Juno News - February 05, 2024


Establishment is against Danielle Smith’s gender policies – but parents aren’t


Episode Stats

Length

49 minutes

Words per Minute

186.75327

Word Count

9,316

Sentence Count

552

Misogynist Sentences

8

Hate Speech Sentences

10


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:00:05.540 This is The Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.
00:00:12.740 Hey, welcome along to The Andrew Lawton Show, Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show here on True North.
00:00:19.020 It is Monday, February 5th, and I'm still, as you can see, not in the regular studio,
00:00:23.780 although I've had a lot of praise for the Klaus Schwab chair that I've been using for the last week on the program.
00:00:30.040 So maybe I'll have to find a way to smuggle this back into my bag when I return from Washington, D.C.
00:00:35.440 I have been covering the climate change free speech trial of Mark Stein.
00:00:40.200 We'll have a bit of an update on that with Phelan McAleer a little bit later on in the show.
00:00:44.380 We'll also have Chris Sims and the latest installment of our Unjust Transition series.
00:00:49.180 A bit of a busy show to start the week.
00:00:51.100 But I wanted to begin following up on the policy that was announced that has sent a wave of discontent by the establishment and the left,
00:01:01.140 but a wave of something far more positive to a lot of people.
00:01:04.700 And I mentioned last week that I would be spending a bit more time on it this week,
00:01:08.920 just because last week with all these conflicting priorities and other things we had to cover,
00:01:13.520 I didn't have a chance to dig into this the way that I wanted.
00:01:16.160 And I should also tell you on, I believe, Wednesday's show,
00:01:20.020 I'm going to have a sit down with Alberta Premier Daniel Smith on this,
00:01:23.820 specifically this as well as a couple of other issues.
00:01:27.660 So that's going to be coming up this week,
00:01:29.800 which was also part of the reason I wanted to kick off this show,
00:01:33.200 talking about the announcement last week in support of parental rights,
00:01:36.660 but also in opposition to a lot of the more radical transgender ideology we've seen being passed off as policy by activists.
00:01:46.640 Here was a little bit of Danielle Smith's announcement.
00:01:49.480 After much discussion, the government caucus and I have therefore decided to implement the following policies and guidelines
00:01:55.440 as it relates to transgender minors and athletes,
00:01:58.560 including additional supports to assist transgender adults to secure the health care they need
00:02:03.440 and the counselling support for youth identifying as transgender
00:02:06.680 to ensure they can successfully work their way through their complex feelings and emotions as they grow to adulthood.
00:02:13.260 First, on the issue of gender reassignment treatments for minors.
00:02:17.720 For minors age 17 and under, top and bottom gender reassignment surgeries will not be permitted.
00:02:24.660 For children age 15 and under,
00:02:27.180 puberty blockers and hormone therapies for the purpose of gender reassignment or affirmation will also not be permitted.
00:02:33.140 With the exception of those who've already commenced their treatment at this time.
00:02:37.600 Now, no sensible person who hears that would hear rabid, ideological, unhinged or callous rhetoric.
00:02:46.000 In fact, it's quite the opposite.
00:02:47.220 You listen to Premier Danielle Smith, you get a profound sense of compassion.
00:02:51.760 She's not taking a stab at what any individual grown-ups do.
00:02:55.660 She's talking about children and minors.
00:02:57.820 She's talking about the importance of waiting and seeing instead of just plowing ahead with irreversible surgery.
00:03:04.760 And yes, irreversible hormone therapy, which some people are trying to say is not the case, but it is.
00:03:11.100 And many experts have said these treatments can have irreversible consequences.
00:03:15.360 And then she's talking in the context of the education system about parental rights.
00:03:19.540 So, what the Alberta government has done is actually gone far beyond, in a lot of ways,
00:03:24.820 what has been proposed in New Brunswick and Saskatchewan,
00:03:28.260 which may be why it took the Alberta government so long to really come out with a cogent and cohesive policy on this.
00:03:35.700 But what credit does Danielle Smith get for trying to be moderate and nuanced and measured?
00:03:42.040 None.
00:03:42.340 This is NDP MLA Janice Irwin crying as she talks about this as though it is an existential threat to trans youth in Alberta.
00:03:56.340 To all the queer and trans youth out there,
00:03:59.660 just know that you are so loved,
00:04:02.840 and we're going to be with you for every step of this fight.
00:04:05.740 We love you so much.
00:04:07.060 Now, obviously, this is a very raw subject emotionally for Janice Irwin.
00:04:16.500 I don't want to take away from what's a very real pain that Janice seems to be experiencing there,
00:04:21.080 but it is very much misplaced.
00:04:22.940 We saw Randy Boissoneau, the Liberal Member of Parliament from Edmonton,
00:04:26.560 talk about this as being the NATO moment,
00:04:29.160 as though we need some collective defense on behalf of all LGBT people in Alberta and Canada.
00:04:35.040 Marcy Ian said she spent the whole night after Danielle's announcement
00:04:38.000 consoling gay and trans youth on the phone,
00:04:41.820 as though people were hearing what Danielle Smith said,
00:04:43.980 and the first thing they do is say,
00:04:45.320 I want to talk to a Liberal Cabinet Minister.
00:04:47.740 I know that's where I go if I'm feeling a little bit discontented with the world.
00:04:52.680 So, look, there are very real policy debates to be had here.
00:04:56.480 I know one activist, Chanel Fall, who is a former teacher in Ontario,
00:05:00.780 was concerned that Danielle Smith did not go far enough.
00:05:03.380 She was saying that Danielle Smith was trying to make nice with people
00:05:07.340 for whom there is no middle ground,
00:05:09.020 for whom there can never be any sense of compromise.
00:05:12.840 And I think the reaction to Danielle Smith has probably been making that clear
00:05:16.800 if anyone was not already aware of it.
00:05:19.980 But at the same time, I think Danielle Smith has put forward a policy that she believes in.
00:05:24.280 This is, I think, very important.
00:05:25.540 She is not a social conservative.
00:05:27.300 She's not approaching this issue from the perspective of a faith basis.
00:05:30.960 She's not approaching it from the perspective of transphobia.
00:05:34.260 In fact, I was, you know, on a radio panel with her once
00:05:36.640 when she was talking about how much she loved Caitlyn Jenner.
00:05:39.220 So, Danielle Smith is, I think, the perfect messenger for a policy like this
00:05:44.660 because she's not coming at it from a place of anything other than, I think, common sense
00:05:49.260 and representing her constituents, representing parents in Alberta.
00:05:53.500 And by the way, just to stress this point, the policies that she's proposed are incredibly popular.
00:06:00.180 Back in August, there was an Angus Reid poll that found about 78% of memory serves,
00:06:06.240 78% of parents believe that they should have to consent to their child changing their name
00:06:11.980 or gender in school.
00:06:13.820 78%.
00:06:14.380 Do you realize how difficult it is to find a coalition on a political issue in this country
00:06:19.440 that has three quarters to four fifths of the country already on side?
00:06:25.500 That is incredible.
00:06:26.860 So, that proves that this is beyond a left-right issue.
00:06:30.680 This is one that parents of all different political stripes believe in.
00:06:34.340 It's not about tolerance.
00:06:35.720 It's not about respect.
00:06:37.260 It's not about diversity.
00:06:38.240 It's just about do parents have a right to have a say in their child's education
00:06:42.620 and what's going on with their child in school.
00:06:45.940 Do you want a world in which teachers are the secret keepers of children and youth?
00:06:52.220 Teachers, government employees, do you want them to be the secret keepers?
00:06:55.800 Absolutely not, is what the majority of parents say.
00:06:59.780 So, let's not pretend that what Danielle Smith is saying here is radical
00:07:03.600 or offside with where Canadians are.
00:07:06.340 And I think if the Liberals want to make this their NATO moment,
00:07:08.860 if Janice Irwin wants to get in front of a lectern or a microphone rather
00:07:12.580 and start crying about this, I think they're going to look like the radicals.
00:07:16.440 They are going to look like the ones here that Canadians take significant issues with,
00:07:20.940 not the other way around.
00:07:23.060 We'll have more on this tomorrow and certainly more on this Wednesday
00:07:26.180 with Premier Danielle Smith.
00:07:27.780 But as promised, I wanted to do a bit of an update on this trial that's been going on now.
00:07:32.560 It's in its fourth week.
00:07:33.720 It was supposed to have been wrapped up on Thursday of last week originally,
00:07:37.720 but it's just been a glacially slow process by now.
00:07:41.560 I won't be able to even make it to the end of it
00:07:43.780 because I've got to get back to interview Danielle Smith, among other things.
00:07:47.420 I'm getting a little homesick, so I'll be heading out soon.
00:07:50.180 But I do want to get to the crux of what's happening here
