Independence Calendar Episode #12 - February 22nd, 2026
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Summary
In this episode of the Independents Calendar for Sunday, February 22nd, 2019, John talks about a variety of topics including: - - What's going on with the petition drive to keep Alberta in Canada? - Will we be stuck at the bottom of a ballot with 9 questions that have 9 questions above us? Will we get our own referendum question on a single ballot?
Transcript
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whether it's uh the independence petition or the coal petition if they get the requisite
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number of signatures our intention would be to put those on the ballot at the same time
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hi it's john and welcome to the independence calendar for Sunday February 22nd this is
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episode number 12 it is great to have you here busy week in independence once again but before
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i get to what's going on right now i want to say hi to vicki and dale a big shout out to them today
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mr and mrs alberton i had them on earlier this week talking about the slow roll on saturday the
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the 21st and that video off the top those crazy people on top of that overpass giving a shout out
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to the independence calendar thanks so much for doing that i appreciate it and when i saw that
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video i thought maybe we can do this in upcoming weeks so grab your phone say your name where
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you're from and say i'm watching john on the independence calendar and maybe you can head
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off the show in an upcoming week send those to me at john bolton ab at gmail.com also short video
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there of premier danielle smith saying we're going to have a referendum on independence this fall but
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will we get stuck at the bottom of a ballot with a lot of other questions she she sent shock waves
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across canada alberta and the independence movement this week when she said we might be at the bottom
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of a ballot that has nine questions above us will we get our own referendum question on a single ballot
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you might be concerned about that i was as well i spoke with mitch sylvester from stay free alberta
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earlier this week i have a segment here on the calendar with mitch and he might be able to answer
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some of your questions now a lot of things going on we're going to tell you about different places
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you can sign the petition where speakers are this week as well lots going on and your submissions here
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on the calendar and we've got some great ones this week including an interview done by our friend
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wade at one of the petition signing places you may have seen this in the news this was an event that
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happened i think it was on saturday hundreds rally in sub-zero temperatures to keep alberta
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canadian well folks you know we've had a bunch of events over the last year where thousands and tens
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of thousands of people have shown up and i told you about that slow roll that vicky and dale put
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together that went on yesterday here's a video i got to set of that and a lot more people showing
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up for alberta independence than to keep alberta in canada like i mean this government does not
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represent us hey and it's just so nice and refreshing to see average people making a grassroots movement
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to change our situation i mean there's more of us than there are of them well done to everybody that
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showed up for that yesterday on a very cold day here in southern alberta i couldn't make it i got very
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busy here yesterday but i plan on being to one in the future and i can cover it myself for an
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upcoming independence calendar this movement is moving international certainly has moved
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south of the border a lot of people down there vacationing this year this article running in the
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national post a separatist referendum campaign carries on in alberta and in arizona stay free
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alberta tweeting this out uh just the other day calling all alberta snowbirds in yuma arizona
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with the petition drive in full swing don't miss your chance to add your voice
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isn't that incredible you know you see all the people go out to sign the petition in january
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into early february and you think you might be slowing down when it comes to momentum for the
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independence movement and then you see something like that and your optimism just goes through the
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roof it makes you feel real good people are signing a petition for alberta independence
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in the united states of america it really is astounding and check this out
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i don't know who put this together but this is signing locations i guess on friday for stay free alberta
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isn't that incredible look how many there are and this is during the week you have to think
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there are way more than that during the weekend now i have been talking to you over the last couple
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of weeks and so many of you have reached out to me regarding an event that i want to have and i want
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to have an event a happening here with a petition signing unfortunately weather has got in the way
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but i'm i'm telling you this more details coming up in just a moment on you how you can help
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and i think it's going to be really cool so stay tuned for that it's going to be a lot of fun
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now if you want to find out about what's going on the best place for you to go is to the stayfreealberta.com
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website you can find out where to sign and you know again i've mentioned here on the
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channel before and on the calendar that there are so many different places you can sign the
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petition right now and there are places where you can see speakers it would be impossible to go through
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all of these this show and the calendar would go on for more than an hour so let's take a look
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at some of the things happening this week some of the places where you can see speakers and also
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places that are happening today february 22nd where you can sign a petition here in alberta
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quiet in the prairies everybody thinks it's fine counting every pipeline every late night over time
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they don't read our headlines they don't hear the pressure
