:11.480 changed everything in alberta why did you do that why'd you say that well i i feel like everything

00:17:17.680 is changing i feel like people are coming together and this is what's so exciting is

00:17:22.100 we're we're unifying we're starting to get a story like a common story you think about

00:17:26.680 like i study history like when does the movement actually take off and it's once there's like a

00:17:32.880 critical mass of people who share a common you know story and uh and i think we're starting to

00:17:39.800 get to that point now with uh with this like the canvassers are they're ecstatic they love what

00:17:47.600 they're doing most of them don't even want to stop canvassing and uh and the volunteers are you know

00:17:52.500 and then uh we're we're all watching youtube channels like this and hearing more updates

00:17:57.520 about we're seeing it on x all these people are doing this and that and this is our founding

00:18:02.300 story oh it's an amazing story you know i think i mentioned to mitch sylvester on the channel uh

00:18:08.300 months ago you know mitch your name could go down in history you know mitch sylvester you know started

00:18:14.700 a new country basically and and we're all part of that you feel like you're part of something and

00:18:18.860 when you go out and meet these people i know you're out talking to albertans you obviously

00:18:23.820 like talking to people and when i go out to events and i'm pretty much a homebody i get out as much

00:18:28.460 as i can and and i love meeting the people and we all feel part of something and i know you feel

00:18:33.900 that way as well right well i feel that way as well and one thing i'm starting to really like

00:18:38.780 about my channel is people who recognize me they they know that i'm not going to chop them up and

00:18:44.700 make them look bad yeah right yeah and so the people there's a there's a level of trust that

00:18:49.420 i'm really starting to notice take off where people are okay uh i can say something to this

00:18:54.300 guy he's not gonna you know make me look bad and uh you know people get their voice out there right

00:19:01.180 so yeah instead of running away from you they run to you right well it's it's starting to happen

00:19:07.100 like okay i haven't published a video yet and i'm a humble guy and i don't like to do this kind of

00:19:13.340 stuff but like the the the the uh canvasser meeting that we went to last night was like

00:19:19.900 appreciation night in innisfil i had the camera running as soon as i walked in and as soon as i

00:19:25.820 opened the door there's a hundred people there they saw me and they all started clapping and i'm

00:19:30.100 like yeah don't let this ever get to my head i let's make a statue of mitch sylvester

00:19:36.720 yeah i i find just a guy with a camera i find it fascinating when i go out places and people

00:19:43.580 want to meet me and and be honest with you i'm just as pleased to meet them i really am i you

00:19:49.520 You know, I just have a YouTube channel and I talk and people come up and they say they they watch me and they enjoy me and watching me.

00:19:56.480 But I love meeting them. And I think you you've got a very enviable job because you're going out specifically to talk to people.

00:20:03.460 And again, it's almost a radical idea these days, John, but well done. Well done to you.

00:20:09.120 Moving forward, what do you see as challenges as we get into the next the next phase of this?

00:20:16.120 we're going to have to have a question we expect the question i don't know they're going to hold

00:20:19.840 us back from that let's hope not danielle smith seems to say she's going to put us on a referendum 1.00

00:20:24.260 in the fall what do you what do you think's coming coming next for us yeah well we're going

00:20:29.920 to need to start uh an education campaign and so i think a lot of social media people like yourself

00:20:35.960 and hopefully myself to some degree uh will start to make uh more effort like that but

00:20:42.080 we need to start having rallies and we need to start having like public events uh i'm thinking

00:20:48.720 honestly flag waving sessions like in various places you know when you see 100 people

00:20:58.540 with with a flag that looks like 500 and if they're all spread out along a along a busy road

00:21:05.900 along the side of the road that really sends a message you know and and then we'll see because

00:21:11.960 maybe the forever canada people will start to organize this too as well i see in my neighborhood

00:21:16.320 there's a couple people got canada flags that are nice and crisp and i'm like okay good for you