00:07:54.200 because the theme last week when I was doing my daily updates
00:07:57.640 was that we have a defamation case in which there has been scant evidence,
00:08:01.920 if any, that defamation has occurred.
00:08:04.920 Defamation has a legal test that must be followed.
00:08:07.840 And one critical component of that test is that you have to show
00:08:10.940 if you are suing someone for defamation that you have suffered,
00:08:14.580 that you have incurred what are called damages.
00:08:17.360 We can't really point to any damages in this case that Michael Mann has raised
00:08:22.200 that he can attribute to that blog post by Mark Stein and Rand Simberg,
00:08:26.860 the two blog posts rather,
00:08:28.460 which has been why this has been such a perplexing case,
00:08:31.220 especially for a Canadian who's here covering some foreign judicial proceeding.
00:08:35.440 But one way I have been keeping apprised has been through
00:08:38.380 Anne McElhenney and Phelan McAleer's fantastic podcast, Climate Change on Trial.
00:08:43.160 We had Phelan on last week to talk about this,
00:08:45.100 and I thought we'd bring him back for an update on where things stand.
00:08:48.320 Phelan, good to talk to you again. Welcome back.
00:08:50.460 Thanks for having me on, Andrew.
00:08:52.120 Now, let's just start with how the process is the punishment here
00:08:55.300 because this was supposed to be done by now.
00:08:59.120 This was supposed to be wrapped up after three weeks.
00:09:01.960 It was, you know, 12 years in the making.
00:09:04.200 But the process has just been glacial.
00:09:07.440 And I'm wondering if you could speak to this a little bit
00:09:09.300 because the judge was saying on Thursday
00:09:11.540 that he still expects to have this wrapped up and done
00:09:14.700 and sent to the jury by Wednesday morning of this week.
00:09:19.040 But the problem with that, of course, is that the plaintiff's side,
00:09:23.140 Michael Mann, had effectively unlimited time to make its case.
00:09:26.420 And now the defence is being told, you've got to keep this tight.
00:09:30.300 Yeah, I'm, you know, I'm not a lawyer,
00:09:32.760 but it struck me as really unfair that Michael Mann
00:09:35.340 was able to eat into Mark Stein and Rand Simberg's time.
00:09:39.700 And therefore, they have to squeeze their defence of these allegations
00:09:45.840 into a few days, you know.
00:09:48.240 And, you know, the judge has been...
00:09:52.380 I mean, if I hear one more word about the NSF report,
00:09:55.960 I mean, this has just been the report that will not die.
00:10:00.320 And he keeps letting them bring it up.
00:10:02.780 He keeps saying it can't be in, it can be in, it can't be in.
00:10:06.340 It can be in, but why haven't you got someone to authenticate it?
00:10:10.080 And, you know, if he'd just make a decision...
00:10:12.700 Also, it's a personal bugbearer of ours,
00:10:15.380 but the jury is constantly late.
00:10:18.240 The jury is always half an hour late.
00:10:21.360 And, you know, certain members of the jury are always late.
00:10:24.760 And, you know, I don't know about Canada,
00:10:26.700 but I know in the UK or Ireland, you know,
00:10:29.980 they would have sheriff's deputies or police officers
00:10:32.740 outside the jurors' houses ready to take them in on a bench warrant
00:10:36.500 or they'd be fined or they'd be sequestered
00:10:39.040 if they were consistently late.
00:10:40.500 So it's a man is using the process to punish,
00:10:46.260 but he's been assisted by the weak judicial system.
00:10:50.920 Yeah.
00:10:51.060 And you had people like Judith Curry,
00:10:53.620 who at the end of it got to testify for, I don't know,
00:10:56.160 like half an hour on Thursday that were waiting all week
00:11:00.260 because they had expected they would be testifying
00:11:02.820 in the time allocated for the defence.
00:11:05.080 And so very disruptive, very costly.
00:11:08.480 But just enough about the process here,
00:11:10.740 I want to talk about the MVP of the week
00:11:12.600 or MBW, Most Valuable Witness, Abraham Weiner.
00:11:16.240 Oh, yeah.
00:11:16.520 This guy, I mean, you're poor.
00:11:18.360 Well, you're the poor guy
00:11:19.420 because your wife just fell in love with Abraham Weiner.
00:11:21.460 This is the professor of statistics
00:11:23.840 that I desperately wish I had as my professor of statistics
00:11:27.880 when I was in university.
00:11:29.220 He knew how to talk about this in very complex stuff
00:11:32.760 in incredibly relatable terms.
00:11:35.380 He was talking about it as sports, as music, as what else?
00:11:39.420 Well, he talked about, you know,
00:11:40.560 polling in the 2016 presidential election,
00:11:43.500 captured the jury's attention and said,
00:11:45.220 yeah, Michael Mann's work is misleading.
00:11:48.500 He said, you know, I don't know his state of mind.
00:11:50.500 I don't know why, but it's clearly misleading.
00:11:52.400 It's clearly manipulative.
00:11:53.960 And then when Michael Mann's lawyer was cross-examining him,
00:11:57.880 I couldn't even follow along
00:12:00.240 with what the argument or line of questioning was.
00:12:02.400 Could you?
00:12:03.340 No, no.
00:12:04.500 And I don't think the jury could either.
00:12:05.960 Yeah, you're right.
00:12:06.520 I mean, I know there are a lot of lawyers in that court.
00:12:09.100 I just hope at the end I'm not looking for a divorce lawyer
00:12:11.340 because my wife has, my wife has,
00:12:14.800 Anne McLean has fallen in love with Abraham Weiner.
00:12:18.340 Yeah, no, he's, I mean, when you saw Michael Mann on the stand
00:12:23.000 and you saw John Abraham on the stand,
00:12:25.800 there was a plausibility to them.
00:12:28.000 John Abraham, just for people that weren't following,
00:12:30.360 was the expert witness.
00:12:31.600 Well, sorry, they tried to call him as an expert witness.
00:12:34.180 Michael Mann did, but they wouldn't certify him
00:12:36.280 as an expert witness.
00:12:37.120 So, you know, they had a patina of, you know,
00:12:42.280 I'm an academic, kind of absent-minded.
00:12:44.320 I'm kind of slightly unworldly.
00:12:46.340 I don't know what a 501c3 is,
00:12:48.200 even though I set one up myself.
00:12:50.720 So they had that patina.
00:12:52.560 But then when Abraham Weiner got up,
00:12:54.640 you realize, ah, this is a real professor.
00:12:57.820 This is a real lecturer.
00:12:59.340 I want to, I'm literally, I felt like saying to him,
00:13:01.580 how can I get to do classes at the Wharton School of Business?
00:13:05.160 Because I want to hear you in full,
00:13:08.980 I want to be taught by you.
00:13:10.580 I want to learn things from you.
00:13:12.060 So, yeah, look, as he says,
00:13:14.820 I don't know what was in Michael Mann's mind,
00:13:18.800 but he said it was manipulative.
00:13:20.980 And he's talking about it from a scientific point of view,
00:13:23.200 manipulative.
00:13:23.680 And, you know, very simple.
00:13:26.000 If you know your end,
00:13:28.820 what he was pointing out,
00:13:30.340 everyone knew what the temperature records were
00:13:32.480 from thermometers, right?
00:13:34.640 So he said,
00:13:37.240 then you make a series of choices
00:13:38.760 to get to that record.
00:13:41.820 You make a series of choices.
00:13:43.580 If you want to get a hockey stick,
00:13:44.980 you make a series of small, tiny choices
00:13:47.420 that get you a flat blade to the hockey,
00:13:51.600 not blade, stick to the hockey stick,
00:13:53.600 whatever, handle.
00:13:54.300 Handle, yeah, the handle.
00:13:55.880 I don't know sports, it's okay.
00:13:57.760 I don't know much about your foreign games, you know.
00:14:01.300 I sound like Mark Stein now.
00:14:02.860 But, so, you make these choices.
00:14:06.520 And then Mann's counsel tried to say to him,
00:14:10.180 but Cole and Mann,
00:14:14.420 they replicated the hockey stick.
00:14:16.800 And he was going,
00:14:17.940 yeah, that was supposed to be an independent replication.
00:14:19.980 Here are all these emails where they communicated.
00:14:22.340 And he says,
00:14:22.700 it doesn't matter what they communicated.
00:14:24.420 The actual act of communicating
00:14:25.900 means it's not independent.
00:14:27.440 And number two,
00:14:28.760 you say there are small differences.
00:14:31.840 There shouldn't be any differences
00:14:33.180 because it was a replication process.
00:14:35.320 And the thing you think is small
00:14:36.580 in terms of statistics is massive.
00:14:40.180 And it's like, okay, you know,
00:14:43.180 Mr. Weiner,
00:14:44.440 I think sometimes he might have lost the jury
00:14:46.880 only in cross-examination
00:14:48.460 when he's been asked highly technical questions
00:14:51.940 that I don't really see the point of.
00:14:53.800 But I definitely,
00:14:54.880 very impressed.
00:14:55.640 The jury was very impressed with him.
00:14:56.980 They took a lot of notes when he was talking.
00:14:59.240 And as you say,
00:15:00.360 he talked about sports,
00:15:01.220 he talked about politics,
00:15:02.360 he talked about cold medicines,
00:15:04.540 you know.
00:15:05.240 Yes, yes.
00:15:06.740 Fallacies, you know,
00:15:07.440 things we think are ESP,
00:15:09.880 you know,
00:15:10.500 there's studies to show ESP exists.
00:15:12.700 And he pointed out how that is the same fallacy
00:15:16.620 that made the hockey stick exist,
00:15:19.020 that you pick your data
00:15:20.620 and maybe not consciously,
00:15:23.240 maybe consciously.
00:15:24.520 He couldn't get into Michael Mann's mind,
00:15:26.500 but he recognized the process.
00:15:28.780 And he actually said,