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they just see the wheat fields never see the fire in our eyes we've been shrinking on the map just a
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corner just a stack but there's a border in our brain now drawn in red and black
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hot goes the province right out the back of your mind
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pop up independent sign while you were passing by
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we're out here in work boots fixing cracks they never saw
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emails in their inbox unread like a quiet thread they're busy with their selfies
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thanks a lot to squid toke for that great song pop-up independence i think that's the second squid
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toke song we have featured here on the calendar i appreciate that very much it makes it a little
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bit more fun here and don't forget stayfreealberta.com is the place to go to find out a lot of information
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there are 205 signing locations available and you can find them by location which is very simple
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they're still looking for canvassers so if you can sign a few people up be sure to
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sign up to do that if you can donate some money i did that earlier this morning money is
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certainly going to come in handy and if you can't make it out to a petition signing place
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click on the button request to sign the petition and somebody from stay free alberta and one of
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the canvassers will come to see you so you don't even have to leave your house now still to come up
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we've got your submissions great pictures and videos from this week so i'll have that for you
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in just a moment and a segment of an interview i did with stay free alberta's mitch sylvester
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earlier this week danielle smith sending shockwaves across alberta canada and the independence
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movement as well that might have concerned you i've got a short segment of that interview
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with mitch that might answer some of your questions but right now i want to tell you about
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a petition event i've been wanting to do for weeks and a lot of you have been so generous to
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offer up your time to help out and i appreciate that i don't know whether i'm going to be able to
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use everybody because so many people have reached out to me and say they want to help i
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want this to be an event i want it to be a happening i want us to all be able to come together
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and hang out and talk about the independence movement have a cup of coffee get some donuts
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we're going to do this i even have somebody who wants to come out and play some music you're going
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to see that in the submissions that we've got coming up in just a moment it's really remarkable
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but here's the thing i initially wanted to do this inside and it's very challenging to do that
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because of rules with elections alberta then i said i was going to do it outside and we still
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might do it outside but i was talking to somebody who sets up these different petition signings
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yesterday and they said why don't we try to do something inside once again so here's the deal
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it's either going to be next weekend or the weekend after guaranteed it's going to have to happen in the
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next two weeks all right so stay tuned if you want to help out but what i'm looking for is i would like
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to see us get inside so we don't have to depend on the weather so this is what i want to see if you can
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help me out with do you or somebody you know have a building and they're part of the independence
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movement have an office space a storefront maybe a warehouse that's got access to some parking
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that's in a really public place where people will see it that we can use to do this event free of
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charge they're willing to donate the space to us okay so a storefront a building something like that
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so we can do something inside it doesn't even have to be heated okay but if it's heated it's even
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better do you know somebody or are you somebody who has this space now what i'm looking for is
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something in southeast calgary i'm looking south of glenmore trail east of deerfoot if possible i
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don't want to go too much farther than that i might go a little west of the river of the bow river but
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i'd like to keep it in southeast calgary in kind of my neck of the woods so if you're somebody who has
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a space like this let me know about it put john i've got a space and send me an email at john bolton
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ab at gmail.com and we can have it inside if we don't find a place we're going to do it outside come
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hell or high water and i'll let you know about that over the next week okay so stay tuned if you want to
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help we're gonna do it within the next two weeks one of the weekends coming up thanks very much for
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your patience on this you're going to say john you're such a wimp there's so many people out
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there doing petitions in the cold i understand that yes i'm a bit of a wimp but i want this to be
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an event and a happening and something a little bit different right now let's take a look at your
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submissions this week keep them coming send me your pictures your flags anything you've got that is
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alberta independence and here are some of the ones we got this week thanks again for all the
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submissions this week keep them coming hats shirts stickers flags pictures of anything
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petition signing areas anything alberta independence i want to see it from you send it to me at john
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bolton ab at gmail.com i try to read all of the email i cannot respond to all of them if i do respond
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it's likely quite a short message from me i got over 200 email this week it takes a significant amount of
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time to get through them and if i missed your picture send it to me again because i may have
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missed it with all the email i get let's get to your submissions this week and we'll start off
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with craig from okotoks with a glorious alberta flag and craig also with his canvassers badge thanks
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for sending those in craig and good luck getting signatures sonia with her dog front and center here
