Juno News - A victory for freedom!

00:00:00.000 Hi, I'm Candice Malcolm, and this is The Candice Malcolm Show. Thank you so much for joining us,

00:00:06.660 folks. We have a great episode for you today, and today's episode is brought to you by Rocklink,

00:00:12.040 but more on them a little later. So we're going to talk about the Nova Scotia forest ban. We're

00:00:16.260 going to talk about the insane, preemptive, soft authoritarianism and government overreach. That

00:00:21.380 is the theme of today's show. But first, I want to report about a little victory here at Juno News.

00:00:26.980 So it's not a victory for us as a company. We do have plenty of those. But this is a victory,

00:00:31.260 a small triumph for all Canadians, and a testament to the value of independent media and the cause of

00:00:36.640 freedom in Canada, not just Juno News, but other independent outlets like the rebel media. Okay,

00:00:41.400 so two weeks ago, we reported on a CBC smear campaign against a Christian singer and prayer

00:00:46.960 leader named Sean Foyt. The CBC teamed up with a liberal MP to smear him, to demonize him,

00:00:53.280 and to pretend that somehow he was a threat to our country. Now, as I mentioned on the show,

00:00:58.380 the CBC wrote dozens of articles. I'm not exaggerating, folks. They wrote dozens of articles

00:01:02.980 smearing him, labeling him MAGA. You can check. MAGA appears in almost every headline that the CBC

00:01:08.600 wrote about Sean Foyt. They're trying to scare you. They're trying to scare people into thinking

00:01:12.680 that he's some kind of a political activist, that he's here promoting Donald Trump, or that he's

00:01:17.500 trying to push a MAGA agenda onto Canada. But that is not true. Sean Foyt is a Christian

00:01:22.100 singer and prayer leader. He tours Canada every single summer, and he's simply trying to inspire

00:01:27.260 Canadians and connect Canadians with God. Now, that shouldn't be controversial in a Christian

00:01:32.680 country like Canada. Canada is still a majority Christian country, and our country was founded

00:01:36.540 on Christian morals and Christian ideals. But to the CBC, that is something to be scared of.

00:01:41.800 And so they successfully disrupted many of Sean Foyt's appearances and services in Eastern

00:01:48.100 Canada and Central Canada. Folks, that is the power of propaganda that the CBC has to capture

00:01:54.520 audiences in that part of the country. But things are a little bit different out West. And Sean

00:02:00.540 Foyt has been given the green light for a concert service in Edmonton, thanks to the UCB government

00:02:07.220 and Premier Danielle Smith. I'm going to read a little bit from this Juno News article written

00:02:11.680 by Cosmo Georgia, breaking Alberta government defies anti-Christian censors and permits Sean

00:02:17.080 Foyt concert. The government has greenlit a major worship event featuring American Christian rock

00:02:22.280 musician Sean Foyt on the legislative assembly on Alberta grounds in Edmonton. And so, like we said,

00:02:31.100 we mentioned this a lot. And we were worried that Sean Foyt was going to Alberta and that

00:02:35.740 he was going to, that the government was going to cave to the same forces and the same hysteria led

00:02:41.060 again by CBC and liberal activism. But good for the UCP, good for Albertans for standing up for

00:02:47.980 freedom of religion and freedom of speech in Canada. You should not censor someone just because you don't

00:02:52.180 like them. Sean Foyt is allowed to do this kind of thing. Canada is a free country after all,

00:02:56.820 and Canadians still have the right to their access of prayer services and religious worship. So again,

00:03:02.480 that is a small victory for all Canadians. Okay, let's talk about these insane forest bans that

00:03:10.220 are happening in our country, folks. This is scary authoritarian stuff. So you probably saw the news

00:03:15.060 last week that Nova Scotia has banned hiking in private woods. You are not allowed to go into the

00:03:21.460 woods in Nova Scotia right now upon fear of a $25,000 fine. So I'm going to read a little bit from

00:03:27.000 the Juneau News report on this. Nova Scotians have been ordered to stay out of the woods in the

00:03:32.680 forest. Folks, 75% of the province is made up of forest, but you cannot go into the forest or you

00:03:37.920 face a $25,000 fine. Simply stepping into the woods, even on private land, is now banned by the

00:03:43.440 provincial government with similar penalties to breaching a fire ban. The announcement came from

00:03:48.480 Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston concerned activities deemed not necessary, including hiking, camping,

00:03:54.640 fishing, off-road vehicles during this dry spell with conditions that could spark a potential

00:04:02.440 wildfire. So this is the announcement made by Premier Tim Houston of Nova Scotia. Remember,

00:04:07.960 this guy's a conservative. And during the recent federal election, he was openly campaigning for

00:04:12.880 himself instead of supporting Pierre Polyev, who was a conservative leader running in the election.