00:15:29.780 I don't care about climate change.
00:15:31.180 I just looked at it as a statistical problem.
00:15:34.040 And he was going,
00:15:34.640 and it's a massive problem.
00:15:36.460 That's what makes it so much fun.
00:15:38.180 Like getting the last thousand years of temperature,
00:15:40.380 it's a huge problem for statisticians.
00:15:43.100 Like,
00:15:43.400 and he was so excited because this,
00:15:45.040 for him,
00:15:45.380 this was like,
00:15:46.200 this was a Christmas present.
00:15:47.380 You know,
00:15:47.520 he had all this data and all,
00:15:48.880 you know.
00:15:49.380 But that's why his testimony was so pure,
00:15:52.100 Phelan,
00:15:52.400 because he's not in this as an activist.
00:15:54.660 I mean,
00:15:54.820 you could argue that Michael Mann and Mark Stein
00:15:56.640 are activists for their own camps.
00:15:59.220 He didn't have one.
00:16:00.020 He was there because he thought
00:16:02.180 it was a fascinating mathematical problem.
00:16:04.440 And he did what you're supposed to do.
00:16:05.860 He put the numbers in.
00:16:07.400 And what was interesting too,
00:16:08.600 is that he accepted,
00:16:09.640 and he made a point of this a few times,
00:16:12.060 he accepted at face value,
00:16:13.880 the validity of the data.
00:16:15.080 He said,
00:16:15.440 let's just assume that Mann's raw data
00:16:18.640 were what they are,
00:16:20.320 which is not a given.
00:16:21.160 But from his perspective,
00:16:22.100 he was only interested in,
00:16:23.880 if we take the figures Mann uses,
00:16:26.500 what do those figures do?
00:16:28.040 And that was,
00:16:28.940 I think,
00:16:29.160 very compelling.
00:16:30.280 And I think very believable
00:16:31.560 and credible to the jury
00:16:33.360 because he's saying,
00:16:34.000 I took his numbers
00:16:35.380 and I came up with all of these
00:16:37.420 different outcomes.
00:16:38.200 The same numbers came out
00:16:39.480 with these different outcomes.
00:16:40.500 That's right.
00:16:40.780 And he said,
00:16:41.420 are all from a mathematical perspective
00:16:43.200 equally valid.
00:16:44.400 That doesn't mean they're equally true,
00:16:46.040 but they're equally valid.
00:16:47.200 So Mann's option
00:16:48.280 is just one of many things
00:16:50.580 that the same inputs
00:16:51.980 can show on the back end.
00:16:53.380 And I,
00:16:53.620 look,
00:16:54.260 I'm not a math guy.
00:16:55.180 I'm not a stats guy,
00:16:56.080 but I understood that.
00:16:57.220 And I think the jury did as well.
00:16:59.600 Yeah.
00:16:59.700 I mean,
00:17:00.460 remember the graph
00:17:02.760 was put up
00:17:03.680 and he says,
00:17:04.440 you can use the figures
00:17:05.220 to get,
00:17:05.700 to get a hockey,
00:17:08.080 you know,
00:17:08.280 a stick,
00:17:08.820 a look,
00:17:09.360 a graph that looks like this
00:17:10.400 as in the,
00:17:11.280 the stick of the hockey stick
00:17:13.680 wasn't,
00:17:14.520 wasn't flat.
00:17:15.500 It was like this.
00:17:16.520 And the last bit
00:17:18.140 went up like that.
00:17:18.920 And,
00:17:19.360 and we had this ridiculous
00:17:21.320 back and forth
00:17:22.160 where Coyne,
00:17:22.980 the lawyer was trying to say,
00:17:24.360 but that's a hockey stick.
00:17:26.480 Yeah.
00:17:26.880 They're trying to say
00:17:27.380 that all of these are hockey.
00:17:28.660 They're literally debating
00:17:29.560 this,
00:17:29.880 this would happen.
00:17:30.560 They're debating
00:17:31.160 whether it was,
00:17:32.420 they were all versions
00:17:33.700 of hockey sticks.
00:17:35.220 Yes.
00:17:35.700 And,
00:17:35.920 and I don't know much,
00:17:36.920 as I say,
00:17:37.260 I don't know much,
00:17:37.740 but I think the blade
00:17:39.060 and a hockey stick
00:17:39.740 has to be flat
00:17:40.560 all the way along.
00:17:41.960 And then the last bit
00:17:43.020 has to incline upwards.
00:17:45.080 You know,
00:17:45.500 it can't,
00:17:46.120 the handle can't incline downwards.
00:17:48.980 Talk about how to decline.
00:17:50.160 We're talking about
00:17:50.520 hiding the incline actually.
00:17:53.300 That's fair.
00:17:53.820 I like that.
00:17:54.300 That's very good.
00:17:55.780 One of the things
00:17:56.560 this week that was,
00:17:57.700 because this was my first week
00:17:58.800 in the courtroom.
00:17:59.620 So you,
00:17:59.940 you've seen a lot of this,
00:18:00.980 but it seemed like
00:18:02.140 there was a lot more
00:18:03.540 procedural stuff.
00:18:05.020 And,
00:18:05.260 and sometimes
00:18:05.980 this procedural stuff
00:18:07.440 was,
00:18:08.580 you know,
00:18:09.280 very,
00:18:09.960 I think useless.
00:18:11.340 It was just,
00:18:12.220 basically,
00:18:12.900 I think the plaintiff
00:18:13.640 trying to run out the clock,
00:18:14.740 which they did
00:18:15.240 in a lot of ways.
00:18:16.200 But we also saw
00:18:17.500 some motions
00:18:18.240 where it looked like
00:18:19.300 the case for Michael Mann
00:18:20.900 was on very thin ice
00:18:22.380 with the judge.
00:18:23.680 And I should just say,
00:18:24.680 we're recording this
00:18:25.740 before Monday.
00:18:27.360 It's going to air on Monday.
00:18:29.200 I mean,
00:18:29.560 theoretically,
00:18:30.240 there may not be
00:18:31.100 a trial on Monday,
00:18:32.260 depending on what happens.
00:18:34.320 Yeah,
00:18:34.640 there,
00:18:35.100 there are,
00:18:35.500 there are two motions,
00:18:37.740 really,
00:18:38.040 that,
00:18:38.340 that could end this case,
00:18:40.280 really,
00:18:40.520 before the defense case
00:18:41.600 gets going.
00:18:42.160 There's a motion
00:18:42.820 to dismiss
00:18:43.720 because there's not
00:18:44.900 enough evidence
00:18:45.500 to bring it
00:18:46.000 before the jury.
00:18:47.540 And the mainstay
00:18:49.880 of that is
00:18:50.720 Michael Mann
00:18:51.520 has not proven
00:18:52.540 any damages.
00:18:54.220 That's an essential part.
00:18:55.420 And he hasn't proven
00:18:56.080 any malice either.
00:18:57.280 Those are the two
00:18:57.780 mainstays,
00:18:58.420 actually.
00:18:59.060 And malice doesn't mean
00:19:00.180 we all don't like
00:19:01.860 Michael Mann
00:19:02.460 and therefore we were
00:19:03.380 motivated by malice.
00:19:04.500 No,
00:19:04.660 malice means
00:19:05.340 that you printed
00:19:06.400 a fact that was wrong
00:19:08.280 and at the time
00:19:09.660 you printed it,
00:19:10.700 you knew it to be wrong.
00:19:13.020 Or at least,
00:19:13.680 or at least
00:19:14.340 had enough doubt about it.
00:19:15.960 Yes,
00:19:16.260 we're reckless
00:19:17.220 I think was the word.
00:19:18.420 So Mark Stein says,
00:19:19.920 I have been saying
00:19:20.560 the hockey stick was wrong
00:19:21.700 since the year 2000
00:19:23.000 and produced articles
00:19:26.680 from the Daily Telegraph
00:19:27.580 saying that.
00:19:29.000 And, you know,
00:19:30.160 I still say
00:19:31.100 the hockey stick was wrong.
00:19:32.520 It's not malice
00:19:34.400 to say that.
00:19:35.220 And I'm not
00:19:35.820 motivated by malice.
00:19:36.860 I'm motivated
00:19:37.380 by belief
00:19:38.800 and opinion
00:19:39.780 and fact.
00:19:40.980 And then
00:19:41.320 the second part of it
00:19:43.160 was man
00:19:44.160 has not been damaged.
00:19:45.300 There are no
00:19:45.840 damages
00:19:46.300 and in fact
00:19:47.120 his career
00:19:47.660 has gone up
00:19:48.460 and up
00:19:48.960 and up
00:19:49.480 and really
00:19:51.240 that's where
00:19:52.020 it got interesting
00:19:52.800 because it's true,
00:19:54.240 right?
00:19:54.440 His salary increased,
00:19:55.840 his book royalties
00:19:56.560 increased,
00:19:57.300 his celebrity
00:19:58.040 hitch count increased.
00:19:59.620 You know,
00:19:59.800 he was hanging with
00:20:00.600 Bill and Al
00:20:02.480 and Leo,
00:20:03.600 a bromance.
00:20:04.040 He actually said,
00:20:04.580 I have a bromance
00:20:05.200 with Leo Leonardo DiCaprio.
00:20:06.920 Like those are the words
00:20:07.740 he used.
00:20:08.120 So his celebrity
00:20:10.240 hitch count
00:20:10.760 has gone up
00:20:11.300 and I think
00:20:13.000 in their desperation
00:20:14.220 to prove damages,
00:20:17.680 I think Mann's side
00:20:19.540 overstepped
00:20:20.900 and overreached
00:20:21.660 and produced
00:20:22.580 to the jury
00:20:24.300 a document.
00:20:25.220 So I don't want
00:20:26.760 to get into
00:20:27.000 too much detail
00:20:27.620 but in 2020,
00:20:28.780 Mann produced
00:20:30.160 this document
00:20:30.740 saying I've lost
00:20:31.500 zillions of dollars
00:20:33.180 in grant money
00:20:34.480 and I lost
00:20:37.700 this $9 million
00:20:38.760 grant for example.
00:20:40.780 Then two years later
00:20:42.520 he looked at,
00:20:43.900 as the trial
00:20:45.300 was approaching,
00:20:46.220 he thought,
00:20:46.600 that was okay
00:20:47.740 for exactly
00:20:48.240 but he said it
00:20:48.780 under pain of perjury.
00:20:50.100 Then he had to
00:20:50.580 revise his figure
00:20:51.460 and this $9 million
00:20:53.020 grant,
00:20:54.000 which was going
00:20:54.380 to Penn State
00:20:54.900 not Michael Mann,
00:20:56.040 was downgraded
00:20:57.180 to a $112,000 grant.
00:21:01.280 Right?
00:21:01.400 You know,
00:21:03.040 who hasn't lost
00:21:03.920 $9 million
00:21:04.420 under pain of perjury
00:21:05.840 in a document?
00:21:06.840 You know,
00:21:07.000 it's happened to us all,
00:21:08.280 the $9 million man.
00:21:10.280 And so this was a,
00:21:13.500 but Mann's lawyers
00:21:15.940 produced the $9 million
00:21:17.680 document
00:21:19.220 with all the fake numbers
00:21:20.980 in it
00:21:21.280 to the jury.
00:21:23.000 Right?