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in the independence movement beautiful looking dog what's your dog's name sonia get another picture with
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your dog and a flag send it to me and we can say hi to your dog personally here on the independence
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calendar eileen with this ongoing information regarding what's going on in wetaskwin a couple
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of pictures here thanks to eileen for sending these in also anonymous sent me these pictures you shall
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remain anonymous of a new alberta republic flag what do you think how does this look unfurled pretty good
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i like i like the flag thanks for sending that in laurie a simple but beautiful alberta flag in
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cooking lake never being there would like to visit for sure ed with a flag in his window every little
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bit helps ed thanks so much for that busker james says he wants to perform at a signing event uh so
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we'll maybe get busker james out to help us out with our signing event which is coming in up within the
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next couple of weeks darwin's picture of his flag he's also a canvasser well done darwin and become
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a canvasser go to stayfreealberta.com our friend wade wade collins and sylvan lake checking out
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canvassers and doing interviews check this out hey it's wade here again me and diane we came down to
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festival street in sylvan lake again today we're on the uh opposite side of the street today than we
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were yesterday and uh beautiful day sun shining the sky is blue as blue could be and uh here we are
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uh me and diane in just a minute i'm gonna have a little interview with diane and uh she'll tell you
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what she thinks of this uh process and we picked here because my house is right there and there's
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a bathroom in there that's a good thing and so uh here's diane how are you this morning i'm doing
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pretty good thank you and what do you have to say to everybody you know what i'm just excited about this
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every day i come i i listen to a podcast on my way here i listen to one on the way home to the farm
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and it gives me hope and i'm excited and my dad is 97 and he's at home and he's excited and uh just
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every single signature counts nice bless us all absolutely thanks diane thanks to wade for that doing
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interviews now wade keep them coming absolutely loved that do some more interviews rj with a great flag at
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glenmore landing safeway thanks for that ar at 130th avenue in the southeast here in calgary with
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this picture not too far from where i live debbie sent on all sent in all these great pictures of
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the event in dalhousie a few weeks back uh pictures with me marty up north was there a picture
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with mitch sylvester and others awesome pictures there it was an outstanding event full house on very
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short notice with a petition signing thanks debbie for those pictures christian got his canvassing
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badge a lot of people sending me pictures of their canvassing badge don't include the number on it
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okay i don't know whether it can be used against you or used in some way i think it's best to block
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those out but thanks a lot to christian for sending that also uh mr and mrs alberton uh with the petition
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place picture here always sending in great pictures and videos as well i appreciate that glenn with a great
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shirt from rimby i love the color of this what do you think and some awesome flag pictures as well
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mike with his big blue insulated mug thanks mike for that and katherine sent in this poster and this is
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a petition signing i thought i'd make a a point of telling you about this one outside of mp matt
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generu's office in edmonton generu is the mp former conservative now liberal who walked across the aisle this
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week go out there and show mr generu you're signing the petition and eventually you're going to put him
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out of a job when we get alberta independence if you've got any submissions for him for me
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get them to me send them to me at john bolton ab at gmail.com thanks for the pictures and all the stuff
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thank you so much for everything you send me i appreciate it
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keep them coming at john bolton ab at gmail.com
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and just keep in mind that i try to read your email i cannot respond to all of your email and if
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i do it's likely to be a very short message but i really appreciate hearing from you i really
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really do keep them coming john bolton ab at gmail.com so earlier this week daniel smith walked
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out and made an address to albertans that has people concerned i was a little concerned when
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he heard it as well i i mentioned this to mitch sylvester in the interview i did with him
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right after daniel smith did this address and i said was this a shot across the bow of the alberta
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independence movement a lot of people had questions mitch provided a whole bunch of answers this is a
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short segment of the interview i did with mitch i'll put a card at the end of this uh video so
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you can click on it and watch the whole thing but here's my interview with stay free alberta's
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mitch sylvester but i want to talk to you about what happened last night i watched danielle smith
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do this speech address to the province and maybe i'm looking for some reassurance here mitch
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um the words independence weren't mentioned at all in this speech um but it seemed like it was
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all over this speech as far as i was concerned uh and and here we are now with referendum questions
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in the fall nine of them some of which address some of the issues we have when it comes to alberta
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independence am i reading too much into this it was just a shot across the bow by the premier
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at the independence movement i really think it is um you know unless they well here's the here's my
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perspective on it okay um every question that she asked is a no brain like why doesn't she just do it
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why do we need why do we need uh her to ask permission for albertans uh to do something about