00:04:17.660 This guy has serious leadership ambitions, even meaning undermining the leader of his own party,

00:04:23.880 at least in name. He's supposed to be a conservative. He's supposed to be on team

00:04:26.880 conservative. He didn't do that during the campaign. And now he's out there telling everybody

00:04:31.560 to get inside and that it's not necessary for you to go hiking or camping or fishing in a Canadian

00:04:37.200 summer. Let's play that clip. 0.96

00:04:39.040 We're telling Nova Scotians, stay out of the woods. We are restricting travel and activities that really 1.00

00:04:45.540 aren't necessary for most of us. Hiking, camping, fishing, and the use of vehicles in the woods are not

00:04:53.540 permitted. Trail systems through woods are off limits. Camping is allowed, but only in official campgrounds.

00:05:02.380 The fine for violating any of these bans is the same as the fine for the ban on burning $25,000.

00:05:10.980 Folks, that is insane. We are Canadians. It is our birthright. It is our God-given birthright

00:05:18.520 that we have certain inalienable freedoms. We are allowed to move. We have freedom of movement

00:05:23.480 in Canada. It's guaranteed in our charter. And besides the charter, it is just a basic right

00:05:27.120 that you could go outside. You can go into the forest. You can go into your yard. You can enjoy

00:05:30.920 nature. We only have a few short months to enjoy the sunshine and the warmth in Canada. And for a

00:05:36.980 premier to preemptively say that you can't go outside, this ban, by the way, folks, goes into

00:05:42.500 mid-October. Mid-October. We're talking about weeks upon weeks, months upon months of not being able to go

00:05:49.400 outside just in case there may be a fire. I mean, to my ears, this is pure authoritarianism. It is

00:05:55.800 unbelievable for a conservative premier to tell you that it's not necessary for you to go outside.

00:06:02.060 Nova Scotia's Department of Natural Resources wrote this on X.

00:06:04.720 If you see something that looks like a violation of the burn ban or wood restrictions,

00:06:09.740 please report it to us by calling this number. Please remember that some people

00:06:13.020 will have travel permits to go into the woods primarily for work. Look, I totally understand

00:06:16.980 a burn ban. I understand that there are concerns of forest fires and that you shouldn't be able

00:06:22.180 to set fires and have bonfires and all those kinds of things. That makes perfect sense, okay?

00:06:26.700 Even an ATV ban, because, you know, there could be a spark, there could be a motor here,

00:06:31.860 and I understand it's quite dry in Nova Scotia right now, but the idea that you can't even go

00:06:35.740 for a walk in nature in Canada is patently absurd and people should be up in arms about it.

00:06:41.360 And yet, instead, what we hear, even from the conservative side, is a lot of people making

00:06:46.560 excuses and saying, actually, it is correct for the government to ban all people from going outside.

00:06:51.760 And so here I'm talking about former conservative strategist turned CBC pundit,

00:06:55.720 Fred Delore. I believe he used to be head of the conservative party. This is what he wrote on X.

00:07:01.600 As a woodlot owner in Nova Scotia, I can tell you firsthand the forest floor is like tinder right

00:07:05.440 now. You can feel the heat rising from it just waiting for a spark. Our province's small

00:07:09.320 communities are tightly woven into the woods. One fire doesn't just burn trees. It can burn roads,

00:07:14.020 wipe out homes, and trap people fast. We don't have a buffer zone or fire breaks that larger

00:07:18.720 provinces do. A short-term ban on recreational access is inconvenient for sure. It's also smart.

00:07:23.500 One careless step could cost millions and devastate lives. I understand that argument. I do understand

00:07:28.540 that there is concern, which is why you need proper forest management. The forests need to be swept.

00:07:33.320 They need to be properly cared for. And I would even understand if the government said, look,

00:07:37.500 this one area is problematic, and so don't go over here. But a blanket ban across an entire province,

00:07:43.740 just in case, is patently absurd. Okay, next, we have Globe and Mail contributor Stephen Mayer.