00:21:23.560 And the judge said
00:21:25.040 he was,
00:21:25.780 and this is a quote,
00:21:26.620 stunned to see this.
00:21:29.280 And Mark Stein
00:21:30.920 and Deliquel
00:21:31.740 for Ransomberg
00:21:32.520 have put in motions
00:21:34.320 to the court
00:21:36.380 saying,
00:21:37.100 on top of everything else,
00:21:39.320 this is another reason
00:21:40.480 why this case
00:21:41.340 needs to be ended now.
00:21:42.900 And if it doesn't
00:21:43.480 need to be ended,
00:21:44.360 we need to exclude
00:21:46.180 all this nonsense
00:21:47.320 about grant money.
00:21:48.380 It's polluted.
00:21:49.400 It's,
00:21:49.920 it didn't make any sense
00:21:51.540 anyway,
00:21:52.080 but now it's polluted nonsense
00:21:53.740 and the jury shouldn't be
00:21:55.280 even allowed
00:21:56.060 to talk about it.
00:21:57.020 Well,
00:21:57.440 and this is the problem.
00:21:58.540 I mean,
00:21:58.720 I was reading
00:21:59.580 because it is kind of absurd.
00:22:01.080 A lot happens
00:22:01.880 during the course of a day
00:22:03.160 where,
00:22:04.060 you know,
00:22:04.280 someone asks a question,
00:22:05.540 you get objection.
00:22:07.220 The,
00:22:07.600 they,
00:22:07.800 they all,
00:22:08.320 it's actually kind of
00:22:09.140 interesting to watch.
00:22:10.020 They all put the headphones
00:22:10.980 on the lawyers
00:22:12.580 and the judge
00:22:13.200 and they put this white noise
00:22:14.780 into the room
00:22:15.780 so that the jury
00:22:16.880 can't hear this,
00:22:18.380 what's called a bench conference.
00:22:19.920 And then,
00:22:20.980 you know,
00:22:21.220 the judge will say
00:22:21.940 overruled or sustained.
00:22:23.120 And if it's sustained,
00:22:24.140 he'll have to say
00:22:24.760 to the jury,
00:22:25.320 disregard
00:22:25.700 what you've just heard.
00:22:27.360 It's all nonsense.
00:22:28.680 The juries are incapable
00:22:29.920 of just unhearing something.
00:22:31.920 And typically,
00:22:33.120 when something,
00:22:34.340 you're told to disregard something,
00:22:35.580 if anything,
00:22:35.980 it highlights it to you.
00:22:37.080 So I,
00:22:38.200 I find it hard to believe
00:22:39.540 that this wasn't deliberate
00:22:40.760 to put these numbers
00:22:41.880 before the jury,
00:22:43.320 knowing that those numbers
00:22:44.940 will stick with the jury.
00:22:46.620 And even if they are eventually
00:22:47.900 told to disregard it,
00:22:49.440 that has,
00:22:50.160 it's polluted the evidence.
00:22:51.400 But as you say,
00:22:51.920 it's also polluted the jury.
00:22:53.820 Yes.
00:22:54.640 You know,
00:22:55.340 and look,
00:22:57.100 far be of me to criticise Mark Stein,
00:22:59.020 but I think every,
00:23:00.480 every team has been at that,
00:23:02.460 asking questions
00:23:03.520 that they know
00:23:04.120 will be objected to.
00:23:05.880 And,
00:23:06.100 and the judge saying,
00:23:08.260 disregard that thing.
00:23:09.380 And so every side
00:23:10.680 has had a little smile
00:23:11.640 on their face.
00:23:12.280 Oh,
00:23:12.680 I didn't mean to.
00:23:13.720 Yeah.
00:23:13.920 Oops.
00:23:14.240 Oh,
00:23:14.520 shucks.
00:23:14.920 Oh,
00:23:15.200 gee golly.
00:23:15.820 I'm sorry,
00:23:16.460 your honor.
00:23:17.260 Even though we discussed this
00:23:18.480 for two hours
00:23:19.260 this morning,
00:23:20.720 how it was,
00:23:21.180 we were all banned
00:23:22.020 from saying this.
00:23:22.840 It accidentally slipped out.
00:23:24.440 Right?
00:23:24.680 Yeah.
00:23:25.180 Every side has been guilty of that,
00:23:27.660 but no side has put
00:23:29.660 fake documents
00:23:31.500 before the jury.
00:23:32.700 That's,
00:23:33.060 that's a step ahead.
00:23:34.400 Right?
00:23:34.700 There's a,
00:23:35.400 you know,
00:23:35.520 there's gamesmanship
00:23:36.340 and then there's
00:23:37.960 putting perjured,
00:23:42.120 you know,
00:23:42.420 Mann filled in the first document
00:23:44.620 under pain of perjury.
00:23:46.300 He did a bit,
00:23:47.060 he did a lot of lawyer blaming
00:23:48.540 during,
00:23:49.700 when he was asked about it
00:23:50.980 at length.
00:23:51.740 He said,
00:23:51.980 oh,
00:23:52.080 that was the lawyers,
00:23:52.700 that was the lawyers.
00:23:53.380 So the lawyers knew about it
00:23:54.860 and they,
00:23:56.200 and Mann knew about it
00:23:57.600 and then they produced it
00:23:58.720 to the jury anyway.
00:23:59.840 The judge has not been
00:24:03.120 the strongest judge so far,
00:24:05.020 but I was kind of very,
00:24:08.220 very shocked to hear him say
00:24:09.400 I was stunned.
00:24:10.540 Yeah.
00:24:10.720 And he was basically saying,
00:24:11.540 help me here,
00:24:12.740 help me remedy this
00:24:15.140 because this is,
00:24:16.340 this is very serious.
00:24:17.880 Well, he,
00:24:18.040 he,
00:24:18.340 the word he used was homework.
00:24:19.480 He said to the lawyers,
00:24:20.800 you've got to go
00:24:21.380 and do some homework
00:24:22.160 because right now
00:24:23.020 I've got a big question
00:24:24.940 about this damages aspect
00:24:26.420 and,
00:24:26.800 and,
00:24:27.340 and it was Mann's lawyer
00:24:28.740 that wanted an extension
00:24:30.220 on the homework assignment.
00:24:31.240 The judge wanted it
00:24:32.100 by Thursday morning
00:24:33.200 at like eight,
00:24:33.940 nine a.m.
00:24:34.440 or whatever.
00:24:35.180 And then Mann wanted it
00:24:36.640 until like,
00:24:37.040 you know,
00:24:37.180 the end of the day Friday
00:24:38.040 and I think they met
00:24:38.740 somewhere in the middle.
00:24:39.680 So hopefully,
00:24:40.720 I think the judge will review
00:24:42.120 that over the weekend
00:24:42.920 and we'll,
00:24:43.300 we'll have a finding.
00:24:44.200 But you know,
00:24:45.140 this was supposed to be done
00:24:46.120 on Wednesday.
00:24:46.840 I'm not optimistic of this
00:24:48.100 despite how firm
00:24:49.140 the judge was on it,
00:24:50.420 but we'll continue
00:24:51.920 to listen to the updates.
00:24:53.660 Climate change
00:24:54.480 on trial.
00:24:55.320 Phenomenal podcast.
00:24:56.400 You've been doing
00:24:56.720 great work on there
00:24:57.580 and I,
00:24:58.400 I should obviously
00:24:59.020 point out the obvious.
00:25:00.200 We don't just happen
00:25:01.120 to have the same chair,
00:25:02.620 you and I.
00:25:03.340 We are in the same hotel
00:25:04.760 right now and,
00:25:06.300 but I,
00:25:06.580 I didn't want to like
00:25:07.460 have this weird,
00:25:08.300 awkward,
00:25:08.520 like sitting beside each other
00:25:10.040 staring at my laptop.
00:25:10.980 So it,
00:25:11.980 from a production perspective
00:25:13.140 made more sense
00:25:13.860 to,
00:25:14.180 to do this virtually
00:25:15.360 even though you're like
00:25:16.080 a hundred feet from me
00:25:17.180 probably.
00:25:18.500 Probably,
00:25:19.020 yes.
00:25:19.340 No,
00:25:19.620 but it's,
00:25:20.960 look,
00:25:21.380 the judge has not
00:25:23.460 been the strongest judge,
00:25:24.680 but I've never seen
00:25:25.500 him as upset
00:25:26.720 about anything
00:25:28.300 as,
00:25:28.880 as the fake document
00:25:30.380 and that it's going
00:25:31.400 to be very interesting
00:25:32.180 on Monday
00:25:32.760 what,
00:25:34.020 what the upshot is.
00:25:35.300 Yeah,
00:25:35.800 very well said.
00:25:36.680 Climate change
00:25:37.180 on trial.
00:25:37.840 Do listen,
00:25:38.400 keep that up in the
00:25:39.040 leaderboard
00:25:39.460 on all of the
00:25:40.920 podcast services
00:25:41.840 and it is a very
00:25:42.840 entertaining
00:25:43.460 and enjoyable listen
00:25:44.300 and when Phelib
00:25:45.640 and I have these chats,
00:25:46.520 if you've been following
00:25:47.080 along in the podcast,
00:25:48.180 you won't have as much
00:25:48.940 catch up to do
00:25:49.860 and homework of your
00:25:50.700 own to,
00:25:51.180 to know what we're
00:25:51.940 talking about
00:25:52.480 and some of these
00:25:53.040 things.
00:25:53.420 Phelib McAleer,
00:25:54.060 thank you so much
00:25:54.760 and send my best to
00:25:55.740 Anne.
00:25:55.900 We'll see you back
00:25:56.380 in court.
00:25:57.740 Thanks,
00:25:58.180 Andrew.
00:25:58.400 All the best.
00:25:59.300 All right.
00:25:59.720 Thank you.
00:26:00.140 That was Phelib McAleer,
00:26:02.000 one of the duo
00:26:02.980 behind climate change
00:26:04.140 on trial
00:26:04.860 and lots of other
00:26:05.540 great projects
00:26:06.860 as well.
00:26:08.040 I wanted to
00:26:09.200 continue along
00:26:10.160 by talking about
00:26:11.660 this just very
00:26:12.280 briefly here
00:26:12.860 because I've had
00:26:13.960 some people email,
00:26:15.340 a lot of people email
00:26:16.100 actually and say
00:26:16.940 thank you for talking
00:26:17.740 about this.
00:26:18.160 But what was
00:26:18.540 fascinating is that
00:26:19.340 so many people
00:26:20.020 followed along
00:26:21.420 with this trial
00:26:22.340 back when it first
00:26:23.380 came up,
00:26:23.840 like 2012,
00:26:24.700 2013,
00:26:25.380 2014.
00:26:26.160 And it used to be
00:26:26.900 much bigger.
00:26:27.540 You had National
00:26:28.220 Review,
00:26:28.840 which is a big
00:26:29.460 American,
00:26:30.180 well it used to be
00:26:30.780 big,
00:26:30.980 it's not as big
00:26:31.720 anymore,
00:26:32.580 but they were in
00:26:33.260 there because that
00:26:33.800 was where Mark
00:26:34.340 Stein's blog post
00:26:35.540 was published.
00:26:37.360 And Competitive
00:26:37.980 Enterprise Group,
00:26:39.120 a conservative
00:26:39.580 think tank in the
00:26:40.300 US,
00:26:40.580 that was where
00:26:40.960 Ran Simberg's
00:26:41.660 blog post was
00:26:42.280 published.
00:26:42.740 So Michael Mann