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something that's critically a problem right now and why do we have to wait nine months for a decision
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on that when it's it's very clear that every one of those questions is is a very simple yes answer
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like do we agree that we should stop uncontrolled migration i i suggest that um that's very clear
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across the whole province everybody agrees with that in spite of the fact and you may be you may
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remember this uh i very clearly remember the premier taking a position a couple years ago that she wanted
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10 million albertans uh in alberta and uh now uh you know and i remember the reaction she got at the
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agm at that time and she should change her stance on that but but we're we're seeing the results of
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half that number right now uh being catastrophic and if it's really catastrophic why are we waiting
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seven or eight months to take action is my problem it's it's more of delay delay delay and and that's
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exactly uh where i see the problem is uh the premier clearly didn't address uh cpp she thought she
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talked about 10 billion dollars in the heritage uh savings fund uh but we're talking about 400
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billion dollars that are flapping in the wind that nobody seems to want to pay attention to she clearly
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didn't talk about revenue collection um you know based on the fact that you know in the event that we
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have a free and independent alberta that we will be able to collect our own taxes on day one and she
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didn't talk much about police uh she didn't talk about any of those things that i think are clearly
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important to us right now uh you know no matter which side of this movement you're on and you mentioned
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all i'm seeing from them uh the ucp is you know delay more delay tactics and um you know i mean we're
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collecting signatures we're going to get to the threshold so that we can have this referendum i
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believe and uh when when that happens then we're going to have to address a clear and independent
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question on uh on on alberta independence i am i got a text message from somebody this morning just
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irate that the question about whether you want an alberta pension plan wasn't on one of these questions
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and you mentioned cpp there but my my question to you is if if we got all of these things which i think
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is highly doubtful because many of these questions are have constitutional issues involved i mean i
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don't think you can get all the 10 provinces to agree on anything when we can't agree to get a
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trillion dollars worth of oil out of the ground which will benefit all of us but you know if we
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got all of these things would you be satisfied at that point no no i i think i think our biggest
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problems in ottawa i i think that the corruption and level in ottawa is off the charts and and i've been
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saying this every night all over the all over the provinces like when people understand that we're
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taxed 43 to 53 percent that's the problem how do you address this mitch this is a question that
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really struck me we have now have nine questions on a referendum on october the 19th i believe is the
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date nine questions and the independence movement wants its questions stay free alberta's question needs
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to be on that referendum are we going to be stuck at number 10 is this what you envisioned when you
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wanted a referendum on independence here in albert we've you know our question is supposed to be a
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constitutional question it's supposed to be a standalone question and all of these questions
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that they're asking is just muddying the waters just making everything less clear the whole all of that
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gets solved with the yes vote on our question all of that gets solved with the yes vote on our question
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every bit there doesn't have to be any more that question solves solves everything or at least gives
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a clear path if if albertans decide that they don't want uh alberta independence well then you know
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then the premier is going to have to act on her own to make these decisions on behalf of albertans or
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that are going to be best for them and i really don't believe that she has to wait seven months to do it
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she should be doing it right now so i'm assuming your advice to people who are out there collecting
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uh signatures and working hard for independence just work even harder and not be too concerned
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about this just keep you know keep your eyes on the prize again i suggest that you're probably going
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to suggest work really yeah i'm going to tell everybody work really really really hard let's not
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take this for granted you know let's make this too big to rig thanks to mitch for doing that i do
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appreciate it again it's a much longer interview with a lot more information i'll put a card at the
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end so you can click on it and watch the whole thing thank you to mitch and i want to say it again
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because mitch is so giving of his time as are all the people involved with the independence movement
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here and if you get a chance and you get to meet mitch go up and shake his hand and thank him because
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you know i do very little when it comes to alberta independence and people are always thanking me for
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everything i do it's nothing compared to mitch sylvester and the other people involved and the
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leaders of the independence movement here so thank you very much for watching i really appreciate it
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i hope you enjoy these i've got an exciting thing coming up early march i'm excited about it i'm not
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going to tell you too much about it right now just a little tease there but another show that might
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be coming up very soon here on my channel keep your email coming to me johnboltonab at gmail.com i love
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hearing from you wherever you may be in the world send us your pictures and anything alberta independence
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and i might feature them on the next calendar thanks for watching the independence calendar