00:07:49.360 He criticized National Post journalists and many others on social media for even questioning the

00:07:55.840 forefront. How dare you question this wise authoritarian move, says Steve Maher. He says,

00:08:00.960 don't listen to these people. Stay out of the woods. They smell like they're about to burst

00:08:04.680 into flames. That is what he said in response to a journalist, Michael Tobe, who just basically

00:08:12.260 said that this is all very excessive, which of course it is. Stephen Maher had a lot more to say

00:08:17.900 about. I'm going to read a little bit from his Twitter thread. He says, because the Nova Scotia

00:08:21.400 government has closed the woods, I went for a run by the side of the road, said along a trail I

00:08:26.240 usually use. It's dumb, obviously, since I would not start a fire by running on a trail, but c'est la vie.

00:08:31.380 So he admits the absurdity of it. He says then, the woods are dry, are tender dry. I think the 0.91

00:08:37.460 province is right to have ordered the woods closed. You can't just ban unsafe activities. You have to ban it

00:08:43.240 all. You have to ban it all, folks. That's the mentality. Just ban it all, right? Most people

00:08:48.040 won't be out there doing irresponsible things like smoking in the woods or starting campfires.

00:08:52.700 They know that it is dangerous and most people have common sense. But instead of trusting people,

00:08:57.680 instead of saying, follow these guidelines, follow these rules, no, we have to resort to a blanket

00:09:02.140 rule and then a blanket ban. And then you have useful idiots like these saying you have to ban it all. 1.00

00:09:07.520 It's just responsible. Stephen Maher goes on to say, there's a lively debate on this website, 1.00

00:09:12.680 talking about X, with libertarian-minded people from points west, blaming Tim Houston for overreach.

00:09:18.500 But I suspect Nova Scotians support the measure of Nova Scotians locked down hard and early during

00:09:22.840 the pandemic. As a result, we had lower mortality. It looks like the death rate was actually lower

00:09:27.840 than normal. And he wrote, some people are having emotional reactions to the forest, Nova Scotia

00:09:34.060 forestry policy. Yeah, because in a free society like Canada, you shouldn't just be able to lock it

00:09:40.160 all down. And he even mentions that during COVID, they were somewhat successful because they locked

00:09:44.220 it all down. Well, you know what? Sweden did the exact opposite thing and they also had lower

00:09:48.080 mortality rates. So explain that one, Steve Maher. But that is the problem. People, it's normalized.

00:09:53.580 We've normalized this idea that the government can just order everybody to stay inside and say no to

00:09:58.460 the forest. And it isn't just Nova Scotia folks. New Brunswick has followed suit. So on Saturday

00:10:03.860 afternoon, we got the announcement from Nova Scotia premiere that they will also join Nova Scotia with their

00:10:09.820 own forest ban and basically just making kind of the same argument, except for, listen to this folks,

00:10:16.520 because speaking at a press conference, New Brunswick premier Susan Holt said that the hiking

00:10:21.260 ban isn't actually about preventing fires in New Brunswick, but preventing possible injuries. Play that

00:10:28.060 clip. Me going for a walk in the woods is going to cause a fire. I can understand why people think

00:10:34.200 that that's ridiculous. But the reality is it's not that you might cause a fire. It's that if you're

00:10:40.480 out there walking in the woods and you break your leg, we're not going to come and get you because

00:10:44.660 we have emergency responders that are out focused on a fire that is threatening the lives of New

00:10:50.680 Brunswickers. And if you take your boat out fishing in a pond in Crown Land and you capsize, 0.64

00:10:55.280 we're not going to be able to come and help you out because our first responders are focused

00:10:59.240 on an immediate and serious threat to our province. Wait a second. So it's not even that they don't

00:11:05.420 trust you not to start a fire, but that they can't get to you to save you because they're so busy. So

00:11:11.440 now folks, we have politicians justifying lockdowns because they're overworked. They're overworked and 0.92

00:11:18.100 underfunded. And so they just can't, they just can't help you if you get hurt. And therefore you're

00:11:22.300 just not allowed outside. You're just not allowed outside in Canada because you might get hurt. And our

00:11:27.280 first responders might be busy. This is totally insane. Okay. This is totally insane. And Canadians 1.00

00:11:32.380 deserve to be mocked rightily. I want to point to a social media post by Shopify CEO Toby Lutke 0.98