00:26:43.980 was motivated
00:26:45.040 by a desire,
00:26:46.640 and he put this
00:26:47.120 in writing actually,
00:26:47.940 to take down
00:26:49.360 National Review.
00:26:50.300 He wanted to
00:26:50.840 bankrupt the
00:26:51.480 organization.
00:26:52.300 So talk about
00:26:53.260 malice,
00:26:53.880 that was where
00:26:54.560 we saw a level
00:26:56.120 of malice was
00:26:57.560 in kind of the
00:26:58.620 motivation behind
00:26:59.700 this lawsuit.
00:27:00.620 And a lot of
00:27:01.360 people,
00:27:01.940 whenever this had
00:27:02.820 come up,
00:27:03.220 were like,
00:27:03.460 oh yeah,
00:27:03.820 that thing's still
00:27:04.380 going on because
00:27:05.120 you don't think
00:27:05.580 this is going to
00:27:06.000 be a dozen years.
00:27:08.080 And look,
00:27:08.620 no matter what
00:27:09.080 happens in the
00:27:10.220 course of this
00:27:11.080 week,
00:27:11.680 I know that this
00:27:12.940 is going to go
00:27:13.480 one way or another
00:27:14.120 to the DC
00:27:14.640 Court of Appeals,
00:27:15.420 so that's going
00:27:16.000 to take another
00:27:16.840 year,
00:27:17.900 two years,
00:27:18.480 who knows,
00:27:19.000 and beyond that
00:27:19.660 maybe it goes
00:27:20.180 to the Supreme
00:27:20.760 Court.
00:27:21.460 I don't actually
00:27:22.700 know how the
00:27:23.140 American legal,
00:27:23.680 no one knows
00:27:24.160 how the American
00:27:24.640 legal system works.
00:27:25.520 They have all
00:27:25.800 these like
00:27:26.180 7th Circuit,
00:27:27.320 9th Circuit,
00:27:27.980 I don't know
00:27:28.580 how any of that
00:27:29.000 works,
00:27:29.260 but I know
00:27:29.860 that there is
00:27:30.260 a multi-level
00:27:30.880 process that's
00:27:31.620 going to be
00:27:31.900 appealed,
00:27:32.340 it's going to
00:27:32.660 be appealed
00:27:33.080 beyond that,
00:27:34.100 and at a
00:27:34.640 certain point
00:27:35.300 the only one
00:27:36.780 who comes out
00:27:37.480 the winner
00:27:37.860 is the lawyer.
00:27:40.220 I mentioned
00:27:40.740 with Salem,
00:27:41.920 I should point out,
00:27:42.980 Abraham Weiner.
00:27:44.160 He's an expert
00:27:45.100 witness,
00:27:45.480 expert witnesses
00:27:46.100 are compensated
00:27:47.280 very handily for
00:27:48.220 it.
00:27:48.360 He had testified
00:27:49.040 that he was
00:27:49.980 being paid
00:27:50.480 like $750
00:27:51.420 an hour
00:27:52.140 and had made
00:27:52.740 like $100,000
00:27:53.720 from this case,
00:27:57.040 and Michael
00:27:57.980 Mann's lawyer
00:27:58.480 was trying to
00:27:58.940 bring that up
00:27:59.520 to make him
00:28:00.560 look bad
00:28:01.020 in front of
00:28:01.380 the jury,
00:28:01.880 but if I
00:28:02.320 were him
00:28:02.560 I would have
00:28:02.900 just turned
00:28:03.220 back to the
00:28:03.660 lawyer and
00:28:04.040 said,
00:28:04.380 well how much
00:28:04.760 have you
00:28:05.000 made from
00:28:05.600 this case,
00:28:06.580 sir?
00:28:06.840 But then I
00:28:07.880 also would have
00:28:08.420 had one of
00:28:09.040 those motion
00:28:09.480 to strike,
00:28:10.160 and the jury
00:28:10.800 would have been
00:28:11.160 told to
00:28:11.480 disregard it,
00:28:12.260 and you can't
00:28:12.800 be too sassy
00:28:13.520 when you are
00:28:14.560 testifying in
00:28:15.540 court,
00:28:15.900 I've learned.
00:28:16.680 But in any
00:28:17.680 event,
00:28:18.060 it is Monday,
00:28:19.200 and what we do
00:28:19.600 every Monday
00:28:20.080 is we check in
00:28:20.860 with our good
00:28:21.500 friend Chris
00:28:22.180 Sims,
00:28:22.520 who is the
00:28:23.020 Alberta Director
00:28:23.840 for the
00:28:24.460 Canadian Taxpayers
00:28:25.360 Federation.
00:28:26.380 Chris,
00:28:26.620 good to have you
00:28:27.060 here,
00:28:27.240 thank you.
00:28:27.960 Thanks for
00:28:28.320 having us.
00:28:28.760 I mean,
00:28:29.800 the carbon tax,
00:28:30.580 you and I
00:28:30.880 have called it
00:28:31.460 tongue-in-cheek
00:28:32.240 the gift that
00:28:32.680 keeps on giving
00:28:33.300 because it just
00:28:33.960 keeps on giving
00:28:34.520 content,
00:28:35.300 but evidently our
00:28:36.640 content has been
00:28:37.320 working because the
00:28:38.240 Liberals are trying
00:28:39.440 to give it a
00:28:39.900 little refresh,
00:28:41.280 a little rebrand.
00:28:42.280 They're trying to
00:28:43.260 put lipstick on a
00:28:44.680 pig here.
00:28:45.700 What on earth is
00:28:46.540 happening?
00:28:47.560 It's pretty funny,
00:28:48.980 and your term has
00:28:50.720 been used a lot in
00:28:51.680 politics, and what I
00:28:52.780 love about this is
00:28:53.580 that it's been used a
00:28:54.420 lot with the carbon
00:28:55.140 tax.
00:28:55.560 In fact, it was
00:28:56.860 former Provincial
00:28:57.760 NDP leader in
00:28:59.060 British Columbia,
00:29:00.240 Carol James, who
00:29:01.640 called the notion of
00:29:03.220 a revenue-neutral
00:29:04.260 carbon tax
00:29:05.120 lipstick on a
00:29:06.440 pig.
00:29:07.200 This is way back in
00:29:08.060 the olden days,
00:29:08.960 Andrew, when the
00:29:09.780 NDP didn't like the
00:29:11.160 carbon tax.
00:29:12.040 I'm old enough to
00:29:13.040 remember that.
00:29:13.680 So it's really funny
00:29:14.940 to see this phrase
00:29:16.240 coming back to bite
00:29:17.100 them because that's
00:29:18.100 exactly what they're
00:29:18.760 trying to do.
00:29:19.600 This is how it
00:29:20.380 goes.
00:29:20.800 So Prime Minister
00:29:22.640 Justin Trudeau's
00:29:23.440 government has this
00:29:24.920 big honking
00:29:25.540 ugly carbon tax,
00:29:26.740 and he's
00:29:27.040 quadrupling the
00:29:27.840 thing within the
00:29:28.560 next seven years
00:29:29.400 or so.
00:29:31.100 We peasants,
00:29:32.120 though, Andrew,
00:29:33.140 are too stupid
00:29:34.620 to understand just
00:29:36.220 how wonderful and
00:29:37.200 beneficial this
00:29:38.240 carbon levy is.
00:29:40.120 And so in their
00:29:41.260 magnanimity, the
00:29:43.020 Trudeau government
00:29:43.920 has now decided to
00:29:45.100 go back to their
00:29:45.740 little whiteboard and
00:29:47.560 figure out a way to
00:29:48.620 rebrand the carbon
00:29:49.840 tax and especially
00:29:51.320 its heavenly
00:29:52.580 rebates.
00:29:53.400 So they're going to
00:29:54.440 try to figure out a
00:29:55.240 way to try to
00:29:56.020 bamboozle people.
00:29:57.420 I don't know what
00:29:58.000 they're going to
00:29:58.300 call the rebate now,
00:29:59.700 like super stardust
00:30:01.040 fancy rebate
00:30:02.060 something, double
00:30:03.540 plus good, who
00:30:04.520 knows.
00:30:05.200 So all this is to
00:30:06.120 say they're going to
00:30:06.720 be spending taxpayers'
00:30:07.980 money, probably
00:30:09.200 talking to a bunch of
00:30:10.240 consultants and
00:30:11.620 lobbyists to put
00:30:12.900 their heads together
00:30:13.660 how to resell the
00:30:15.840 carbon tax and the
00:30:17.160 rebates to Canadians.
00:30:18.340 When the facts are
00:30:20.220 the math speaks for
00:30:21.620 itself, the
00:30:22.700 parliamentary budget
00:30:23.540 officer has figured
00:30:25.000 out that the
00:30:25.800 average Canadian
00:30:27.200 family, especially
00:30:28.400 here in Alberta,
00:30:29.500 will be out more
00:30:31.400 than $900 this
00:30:34.200 year in 2024 with
00:30:36.860 the rebates factored
00:30:37.940 in.
00:30:38.220 That's net because
00:30:39.720 of the carbon tax.
00:30:40.640 So people aren't
00:30:42.020 dumb.
00:30:42.680 They know that this
00:30:43.720 is emptying their
00:30:44.400 wallets.
00:30:44.900 They know that this
00:30:45.780 is basically a tax on
00:30:46.900 everything, but the
00:30:48.080 Trudeau government is
00:30:49.080 undeterred.
00:30:50.500 They're going to try
00:30:51.280 to polish this one.
00:30:53.160 Yeah, and look, I
00:30:53.960 mean, sales,
00:30:55.920 marketing, advertising,
00:30:57.580 communications, all
00:30:58.600 of these have a place.
00:30:59.600 They're all valuable,
00:31:00.360 but the one thing you
00:31:01.980 should always do is a
00:31:03.120 bit of an introspection
00:31:04.200 activity whenever you
00:31:05.700 are thinking you need
00:31:06.480 a rebrand is wonder
00:31:08.080 whether people are
00:31:09.500 aware of the policy
00:31:10.940 and dislike it on its
00:31:12.520 merits.
00:31:13.860 And that's the thing
00:31:14.700 here.
00:31:14.960 I mean, it's one area
00:31:16.180 to say, OK, well,
00:31:17.520 people don't really
00:31:18.100 understand this, so
00:31:19.320 we're going to, you
00:31:20.060 know, sell it to them
00:31:20.940 so that they
00:31:21.420 understand it.
00:31:22.520 In this case, the
00:31:23.140 reason people don't
00:31:23.780 like it is because
00:31:24.780 they understand it,
00:31:26.000 because they see how
00:31:26.920 much it's costing
00:31:27.660 them.
00:31:28.240 So in that case, any
00:31:29.120 rebrand is just going
00:31:30.340 to be lying.
00:31:31.620 Yeah, exactly.
00:31:32.680 The call is coming
00:31:33.560 from inside the
00:31:34.300 house, folks.
00:31:35.560 This is the problem.
00:31:37.180 And it's one of these
00:31:38.220 things where you see
00:31:39.300 no matter which
00:31:40.060 government is in
00:31:40.960 power, which party
00:31:41.880 is in power, quite
00:31:43.100 often if they stay in
00:31:44.120 government this long,
00:31:45.240 they can just
00:31:46.420 really become
00:31:47.200 ensconced in their
00:31:48.100 bubble.
00:31:48.800 They become tone
00:31:49.520 deaf.
00:31:50.200 They stop listening
00:31:51.160 to what us average
00:31:52.540 worker drones are
00:31:53.680 doing and saying, and
00:31:55.140 they start believing
00:31:56.160 their own spin.