00:21:21.500 you know um but are you guys going to be able to organize large flag waves and are you going to be

00:21:27.380 able to organize convoys i doubt they'll organize convoys but they'll have they'll have a couple

00:21:32.220 rallies probably at the legislature and stuff like that i if it's if it's ever set up we're

00:21:38.540 going to be in the same place as them i'm not going yeah i i don't ever want to be in a situation

00:21:44.160 where it could fight you know you know well what i want to do and i and i and i think you're a good

00:21:49.580 example of this and i think we need to do going forward is we need to encourage more people to do

00:21:54.700 what you do talk just talk yeah because you might hear something that interests you because i can't

00:22:03.060 be convinced to go the other way i'm i'm long past that i i consider myself an albertan now

00:22:08.740 and it says it right on my hat but some people might be sitting on the fence and i met a girl

00:22:14.120 when i was in where was it now was it in here it could have been iricana but um no it was her name

00:22:21.620 was dora and it was in el nora that's where it was or no no young girl 20 years of age and she

00:22:28.140 wasn't convinced her parents were and we had a great discussion and i said i admire you for

00:22:32.620 talking thank you very much and we had a great discussion and i said i don't expect you to sign

00:22:37.500 the petition today but at least you're talking and you're thinking about it so john i i appreciate

00:22:42.140 what you're doing out there uh anything else yeah yeah anything else you'd like to add

00:22:47.660 before you go we want to send people over to your channel of course well and i i really do

00:22:52.380 like what you said there about everybody's got a phone we can all record our little videos

00:22:56.860 and uh you can reach people that other people can't reach like you have a circle of friends

00:23:03.800 20 or 30 people that trust you and know you and you can say things to them and hopefully that'll

00:23:09.820 get the conversations going but um if everybody started making videos about here's why i support

00:23:15.820 this you just publish that to your social media uh that that's really using the tool effectively

00:23:21.660 and um yeah we don't all have to have these grand youtube channels which

00:23:26.840 you know we'll see how like i think about long term what's the future of my channel like

00:23:32.560 we win independence and then i keep talking to albertans or we lose and then i don't know if

00:23:40.100 i'm going to keep talking to albertans i might go back into my shell yeah yeah absolutely well

00:23:47.020 well john we'll send people over we we need you to have some more subscribers for sure

00:23:52.220 on on youtube you need to have a lot more so go over and subscribe to talking to albertans find

00:23:57.740 john online you can look for at john from alberta of course on x j-o-n not j-o-h-n like my name

00:24:05.260 but i admire what you're doing i appreciate it it's been nice to meet you a couple of times we'll

00:24:08.780 have to sit down uh sometime when we have an opportunity just to chat um but thank you very

00:24:13.980 much for talking to me and i i want to talk to more people in the independence movement

00:24:17.900 because the great thing about what i do and i say this every time i go out to these petition

00:24:21.500 signing things is i love that we're signing people up for the petition but i love the fact that i get

00:24:26.140 a chance to talk to people and um just such nice people and friendly and happy people uh the people

00:24:31.980 in the independence movement thanks again for what you're doing well and one more thing it's like

00:24:36.460 we're gonna have to do a walk and talk with this thing this is how i record my videos i always like

00:24:40.940 to show that this is a tiny little camera yeah i could go for a walk and talk and then that'll be

00:24:46.300 fun it's yeah it's amazing we should get out when the weather's better we're getting a snowstorm in

00:24:50.780 calgary oh it's fine even in the cold yeah i know i know it is but you have to understand i don't

00:24:56.300 like winter very much and it's getting a little long in the tooth for me john thanks so much

00:25:01.180 links in the description um to check it out yeah yeah and make sure you subscribe as well

00:25:07.660 If you like this video, give it a thumbs up, subscribe to the channel, ring the bell for notifications.

00:25:11.780 I'll see you in the next one.

John Bolton - April 02, 2026

He's A RADICAL He TALKS To People - Talking to ＂Talking To Albertans＂

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