00:11:40.180 mocking government overage. This is absolutely right. He writes, true north, strong and free with a little

00:11:44.700 Canadian maple leaf. Little asterix there, except you're not allowed to go in the woods. That is

00:11:49.780 absolutely right. Okay. It is so absurd that we have this entire elbows up movement that we,

00:11:54.580 people on the political left, liberals, CDC crowd, love to talk about waving the Canadian flag, love

00:12:00.780 to talk about elbows up, love to champion the charter of rights and freedom, except for then they can

00:12:05.860 also sit there and ban you from going in the woods, not because you could start a fire in a very dry

00:12:10.760 season, but because you could fall and get hurt and that you might have to wait a long time to get

00:12:16.760 help or heaven forbid, you might have to get help from someone in your own community. You might have to

00:12:20.680 make a phone call and get someone in your family or someone else to help you. But no, no, no, we're

00:12:25.700 just going to ban everybody from going in the woods. CTV contributor Sharon Khan mocked Toby Lutke of

00:12:31.880 Shopify for opposing the force ban. This is what she wrote on X. Being Canadian isn't about whining that

00:12:37.640 you can't stroll in the woods during a fire ban. It's about knowing when to shut it down for the

00:12:42.640 greater good. The real danger is leaders like Toby who worship freedom at all costs, even if it means

00:12:48.040 watching the province burn. Wow, quite the hyperbole there. Is the province burning? Is the province

00:12:54.460 burning? Quick question. Well, look at this. We have a map of Nova Scotia so that viewers can see the

00:13:01.060 actual forest fires that are happening in the province. And there are currently two active forest fires. There

00:13:08.520 are two small and contained forest fires, as you can see. So no, the whole province isn't up in flames. No, there

00:13:16.620 aren't massive wildfire raging across the province right now, just like what we saw in France earlier

00:13:23.960 this summer, what we've seen in California or Hawaii over recent years, devastating fires. And yes, in

00:13:29.380 large part that was because they didn't evacuate fast enough. This isn't, we're not talking about

00:13:34.720 evacuating from a live fire here, right? We're talking about banning people from staying inside

00:13:39.180 lest they start a fire or even lest they get hurt and we can't get to them on time. So just totally over

00:13:45.600 the top from the legacy media and social media commentators. I have one more, Laura Babcock,

00:13:50.300 who is just like your traditional, typical CBC lib, Trudeau and on type on acts. This is what she

00:13:57.340 writes. People who are complaining that they can't go into the woods during fire season remind me of the

00:14:02.320 same people who were complaining they couldn't go to parties during the pandemic. Selfish and small

00:14:07.640 minded. They never care about the greater good. The greater good folks. No, you can't enjoy your life. 0.87

00:14:12.980 No, you can't live in freedom, even though it's your birthright in Canada, because we've just decided

00:14:18.080 that for the greater good, you just can't do that anymore. We're just going to take away your rights

00:14:22.220 for the greater good and you go along with it. And if you don't, we will ridicule you and call you 0.97

00:14:29.140 out. And yes, we have already had our first fine handed out from the Nova Scotia government. So this

00:14:34.500 isn't just a scare tactic. They're actually out there handing out these fines. A veteran has been

00:14:39.460 fined $28,000 for the crime of walking in the woods in Canada. In a video shared on X, retired

00:14:46.760 Canadian veteran, Jeff Evely walked into the woods and opened the fines of Nova Scotia's ban moments

00:14:52.980 before being fined nearly $29,000 by provincial environmental officers. There are environmental

00:14:58.800 officers out there patrolling the forest, monitoring them, making sure you don't go outside.

00:15:03.800 And if you do, you will get punished with the full extent of a fine handed out by the

00:15:08.940 feds, by the, by the province. And this is a longer clip, but I'm going to play it 65 seconds

00:15:13.400 so that you can see the absolute ridiculousness of this all. Let's play that clip.

00:15:17.720 This is the DNR office on Mountain Road in Coxete, Nova Scotia. And this is not the woods. Back

00:15:28.720 here, this is the woods. So I have a couple of conservation officers with me right now who

00:15:35.480 are not on camera, but have advised me that if I go into the woods, if I defy their orders

00:15:40.940 to go into the woods, then I will be fined. And they also said that they would double my fine

00:15:46.140 to $50,000. I don't know that there's a good spot to do this, but I'm just going to make

00:15:51.700 this as painless as I can for those guys and go in here. And they have me on camera.