00:31:58.160 And this is exactly
00:31:58.980 what's happening in
00:31:59.820 Ottawa with this idea
00:32:01.140 of, oh, well, we just
00:32:02.500 need to explain it to
00:32:03.680 these dumb dumbs
00:32:04.380 better, and then they
00:32:05.540 will love us all
00:32:06.300 again.
00:32:06.800 It reminds me of that
00:32:07.720 meme that they use for
00:32:08.660 Principal Skinner all
00:32:09.500 the time from The
00:32:10.280 Simpsons.
00:32:10.880 It's like, you know,
00:32:11.460 am I wrong?
00:32:12.240 No, definitely it's the
00:32:13.320 children.
00:32:13.820 That's what we're
00:32:14.180 dealing with here.
00:32:15.300 Yeah, I wanted to
00:32:16.380 ask you about this
00:32:16.880 other thing.
00:32:17.340 I hadn't heard of
00:32:18.020 this until you
00:32:18.640 brought it up.
00:32:19.200 Something called a
00:32:19.800 wing night mutiny.
00:32:21.540 Now, I love wings.
00:32:22.960 I don't love mutiny as
00:32:24.180 much, but if there are
00:32:25.200 enough wings, I can
00:32:25.980 tolerate the mutiny.
00:32:26.880 What's the wing
00:32:27.380 night mutiny?
00:32:29.100 Yeah, I'm just, full
00:32:30.560 disclosure, a huge fan
00:32:32.040 of chicken wings
00:32:32.680 myself.
00:32:33.300 If you ever go to a
00:32:34.140 restaurant with me,
00:32:34.820 you'll wind up with
00:32:35.340 like this goblin pile of
00:32:36.760 bones in front of
00:32:37.540 me.
00:32:38.180 So I think this is
00:32:39.820 important.
00:32:40.340 So this is funny.
00:32:41.240 The city of
00:32:42.540 Calgary, following
00:32:43.820 suit with the city
00:32:44.560 of Edmonton, which
00:32:45.320 is much more
00:32:45.840 docile, except for
00:32:46.820 their hockey team.
00:32:47.860 The city of
00:32:48.500 Edmonton took this
00:32:49.480 lying down a few
00:32:50.440 months ago, but the
00:32:51.220 city of Calgary, boy,
00:32:52.360 they're not taking
00:32:52.960 this.
00:32:53.360 What this is, is
00:32:54.220 there's now a 15
00:32:56.320 cent mandatory tax
00:32:58.420 per paper bag.
00:32:59.900 There's a dollar
00:33:01.380 mandatory municipal
00:33:03.100 tax per reusable
00:33:04.560 bag.
00:33:05.040 Those ones that
00:33:05.660 fill up all of our
00:33:06.620 under-sink cabinets
00:33:07.500 and in our trunks.
00:33:09.020 The idea of plastic
00:33:10.420 single-use bags, like
00:33:11.420 that's right out,
00:33:12.440 right?
00:33:12.700 Because Prime
00:33:13.280 Minister Trudeau
00:33:13.800 banned those
00:33:14.380 things.
00:33:15.180 But here in
00:33:15.680 Calgary, it wasn't
00:33:17.040 just the bags.
00:33:18.320 They actually put
00:33:19.340 forward this new
00:33:20.260 law and enforced
00:33:21.740 it, saying you now
00:33:23.320 must beg slash
00:33:25.100 plead for a
00:33:26.480 napkin when you're
00:33:27.960 at a restaurant or
00:33:29.640 a wooden fork.
00:33:31.580 Please, Mayor
00:33:32.360 Gondek, may I have
00:33:33.340 a fork or utensil
00:33:34.360 to eat my meal?
00:33:36.020 So it's redonkulous
00:33:38.200 because this local
00:33:39.660 government is like,
00:33:40.460 we're going to save
00:33:41.060 the world by making
00:33:42.080 people ask for
00:33:42.980 napkins.
00:33:43.900 And so Premier
00:33:44.580 Daniel Smith had a
00:33:45.600 really funny line.
00:33:46.740 She said, yeah,
00:33:47.560 this almost caused
00:33:48.700 a wing night mutiny.
00:33:51.120 So we're picturing
00:33:52.660 people just revolting
00:33:54.220 in pubs across
00:33:55.280 Canada and like
00:33:56.200 flinging their
00:33:57.000 chicken wings at
00:33:57.920 people.
00:33:58.640 I don't know if
00:33:59.440 that happened.
00:34:00.040 I have not yet
00:34:00.560 heard reports, but
00:34:01.300 wing night mutiny
00:34:02.300 became a thing.
00:34:03.940 And that actually
00:34:04.560 helped energize
00:34:05.740 local politicians.
00:34:07.200 Some of the city
00:34:07.880 councillors on
00:34:08.780 Calgary City Hall,
00:34:09.940 it kind of gave
00:34:10.980 them the courage
00:34:12.220 to speak up and
00:34:13.380 to say, you know
00:34:13.900 what, this is stupid.
00:34:15.060 We shouldn't have
00:34:15.600 a 15 cent bag tax
00:34:17.040 and it's going to
00:34:17.460 be 25 cents next
00:34:18.500 year.
00:34:18.860 And we shouldn't
00:34:19.520 be nuisancing
00:34:21.120 people to death on
00:34:22.180 things like forks
00:34:23.220 and napkins.
00:34:24.100 For goodness sake,
00:34:24.800 stick to your
00:34:25.240 knitting, City Hall.
00:34:26.340 So this really
00:34:27.060 gave city
00:34:28.540 councillors around
00:34:29.700 Calgary City Hall
00:34:30.600 table the courage
00:34:32.200 to speak up and
00:34:33.220 to say, you know
00:34:33.720 what, we shouldn't
00:34:34.860 be nickel and
00:34:35.500 diming people to
00:34:36.220 death with nuisance
00:34:37.120 taxes, like dumb
00:34:38.100 things like these
00:34:38.840 bag taxes.
00:34:39.460 And we certainly
00:34:40.780 shouldn't, as
00:34:41.800 mayor, be telling
00:34:43.300 people whether or not
00:34:44.440 they can have
00:34:44.860 napkins.
00:34:45.480 Like, that's so
00:34:46.240 dumb.
00:34:46.940 And so what's really
00:34:48.320 interesting here is
00:34:49.520 that now this could
00:34:50.980 cascade into Edmonton.
00:34:52.660 The folks of Edmonton
00:34:53.920 might now find their
00:34:54.960 voice because the
00:34:55.880 people of Calgary
00:34:56.640 have spoken up.
00:34:57.620 But it's not over
00:34:58.340 yet.
00:34:59.060 In Calgary, they
00:34:59.780 still need to email
00:35:00.680 their councillors.
00:35:01.520 They still need to
00:35:02.260 phone the mayor's
00:35:03.000 office.
00:35:04.120 See, stuff like this
00:35:05.280 though is infuriating
00:35:06.520 for, not just because
00:35:07.480 I too like chicken
00:35:08.580 wings, but because
00:35:10.300 it's the kind of thing
00:35:12.420 that people pretend
00:35:13.620 is little and people
00:35:15.120 pretend is small.
00:35:15.820 They say, oh, what's
00:35:16.360 the big deal?
00:35:16.840 They still have
00:35:17.500 napkins, you just
00:35:18.460 have to ask for them.
00:35:19.480 But it really speaks
00:35:21.220 to an attitude issue
00:35:22.460 here because when
00:35:23.180 government is regulating
00:35:24.300 things so small and so
00:35:26.480 seemingly insignificant,
00:35:27.980 it's licensing government
00:35:29.220 to regulate the big
00:35:30.280 things, to regulate the
00:35:31.220 giant things.
00:35:31.960 And at a certain point,
00:35:33.360 it's going to be where
00:35:34.780 I, literally, this would
00:35:36.020 not be far off to
00:35:36.860 believe where governments
00:35:37.640 mandate cloth napkins.
00:35:39.400 Yep.
00:35:39.600 Where governments mandate
00:35:40.740 cloth napkins and all of
00:35:41.920 a sudden your crappy
00:35:42.740 hole in the wall diner
00:35:43.680 has to have linen like
00:35:44.760 it's a, you know, a
00:35:45.500 Michelin star restaurant
00:35:46.440 or whatever because that's
00:35:48.080 what the government has
00:35:49.060 decreed.
00:35:49.880 And that's, I think,
00:35:51.080 the problem here is that
00:35:52.060 when you license government
00:35:53.440 to encroach on something
00:35:54.720 like this, you're giving
00:35:56.600 it a power that will
00:35:57.960 only expand and balloon
00:35:59.300 just like the carbon tax
00:36:00.640 has increased and
00:36:01.800 ballooned.
00:36:02.760 Yes, exactly.
00:36:03.520 The carbon tax started
00:36:04.780 at, oh, it's only, you
00:36:05.940 know, it's only $10 per
00:36:07.760 tonne.
00:36:08.180 Well, it's going to be
00:36:08.940 $170 per tonne pretty
00:36:10.800 soon, folks.
00:36:11.560 It used to cost you about
00:36:12.800 50 cents in the carbon
00:36:13.900 tax.
00:36:14.600 Pretty soon it's going to
00:36:15.300 be costing you $20 every
00:36:17.480 single time you fill up
00:36:18.380 with the carbon tax.
00:36:19.320 And you really nailed,
00:36:20.700 nailed it here, Andrew,
00:36:21.740 because we can even give
00:36:23.000 you an example of how
00:36:24.560 quickly this can escalate.
00:36:26.360 So in Vancouver, the city
00:36:28.600 of Vancouver, they still
00:36:29.660 have their bag tax.
00:36:30.900 Yes, but they did have to
00:36:33.020 climb down on this weird
00:36:34.540 cup tax.
00:36:36.320 I don't know if you heard
00:36:37.060 about this, but I was
00:36:38.500 living next to Vancouver
00:36:39.820 when this all happened.
00:36:40.760 So it was pretty crazy.
00:36:41.820 So the city of Vancouver,
00:36:43.960 along with their bag fee,
00:36:45.420 also imposed this weird
00:36:46.820 cup tax so that every
00:36:48.300 single time you went to
00:36:49.400 a coffee shop or a gas
00:36:50.660 station or some mom and
00:36:51.720 pop corner store and you
00:36:53.560 dared use a disposable
00:36:55.220 paper cup, they were
00:36:56.900 charging you an extra 25
00:36:58.620 cents.
00:36:59.900 Where did that quarter go?
00:37:01.840 It didn't go to the city.
00:37:03.680 So where was it going?
00:37:05.120 I phoned them and asked
00:37:06.680 them.
00:37:07.440 This was the plan.
00:37:08.480 They wanted to force all
00:37:10.680 of these stores to collect
00:37:12.640 these quarters, save them
00:37:14.560 all up because in the very
00:37:16.460 near future, the city of
00:37:18.160 Vancouver was going to ban
00:37:20.060 all disposable or single
00:37:22.700 use cups.
00:37:23.700 Every single one of them
00:37:24.820 would not be allowed within
00:37:26.340 the city limits.
00:37:27.440 How are we to drink coffee,
00:37:28.640 you ask?
00:37:29.780 They actually wanted to force
00:37:32.020 Vancouverites to share a
00:37:34.580 communal pool of cups.
00:37:38.480 I'm not kidding.
00:37:39.820 And the money that these