00:16:03.280 Fine is $28,870,250. Okay. I thought it was $25,000. It's $28,870. Oh, victim fees. Okay.

00:16:16.920 Sounds good. I have a ticket here for, let me see if you can see that, $28,870.50 for victimizing

00:16:29.840 somebody. So in a country where thieves break into homes, break into cars, where you have

00:16:36.000 heinous crimes happening almost every day, judges giving shortened sentences for immigrants so 1.00

00:16:40.680 lest they don't get deported. Here we have a veteran in defiance of the law, doing it intentionally

00:16:45.820 just to basically see if they're being sincere with these fines. Yes, they are. Not only do you

00:16:52.040 have to pay the $25,000 fine, you also have to pay taxes on that fine and something called a victim

00:16:56.000 fee, which I have no idea what that is about. But this is absurd, folks. And I'm proud to report,

00:17:01.180 happy to report that the Canadian Centre for Constitutional Freedoms will be working with

00:17:06.120 Jeff Eveli to challenge this forest ban as they should. Okay. I want to share some of my thoughts

00:17:13.120 as to why I think that this is such a big deal. So as usual, as typical, the CBC lib crowd are

00:17:20.080 intentionally misreading the negative reaction, right? They're pretending that people who are

00:17:26.140 criticizing this are just libertarians. They're Westerners. They don't understand Nova Scotia.

00:17:29.580 They don't understand the threat that is happening. Maybe they don't understand the collectivism of a

00:17:35.560 place like Nova Scotia. And really, this is just about the government acting in the greater good.

00:17:40.700 Now, let me just tell you, if this was actually the government acting in the greater good, if there was

00:17:44.900 a clear and imminent danger, an evacuation order would be necessary, it would be reasonable,

00:17:50.580 and no one would be questioning it, right? If folks from Los Angeles or Maui or even the town 0.79

00:17:56.260 of Jasper had been evacuated, people wouldn't question that, right? For their safety, that is

00:18:02.200 what the greater good is for. That is what a responsible government would do. If there's

00:18:05.180 imminent danger, evacuate. Nobody would question that. In fact, they would applaud it. It happens all

00:18:10.260 the time during floods, during hurricanes and other natural disasters, including force fires.

00:18:14.240 But what we oppose is governments ordering people to stop healthy outdoor activities just in case.

00:18:21.940 And a permanent ban, an indefinite ban until the end of summer, until it starts snowing,

00:18:26.920 basically. A government saying that you can just shelter in place. We now have that power to force

00:18:32.400 you inside. During the dark ages of COVID, the government created this power. Well, they didn't

00:18:36.720 actually create it. They borrowed it from communist China. This is a power that the communists use in 0.74

00:18:41.160 places like China. They can just ban you from going outside and order you to shelter in place. 0.95

00:18:45.960 And folks have no choice but to go along with that. But that is not a welcome public policy

00:18:50.740 development in a free and democratic society. Governments should not have this power. Now, let me just

00:18:56.580 tell you, folks, we should have fought harder against these restrictions during COVID. Yes, in the

00:19:01.440 very early days, we're all concerned. We didn't know what was going to happen. And so maybe we could be

00:19:05.740 forgiven for going along with it for the first two weeks. Remember that two weeks to flatten the

00:19:09.240 curve? But the extended, over and over, overly used orders to stay inside, to remain indoors,

00:19:16.900 to shelter in place, to work from home, et cetera, et cetera, should have never been allowed in the

00:19:20.460 first place. Thankfully, we finally did have an uprising against it was called the Trekker Convoy.

00:19:24.640 We all know how that ended with government propaganda units and former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau

00:19:29.420 absolutely, inexplicably demonizing these people in horrendous ways. Don't get me started on that.

00:19:35.680 But we should have not allowed it to do it because now governments have that as part of their arsenal.

00:19:40.820 It's just another tool in the toolkit. We can just order people to shelter in place, order everyone to

00:19:44.780 stay inside, say no forest. You're going to ban you $25,000 for going into the forest. Folks,

00:19:51.060 this is the road to serfdom. We are on the road to serfdom. We are well along this road. And that is why

00:19:56.300 this needs to stop. Do not allow them to normalize this. Fight back with every ounce that you can.

00:20:01.340 Good for that individual for defying the rule. Hopefully that forest ban will get overturned. You won't

00:20:06.120 actually have to pay that fine. But if you don't, if we just go along with it, like the CBC journalists

00:20:11.340 and the Globe and Mail journalists are all telling you that you have to every year, every year during the

00:20:16.560 summer, rather than clearing out the forest and having responsible forest management, rather than just being

00:20:20.940 concerned with specific areas that could be at risk, the governments will use this every time

00:20:26.220 they can. They will just say, you know what, time to shelter in place. Forest fire season's coming. We don't

00:20:31.780 want anyone to get hurt. Everyone just be good little, good little people and go into your house, go along with

00:20:37.060 what we are saying. And we cannot allow that. That is not something that we should go along with, which again, is why

00:20:43.760 we need to fight back against this. All right, folks, I am very pleased today now to be joined by

00:20:50.800 Jonathan Wellam. He is a president and CEO of Rocklink Investment Partners. Rocklink is an independent

00:20:56.500 investment managing firm focused on creating portfolios of high quality assets. It's based out of Burlington,

00:21:01.840 Ontario. They are a proud sponsor of Juno News. Jonathan has years of investment and financial

00:21:07.020 experience, and he is joining our show today to provide viewers with helpful financial advice and to

00:21:11.940 provide analysis on Canada's current fiscal outlook. For more information about Rocklink and their services,

00:21:17.700 please visit rocklink.com. That's R-O-C-K-L-I-N-C dot com. Jonathan, thank you so much for joining the 0.95

00:21:26.040 Candice Malcolm Show. How are you? I'm doing very well, enjoying a lovely summer here in Toronto, and

00:21:31.380 the stock market's been pretty good too, so no complaints when you're in the investment industry.

00:21:36.140 Well, there you go. And in Ontario, we're still allowed to go in the forest. We're still allowed

00:21:39.620 outside, unlike our brothers and sisters out east. You had an op-ed here at Juno News called

00:21:45.180 The Moral Decline, The Path to Currency Collapse in Canada. So why don't you walk us through that?

00:21:51.220 Well, one of the things that we've been observing the last couple of years, of course, is the high price

00:21:55.360 of gold, silver, some of the commodities going up. And I was quite intrigued by a lot of articles that I was

00:22:00.380 reading that suggested that when the currency starts to weaken, that that's when it leads to moral

00:22:08.260 problems and moral issues, social issues and so forth. And I thought, well, this is actually very

00:22:13.500 untrue. I mean, yes, as currency weakens, it's going to lead to further problems. But why do we

00:22:18.640 experience currency declines in the first place? And so you go back and, of course, you look at

00:22:23.420 history. I started in that op-ed, even going back to the Old Testament, back to the prophet Isaiah

00:22:28.980 speaking about the corruption in the societies back then. And one of the indications that you know

00:22:35.340 a society is quite evil and corrupt is it dilutes its currency. It waters it down. And back then,

00:22:41.600 of course, they had silver coins. And so they would water it down with dross or non-silver

00:22:47.200 metals. And so when you look at our own situation in Canada, I think people don't fully realize,

00:22:52.800 we're starting to see some of the impact in our economy and the standards of living, which have

00:22:56.400 collapsed for our young people over the last couple of decades. But they don't realize how much our

00:23:01.080 currency has lost value over the last 50, 54 years. And so if you go back to what I did in the

00:23:07.220 articles, I went back to 1971 when Richard Nixon, the President of the United States, took the U.S.

00:23:13.200 off of the final remnants of a gold standard. Gold was $35. Today it's $33, $3,400. So it's up 95 times.

00:23:22.200 And then if you look at the debt, if you look at the debt of the United States, similar to Canada,

00:23:28.200 the debt level has increased by 92 times. And then the money supply is up by about 82 times.