00:37:41.460 businesses were being
00:37:42.360 forced to collect was
00:37:43.880 supposed to go to a
00:37:45.240 dishwasher so that now
00:37:47.240 these businesses would be
00:37:48.520 responsible for washing
00:37:50.440 everybody's cup that has
00:37:52.220 been, you know, in their
00:37:53.100 backpack on SkyTrain for a
00:37:54.620 week or under their truck
00:37:55.900 seat or whatever.
00:37:57.300 Just imagine.
00:37:58.460 Imagine hundreds of
00:37:59.700 thousands of people being
00:38:01.240 forced, adults, to force
00:38:03.040 to share this group of
00:38:04.680 cups.
00:38:05.140 It was so weird that they
00:38:07.120 actually had to back down.
00:38:09.120 But again, this is what
00:38:09.940 happens when you give them
00:38:10.880 that inch.
00:38:12.320 Yeah.
00:38:12.860 No, very well said.
00:38:13.880 It'd be like the Stanley Cup
00:38:14.920 craze in the, I think it's
00:38:16.320 mostly in the US now.
00:38:17.400 Those like, I don't even get
00:38:19.200 the Stanley Cup craze.
00:38:20.200 It's not even a hockey thing.
00:38:21.280 It's like some, there's some
00:38:22.280 like weird, like reusable cup
00:38:24.640 that everyone is like going
00:38:27.220 crazy over.
00:38:27.860 And it's like, it's just a
00:38:28.700 reusable mug.
00:38:29.700 So I don't know.
00:38:30.480 Stanley, actually there's a
00:38:31.640 Stanley Park in BC, isn't
00:38:32.880 there?
00:38:33.000 It's the Stanley Park cups
00:38:34.060 we'll say.
00:38:34.700 Yes.
00:38:34.960 I would like to think that
00:38:36.000 or I'd like to think it's a
00:38:36.740 hockey thing.
00:38:37.200 But what's really funny is
00:38:38.200 that in actual fact, like
00:38:40.420 Stanley, the company's been
00:38:41.680 around forever.
00:38:42.280 It's like thermos, right?
00:38:43.880 It's almost become synonymous
00:38:45.000 with something that keeps
00:38:45.980 your coffee hot.
00:38:47.880 And like working men at
00:38:49.960 like construction sites have
00:38:51.180 had these things in their
00:38:52.100 trucks forever.
00:38:52.940 But for some reason, these
00:38:54.540 big pink ones took off.
00:38:56.860 I don't know.
00:38:57.840 You know what?
00:38:58.720 The Liberal government should
00:38:59.940 hire the Stanley marketing
00:39:01.200 team to do their carbon tax
00:39:02.640 rebrand because clearly
00:39:05.160 they've managed to to do
00:39:07.320 something pretty good on
00:39:08.200 their own rebrand over at
00:39:09.400 Stanley.
00:39:09.560 It looks like a shade of
00:39:10.920 lipstick.
00:39:11.820 Yeah, there you go.
00:39:14.100 All right.
00:39:15.160 Chris Sims, we will talk to
00:39:16.400 you next Monday.
00:39:16.920 Always a pleasure.
00:39:17.760 Thank you so much for coming
00:39:18.620 on.
00:39:19.380 Thank you.
00:39:20.560 All right.
00:39:21.200 That was the lovely and
00:39:23.120 wonderful Chris Sims.
00:39:25.160 Just keeping with the
00:39:26.000 carbon tax theme here,
00:39:27.020 you'll no doubt be aware by
00:39:28.280 now we are on this show
00:39:29.940 doing a new series called
00:39:31.000 Unjust Transition.
00:39:32.720 We are talking about the
00:39:34.480 Liberal government's so-called
00:39:36.040 just transition and how it is
00:39:37.640 in fact a war on the oil and
00:39:39.260 gas sector.
00:39:39.880 We've been doing this by
00:39:40.560 sitting down with oil and
00:39:42.160 gas CEO and a mining guy
00:39:43.940 too.
00:39:44.220 We have the token miner,
00:39:45.780 but mostly oil and gas CEOs
00:39:47.680 talking about what their
00:39:48.640 industry is doing, what they
00:39:49.700 are doing and what they wish
00:39:51.380 the government and Canadians
00:39:52.680 would know about.
00:39:53.760 So today I wanted to turn to
00:39:55.180 Ron Gusick, who is the
00:39:57.600 president of Liberty Energy.
00:39:59.380 And I should say I was a bit
00:40:01.100 sick or coming off of a bit
00:40:03.220 of a prolonged illness when
00:40:04.240 we did these interviews.
00:40:05.640 So the audio was a little
00:40:07.160 and the audio, there's also
00:40:08.020 an audio issue.
00:40:08.720 So when I was listening to it,
00:40:09.580 I didn't know if it was the
00:40:10.300 audio issue or just my own
00:40:11.380 obnoxious grading post
00:40:13.200 illness voice or a bit of
00:40:14.440 both.
00:40:14.700 So nevertheless, this was my
00:40:16.560 interview with Ron Gusick.
00:40:18.220 I'm joined by Ron Gusick of
00:40:33.980 Liberty Energy, president of
00:40:35.940 that company.
00:40:36.480 Just before we get into some
00:40:38.300 of the policy aspects here,
00:40:39.620 what does your company do?
00:40:41.400 So Liberty is a North America
00:40:43.060 wide oil field services company
00:40:44.620 primarily focused on hydraulic
00:40:46.140 fracturing.
00:40:46.820 So wireline services,
00:40:48.920 hydraulic fracturing being our
00:40:50.060 core business, also in the
00:40:52.300 space around mobile power
00:40:53.800 generation and supplying
00:40:55.320 natural gas to run that
00:40:57.120 power generation as well.
00:40:59.080 So for, I mean, you're
00:41:00.860 connected to a lot of the
00:41:01.920 other players in this.
00:41:03.140 You're servicing a lot of
00:41:04.700 them.
00:41:05.080 And what have you seen just
00:41:06.660 in the last decade as far as
00:41:08.380 trends in the industry goes?
00:41:09.800 And I'd say overall optimism
00:41:11.400 and confidence in the industry.
00:41:12.700 Yeah, a lot to unpack in that
00:41:15.120 question.
00:41:16.000 Certainly been a real
00:41:17.840 migration in terms of where
00:41:20.140 the industry has been focused
00:41:21.260 and maybe it's a little bit
00:41:22.440 more than a decade, but
00:41:23.440 certainly in about that
00:41:25.060 timeframe, you've seen this
00:41:26.120 real transition into
00:41:27.160 development of unconventional
00:41:28.820 resources.
00:41:29.380 We've gone from, you know,
00:41:30.880 where I started in my career
00:41:32.380 25 years ago, a very
00:41:33.780 conventional world of
00:41:34.820 vertical wells, a lot of
00:41:36.700 them to access the reservoir
00:41:38.040 to these extended reach
00:41:40.040 horizontal wells with hydraulic
00:41:41.460 fracturing in them.
00:41:42.800 And we can produce a massive
00:41:44.160 amount of resource from a
00:41:45.440 very small footprint on
00:41:46.680 surface enabled by really
00:41:48.260 two technologies, horizontal
00:41:49.460 drilling and, and hydraulic
00:41:51.560 fracturing of that.
00:41:52.560 We've seen the completion
00:41:53.660 evolve a fair bit there.
00:41:55.480 We've seen the technology on
00:41:57.200 surface that enables that
00:41:58.940 evolve a fair bit.
00:42:00.080 Lots of moving pieces there.
00:42:02.560 There's obviously been a fair
00:42:03.660 bit of innovation in this
00:42:05.180 industry, just from a
00:42:06.300 technological perspective
00:42:07.440 alone.
00:42:07.940 How much of that has really
00:42:09.100 come from Canada and
00:42:10.260 Canadian enterprise?
00:42:11.880 Certainly a lot of great
00:42:12.900 things have happened here.
00:42:13.840 Canada has been at the tip
00:42:14.680 of the spear, I think, from,
00:42:16.100 from a development
00:42:17.460 standpoint with regards to
00:42:19.440 technology for decades in
00:42:21.420 the oil and gas space.
00:42:22.840 I think we hold ourselves to a
00:42:24.540 very high standard in Canada.
00:42:25.940 We, we are leaders in, I
00:42:28.500 would say the regulatory
00:42:29.720 environment around how we
00:42:31.440 produce oil and gas.
00:42:32.420 I think we have a, a great
00:42:34.900 suite of responsible producers
00:42:36.340 here who strive to be the best
00:42:38.380 at what they do.
00:42:39.520 And as a result, that means
00:42:40.740 we've always been at the, at
00:42:42.000 the tipping, at the tip of the
00:42:43.440 spear with regards to the
00:42:44.660 technology we use to do that.
00:42:46.220 And so I think Canada should be
00:42:47.680 proud of themselves in that,
00:42:48.700 whether it's, you know,
00:42:49.780 unconventional gas development
00:42:50.980 or heavy oil development,
00:42:52.120 but across that whole suite, I
00:42:53.420 think we've got a lot to be
00:42:54.440 proud of.
00:42:55.040 And your company has, you
00:42:56.220 said well over 5,000 employees
00:42:58.460 it is, right?
00:42:59.140 What's the, I mean, what's the
00:43:00.260 profile of that, of those
00:43:01.740 employees?
00:43:02.140 So the vast majority of those
00:43:04.220 people are out in the field
00:43:05.400 working 24 hours a day, 365 days
00:43:08.400 a year to provide services to
00:43:09.920 E&P companies.
00:43:11.480 You know, if you thought about
00:43:12.640 our employee base, I guess 90% of
00:43:15.700 them are out at the tip of the
00:43:16.900 spear providing that level of
00:43:19.200 service every day.
00:43:20.080 And so when you think about that
00:43:21.840 kind of work, like these are
00:43:22.920 people who are outside either day
00:43:25.980 shift or night shift.
00:43:26.760 So 12 hours at a time, whatever
00:43:28.280 the weather might be, it doesn't
00:43:29.440 matter if it's minus 40 or plus
00:43:31.520 45 outside, they're outside
00:43:33.840 working on a well site to bring
00:43:37.140 energy to us.
00:43:37.960 So when you hear the government
00:43:39.940 and a lot of, you know, NGOs use
00:43:42.600 language like the just
00:43:43.660 transitioners, the so-called just
00:43:45.220 transitioners I've been talking
00:43:46.340 about, this idea of moving the
00:43:48.460 economy and the workforce to what
00:43:50.240 they call low carbon, they're
00:43:52.200 talking about those people.