00:23:34.620 And so what you've seen here is you've seen largesse, governments getting larger and larger,

00:23:39.300 promising more and more, taxes going up, regulations going up. You've seen deficits increase,

00:23:45.400 accumulated debts go right off the charts. And what, of course, what happens eventually is you

00:23:50.700 crowd out private money, you crowd out productivity, you start to become a redistribution economy,

00:23:56.740 and you don't make things anymore, and you don't produce things anymore, and you don't dig holes and

00:24:00.940 develop your resources like we're seeing in Canada. And what happens? You lose purchasing power and

00:24:05.860 wealth levels start to decline. And so that was really the purpose of the article that, you know,

00:24:11.100 what's led to that, you know, lack of hard work, virtue standards, breakdown in the homes and the

00:24:16.940 families in our country and so forth. And so you've had a lot of moral and ethical issues, which have

00:24:23.120 gotten us to the place where we are now. And so our issue is, if we're going to fix these things,

00:24:28.800 we have to acknowledge the foundation has been really broken. And when you look at your currency,

00:24:34.600 and you look at the loss of your purchasing power, that's one of the best indications that

00:24:38.760 something has really gone wrong in your country. Well, it really is a stealth tax on middle class 0.64

00:24:43.860 and on people who save, and it's punishing people who save. Your article does a great job of going

00:24:49.020 through the history of it. And to me, Jonathan, it's so frustrating, because it seems to me that every

00:24:53.860 time governments do this and print massive amounts of money, the same thing happens. We deal with

00:24:58.160 sky high inflation, right? You drown out the money supply. And so you know, you walk us through,

00:25:03.000 it happened in the Roman Empire, it happened in the French Revolution, it happened in obviously

00:25:07.000 Zimbabwe and places like Argentina. And yet, post COVID, you know, I could have told you that this

00:25:13.760 was going to happen. They told us it was something new called modern monetary theory, and that all you

00:25:19.820 had to do is just print money. And it was like magic, that that wasn't going to happen. And then we all

00:25:24.260 went through inflation, then they tried to gaslight us and say, Oh, no, the inflation had nothing to do

00:25:28.920 with our spending, it was transitory, or it was just because of supply chains. And it was because

00:25:33.840 of COVID. No, it wasn't. It was because of the printing of money. And I feel like we're having

00:25:37.580 similar, we're similarly being gaslit, because every, every, every problem in Canada, it's easy,

00:25:44.320 there's a scapegoat, they just blame it on President Trump and say, this is all because of the tariffs.

00:25:48.060 There's a report last week that Canada lost over 40,000 jobs, which is the most since the pandemic

00:25:53.560 jobs lost 40,000 positions in July. That's pretty scary. And yet the liberals and the media and CBC

00:26:01.020 kind of just shrug it off and pretend that it's about President Trump. But it isn't right. The

00:26:05.260 Canadian economy is in trouble independent of what's happening. Absolutely. These trends have

00:26:10.400 been in place now for 10 years plus. And I would argue even they were some of these trends that started

00:26:14.860 going back a couple of decades. They certainly were exacerbated and made much worse from the days

00:26:20.060 when Justin Trudeau took over, and the liberal policies, which are basically socialist left-wing

00:26:25.580 policies. And so if you crowd out the private sector, and you don't make things and produce, and you grow

00:26:31.340 your economy, then of course prices are going to go up if you flood more currency into the system. It's

00:26:36.440 impossible not to. And when you look at President Malay down in Argentina, what he's doing is trying to 1.00

00:26:42.380 reverse everything that we're actually doing. What is Trump doing in the United States right now?

00:26:46.920 He's unleashing capital. He's lowering the cost of capital. Money's coming into the country.

00:26:52.040 You get productive businesses to expand. And that's the way you're going to deal with inflation.

00:26:57.240 We're doing the exact opposite. So it shouldn't surprise us. Our standard of living in Canada

00:27:01.280 cannot increase. It has to go down if we continue on the policies in which we are the road that we've

00:27:08.080 been on now for the last 10 years plus. And Prime Minister Carney is not making any changes. His

00:27:13.560 ideology is the same as we've seen the last 10 years. And you can see him basically slow-walking

00:27:19.580 everything. And what we need to do is unleash capital, get capital back in this country, start

00:27:24.500 to develop the oil sands, further pipelines, develop our uranium more, all of our resources,

00:27:31.300 the developments of our energy, lower our cost of energy, get off these crazy EV mandates, let the 0.74

00:27:37.520 market determine where our energy should be developed. That's what will lower inflation and

00:27:42.480 drive up our wealth. And we're starting to see what's happening in the U.S. And it's going to be

00:27:47.180 a major contrast between Canada and the United States because of policies, not because of tariffs.

00:27:52.700 I mean, tariffs can make things a little bit more, put a little more pressure on us, but that is not

00:27:57.560 the underlying reason at all. Well, so it feels like a bit of a contradiction then that the stock

00:28:02.320 market is doing so well. You mentioned the top of the stock market is doing quite well. I noticed

00:28:06.200 last week that the TSX, the Toronto Stock Exchange, hit an all-time high. I think that was in large

00:28:11.200 part because of Shopify. Shopify has become the number one stock, the highest valued company in

00:28:17.080 Canada. Full disclosure to the audience, my husband is an executive at that company. And so I'm

00:28:21.040 obviously cheering on Shopify. I think it's a great success story for Canadians. It's a company that

00:28:25.340 enables small businesses to move their business online and helps people connect with customers.

00:28:29.900 It's a great Canadian success story. So walk us through a little bit about the stock market,

00:28:35.680 why it's doing so well, and how it can do so well even when we are governed in a way that's been

00:28:40.760 sort of driving middle-class prosperity down, making the cost of living so expensive, and just

00:28:46.440 making it really unaffordable for young Canadians. Yeah, one must remember that the TSX or the Toronto

00:28:51.760 stock market, which you're referring to, still have very large corporations, and many of these

00:28:56.100 companies have expansive operations south of the border and around the world. And so they are

00:29:00.780 actually profiting from some of the developments in the United States and some of the opportunities

00:29:05.160 down there. We also have a large materials or commodity sector, and that also has been going up

00:29:11.500 quite a bit because people are concerned about the drop of their currency values. Going back to the

00:29:15.640 currency issue again, if fiat currency is going down in value, then commodities typically will go up

00:29:21.040 to protect you in value. So gold has been going up, some of the precious metals. Canada's got some

00:29:26.280 great companies in that space. And so those companies have been doing well. But I think if

00:29:30.400 you look at even some of our big infrastructure companies, the Brookfield companies, which have

00:29:35.320 been really topical, of course, because of Bart Carney, they're doing very well. But I mean,

00:29:39.620 they're expanding all around the world, but they trade in the Toronto stock market. So I think it's

00:29:43.560 the smaller businesses, the really Canadian-centric companies that are under more pressure,

00:29:48.300 they're under the radar screen and not necessarily reflected within the TSX itself.

00:29:53.540 But boy, if we had proper governance and policy out of Ottawa and across most of our provincial

00:30:00.100 governments, because we have very poor leadership at the provincial level too, in many of our provinces,

00:30:05.180 speaking from Ontario, I'm horrified with Doug Ford's policies as a business person. And if we had

00:30:11.940 better policies, we would unleash amazing growth in this country. The wealth in this country is

00:30:16.640 almost unprecedented around the world. But you have to develop it, and you have to want to develop

00:30:21.740 it, and you have to bring the capital in, and you have to lower the cost. So we would have a much

00:30:26.400 higher TSX if we had proper policies.

00:30:29.120 Well, I think that Argentina's President Mele is providing a great example of what policy changes

00:30:36.180 and free markets can do. This is Jonathan Wellam, who is the President and CEO of Rocklink. Rocklink is a

00:30:41.280 proud sponsor of Juno News. So Jonathan, tell us a little bit about your business and how people can

00:30:46.020 work with you.

00:30:47.380 Yeah, we're a wealth management company. We work with families directly. We're registered right across the

00:30:52.440 country. We are disciplined long-term investors. So we try to think outside the box. We just don't

00:30:57.580 follow the indexes. We buy a handful of great companies that are well researched by a very strong group of

00:31:02.940 research professionals here at Rocklink. And we buy and we try to invest for the long term. So we

00:31:08.100 try to think three to five years out. So we're not driven by ESG, DEI, all of the little acronyms

00:31:15.220 out there. We go back to basics. We look for great companies run by the very best people, and we can buy

00:31:20.760 them at good valuation. So absolutely, give us a call. We'd love to talk to you and give you a free

00:31:25.840 analysis and assessment of your financial position.

00:31:28.280 All right, folks, you can find out more at rocklink.com. That's R-O-C-K-L-I-N-C.com. Jonathan,

00:31:34.280 thank you so much for joining the show. And thank you for sponsoring Juno News and this episode.

00:31:37.840 Thank you very much, Candice. Love the program and the work that you're doing.

00:31:41.020 All right, folks, that's all the time we have for today. Thank you so much for tuning in. We'll be

00:31:43.840 back again tomorrow with all the news. I'm Candice Malcolm. This is Candice Malcolm's show. Thank you

00:31:46.820 and God bless.

Juno News - August 12, 2025

A victory for freedom!

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