00:43:53.380 They're talking about those people
00:43:54.640 and those jobs and a future where
00:43:56.600 those jobs don't exist.
00:43:57.780 So how does that weigh on you as
00:43:59.920 the president of a company in this
00:44:01.260 space that has to plan for the
00:44:02.640 future?
00:44:04.000 Yeah, that's a tough one for me to
00:44:05.920 think about.
00:44:06.660 First of all, because I disagree
00:44:08.220 with the premise.
00:44:09.360 You know, I certainly expect that
00:44:10.640 we're going to be using oil and
00:44:11.780 gas for decades to come yet.
00:44:13.400 And I think there's a lot of great
00:44:14.460 data to support that.
00:44:16.120 But I also think about it just in
00:44:18.260 terms of what opportunity we
00:44:20.460 provide to those people.
00:44:22.000 You know, the vast majority of the
00:44:23.260 people who work in our company, who
00:44:24.540 work out there at the tip of the
00:44:25.580 spear, they're high school
00:44:26.800 graduates.
00:44:27.500 Some of them have some specialized
00:44:28.680 expertise, maybe an electronics
00:44:30.560 technician, maybe a mechanic,
00:44:32.460 something like that.
00:44:34.220 But a lot of them just a high
00:44:35.660 school diploma.
00:44:36.540 And we've offered them an
00:44:38.280 opportunity to live a life that
00:44:40.540 they might not otherwise have
00:44:42.040 expected to.
00:44:42.940 We just finished filming a video
00:44:44.700 actually called A Day in the
00:44:45.740 Life.
00:44:46.120 And it's just a bit of a purview
00:44:47.960 around what it looks like to work
00:44:49.740 in the industry.
00:44:50.720 And there are some heartwarming
00:44:52.300 stories in that of people whose life
00:44:54.460 looks so much different than they
00:44:55.760 anticipated it might have been
00:44:57.140 because of a job in oil and gas.
00:44:59.440 Our employees work two weeks on,
00:45:01.040 two weeks off in the field.
00:45:02.020 So they work 26 weeks of the year
00:45:03.740 and they will earn, you know, once
00:45:05.920 they get to a supervisory level,
00:45:07.240 certainly a six-figure income.
00:45:09.700 That's not something you find
00:45:11.340 easily.
00:45:11.920 And it's a life-changing experience
00:45:13.600 for these people.
00:45:14.220 I don't think that's easily
00:45:15.240 replaced.
00:45:15.760 And so I have a really hard time
00:45:17.460 with this idea of a just
00:45:18.460 transition.
00:45:19.300 Well, and I'm glad you brought it
00:45:20.400 up that way.
00:45:20.860 Now, I mean, critics of that
00:45:22.400 position would say that, well,
00:45:23.800 you know, we, you know, the jobs
00:45:25.060 can be transitioned and they'll be
00:45:26.320 moved away or whenever.
00:45:27.340 But I think you have to go back
00:45:28.780 to the first principle and the
00:45:30.080 very premise on which that rests.
00:45:31.780 And that premise is based on,
00:45:33.840 I would say, a very misinformed or
00:45:35.820 ill-informed view of what the
00:45:37.360 sector is and how a lot of these
00:45:39.700 innovations that we were talking
00:45:40.880 about are really achieving from the
00:45:42.480 industry's perspective, the stated
00:45:44.800 goals from the government's
00:45:46.360 perspective.
00:45:46.800 So explain how that is.
00:45:48.380 Yeah, I, you know, certainly I, I,
00:45:51.260 I think we have an incredibly
00:45:52.380 innovative industry and, and I,
00:45:54.840 you know, the way I like to think
00:45:56.120 about it is the oil and gas industry
00:45:57.780 delivers a dollar's worth of
00:45:59.320 benefit and we do a nickel or
00:46:00.780 dime's worth of damage along the
00:46:02.660 way.
00:46:03.040 And so if you're always prepared to
00:46:05.120 contemplate the trade-offs, but
00:46:07.040 honestly weigh the pros and cons,
00:46:08.900 you come out in favor of oil and
00:46:10.320 gas each and every time.
00:46:11.460 And so that's important for me to
00:46:13.060 remind our employees about, I want
00:46:14.520 them to get out of bed each and
00:46:15.740 every day, excited about what they
00:46:17.080 do and proud about what they go
00:46:18.320 to work doing.
00:46:19.560 And so that's part of our mandate
00:46:21.240 to them is to help them understand
00:46:22.660 that, that what they do for the
00:46:24.140 world is, is quite literally
00:46:25.580 life-changing.
00:46:26.840 And, um, but the, at the same
00:46:29.920 point in time, we have that
00:46:31.240 nickel or dies worth of damage and
00:46:32.640 it's incumbent upon us as a
00:46:33.860 company to do everything we can to
00:46:35.380 minimize that.
00:46:36.160 And not just us as a company, but
00:46:37.660 us as a broader industry.
00:46:39.020 And it's, so we count on our
00:46:40.720 employees on that, that team of
00:46:42.240 people out there to find ways to
00:46:44.060 innovate, to move the ball
00:46:45.440 forward, to make sure that the
00:46:47.260 next molecule of gas we produce is,
00:46:49.600 is done a little more responsibly
00:46:51.000 than the previous molecule of gas
00:46:52.640 we produce.
00:46:53.360 And, and I think you can see, uh, a
00:46:56.500 continued stream of evidence around
00:46:58.220 technological advancements that
00:46:59.720 demonstrate we've done exactly that
00:47:01.240 as an industry.
00:47:01.840 Well, and to take that metaphor a
00:47:03.440 little bit further, if, if we
00:47:04.640 accept, which I think there's ample
00:47:06.340 reason to, that the demand exists and
00:47:08.380 that the demand is not going
00:47:09.480 anywhere, someone has to provide that
00:47:12.320 supply.
00:47:13.200 And I don't think anyone could argue
00:47:14.720 that the nickel or dime's worth of
00:47:16.680 damage that you say that may exist in
00:47:18.440 a Canadian context from Canadian
00:47:19.820 companies is going to be anything but
00:47:23.080 dwarfed by what other suppliers will
00:47:25.220 do.
00:47:25.560 And, you know, maybe it's a quarter's
00:47:26.800 worth of damage somewhere else or 50
00:47:28.700 cents.
00:47:29.120 So, and that's the fundamental reality
00:47:30.720 here is that it's a much safer bet to
00:47:32.800 invest and rely on Canadian energy.
00:47:35.700 Yeah.
00:47:36.000 I think that's a great way to think
00:47:37.420 about it.
00:47:37.820 If, you know, we often view things
00:47:39.860 through the lens of a billion people
00:47:41.340 who live the way that you and I enjoy
00:47:43.580 our life.
00:47:44.340 And, and that's unfortunate because
00:47:45.980 there are 7 billion people who don't.
00:47:48.180 And so the very simple math that I like
00:47:50.080 to think about when we have this
00:47:51.860 conversation around the demand for
00:47:53.500 energy is, look, we have a billion
00:47:55.320 people who averaged across them.
00:47:57.220 So this is North America, Western
00:47:58.920 Europe, uh, Japan,
00:48:00.720 South Korea, Australia, New Zealand,
00:48:02.640 those people on average use 13 barrels
00:48:06.000 of oil per person per year.
00:48:09.060 So we have a billion who live in that
00:48:10.840 world.
00:48:11.260 We have 7 billion people who averaged
00:48:13.220 across all of them have access to, or
00:48:15.220 use three barrels of oil per person per
00:48:17.820 year.
00:48:18.380 And so if you think about this idea that
00:48:20.520 even if we reduced our consumption by
00:48:23.120 three barrels of oil per person per year,
00:48:24.800 and they raise their consumption by three
00:48:27.080 barrels of oil per person per year, demand
00:48:29.180 is growing massively over the coming
00:48:31.500 decades.
00:48:32.460 And, and so if we accept that that's a
00:48:35.260 reasonable premise, that there's going to
00:48:36.720 be a massive, uh, growth and demand for
00:48:39.600 energy such that everybody in the world
00:48:41.800 has access to the type of life or
00:48:43.520 something closer to the life that you and
00:48:45.100 I enjoy, then the question becomes, where
00:48:47.420 should that energy come from?
00:48:48.960 And we're a hundred percent behind the
00:48:50.800 idea, uh, exactly as you espoused is that
00:48:53.300 if it's going to come from someplace, it
00:48:55.460 should come from Canada.
00:48:56.660 We produce, we produce the lowest impact
00:49:00.020 molecule of gas or barrel of oil that can
00:49:02.240 be found anywhere in the world and do so
00:49:04.220 incredibly responsibly.
00:49:05.620 And we have an immense amount of people
00:49:07.280 who benefit from that, both directly in the
00:49:09.100 industry and economically in the country.
00:49:11.320 And so why would we choose to do it any
00:49:13.860 place else?
00:49:15.000 Yeah, that's, that's not even a
00:49:16.220 nationalistic argument.
00:49:17.380 It's, it's an environmental argument.
00:49:18.900 It's an economic argument.
00:49:19.920 It's all of that.
00:49:20.640 Well, a fascinating subject.
00:49:22.320 Your perspective on that, I think, puts
00:49:23.760 it into context for a lot of people.
00:49:25.980 Rod Gusick of Liberty Energy.
00:49:27.580 Thank you very much.
00:49:28.500 My pleasure.
00:49:29.020 Thanks very much.
00:49:30.780 If you want to support the work we're
00:49:32.140 doing, you can do so at donate.tnc.news.
00:49:34.920 And we're so grateful to all of you for
00:49:36.700 your support.
00:49:37.780 Uh, the fun continues tomorrow and the
00:49:39.640 rest of the week here on the Andrew
00:49:41.000 Lawton Show at True North.
00:49:42.420 Thank you.
00:49:42.920 God bless and good day to you all.
00:49:45.300 Thanks for listening to the Andrew Lawton
00:49:46.800 Show.
00:49:47.540 Support the program by donating to True
00:49:49.360 North at www.tnc.news.