Juno News - Fighting mandatory vaccines needs to be an election issue

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.

00:00:06.760 This is The Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:12.580 Coming up, two high-profile disqualifications by the Conservative Party,

00:00:17.040 making the election about the issues that matter, and the latest on vaccine passports.

00:00:23.480 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.

00:00:27.020 Hello and welcome to another edition of Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show,

00:00:34.560 Friday, August 13th, 2021.

00:00:37.560 Friday the 13th, we'll try not to get too spooky on you.

00:00:41.120 The prospects of a Justin Trudeau majority government might be terrifying enough

00:00:46.300 as we head into what is supposed to be an election starting on Sunday.

00:00:52.260 So we've been talking about this, I know, and the horse race stuff can get a bit boring,

00:00:56.220 but it seems like now we know pretty definitively that the election is going to be called on Sunday

00:01:01.880 and all of the politicians will be off to the races with an election to be held on September 20th.

00:01:08.440 And we've got some great stuff planned at True North on how we're going to cover that election.

00:01:13.700 You may remember I had a bit of a rough go in 2019 following around the Liberal campaign bus.

00:01:19.760 We're not going to do a repeat of that, but we are going to do lots of on-the-ground coverage,

00:01:23.720 talking about the stories the mainstream media is ignoring or is butchering.

00:01:29.060 And that's going to be something where, I mean, I've got to get packed.

00:01:31.500 I'm headed to Ottawa on Sunday for the election call.

00:01:34.640 And we've got at True North Sunday evening an election kickoff show, which you won't want to miss.

00:01:39.960 That'll be lots of fun.

00:01:41.120 My friend and colleague Candace Malcolm is going to be hosting that.

00:01:44.960 But there's already lots of news being made by it.

00:01:47.820 Now, if you look around, a lot of ridings do not have candidates still,

00:01:51.420 in the Liberals, the Conservatives.

00:01:53.280 Now, I mean, the Liberals have known this is coming.

00:01:55.940 They've known their plan.

00:01:57.060 So they've got no excuse to be so disorganized.

00:02:00.660 But even Conservatives are trying to scramble to get candidates nominated.

00:02:04.620 And even once they're nominated, that is not a guarantee that they're going to remain on the ballot.

00:02:10.840 I want to talk about a couple of examples here that are really

00:02:14.200 raising a lot of concerns from Conservatives in Canada.

00:02:18.440 One is a story I broke just last night.

00:02:21.080 Pierre Lemieux, who was formerly the three-term MP for Glengarry Prescott Russell,

00:02:27.060 applied to run again in this upcoming election in January.

00:02:31.480 He submitted his nomination paperwork.

00:02:33.660 He said, listen, I've represented this riding three times.

00:02:36.560 I want another go at it.

00:02:38.160 And only last week, the party told him, no, you cannot run.

00:02:42.980 They rejected his application seven months after he put it in and told him no.

00:02:47.940 And now they've appointed someone.

00:02:49.380 I don't even know who it is.

00:02:50.280 It's not on their website.

00:02:52.380 Now, this is where it gets interesting.

00:02:54.060 So Pierre Lemieux was also a leadership candidate in 2017.

00:02:58.500 Very prominent Social Conservative MP.

00:03:01.240 He was appealing to Social Conservatives when he ran for the leadership.

00:03:04.960 He didn't do too, too well.

00:03:06.100 He came in seventh out of the 13 or 14 candidates with 7.6-something percent of the points in the race.

00:03:13.440 But nonetheless, a significant member of Stephen Harper's Conservative government, of the Conservative movement in Canada, and now persona non grata as a candidate.

00:03:24.560 Here's what happened.

00:03:25.880 The party cited the rules.

00:03:28.500 And the party is accurate to point to the rule that they were using to justify denying Pierre Lemieux the right to run.

00:03:35.820 A spokesperson said to me in an email, in accordance with our nomination rules, an applicant must not have been an unsuccessful candidate in both of the two prior federal general elections.

00:03:47.000 And if you look at the nomination rules, that's valid.

00:03:50.160 You can't lose two times in a row and then run a third time.

00:03:54.040 So Pierre Lemieux, he lost in 2015.

00:03:56.240 He ran again in 2019, was also unsuccessful.

00:03:59.560 And now he wanted a third kick at the can.

00:04:02.980 Here's the thing, though.

00:04:04.900 The rules also allow a candidate to get a waiver, which, at the risk of getting too in the weeds on this, basically allows the party to say, you know what, we're going to let you run again anyway.

00:04:17.000 And the reasons they would do this would be, for example, in the case of someone like Pierre Lemieux, who's a former three-time MP, someone who has name recognition, who has an organization, and someone who could bring that riding back into play.

00:04:31.060 Glengarry Prescott Russell had not been conservative for 60 years when he won with a margin of just over 200 votes in 2006.

00:04:40.700 And then he increased that margin over the next two elections by the thousands.

00:04:45.000 So for all the people saying, well, rules are rules, just take a look at Richmond Hill.

00:04:50.300 When another former MP, Costas Menegakis, who lost in 2015, lost again in 2019, is somehow magically on the ballot in 2021.

00:05:02.560 One can only assume that he received this waiver, which Pierre Lemieux was denied.

00:05:08.140 So it's not even like the rule is being evenly enforced in the same election in the exact same circumstances.

00:05:15.960 A candidate that was an MP in the Harper years, lost in 2015 and 2019, and wants to run again.

00:05:22.780 They're saying yes to Costas Menegakis and no to Pierre Lemieux.

00:05:26.960 And I don't know the reason.

00:05:28.780 That line I shared from the Conservative Party of Canada is the only official corroboration I've gotten.

00:05:34.480 He is a social conservative.

00:05:36.320 A lot of people are getting very frustrated with what they feel as a social conservative purge.

00:05:42.880 There have been a number of candidates, a number of candidates going back months that I've spoken to,

00:05:48.220 who have not been allowed to run because of their social conservatism.

00:05:52.020 You had also this week a very popular candidate in UConn, a seat that could be in play for the Conservatives.

00:05:59.760 Jonas Smith disqualified after he was given the nomination.

00:06:04.180 So he was the nominee.

00:06:05.560 He was acclaimed, I think, a couple of months ago.

00:06:07.740 And now the party has scrapped it.

00:06:10.780 And the rationale in an email they gave is for unwillingness to support public health guidelines.

00:06:19.820 Unwillingness to support public health guidelines.

00:06:22.020 Now, Jonas Smith says this is because he's against mandatory vaccinations in workplaces.

00:06:26.960 He's against vaccine passports.

00:06:29.740 Basically, he's against the coercive measures that a lot of people are pushing when it comes to vaccination.

00:06:36.520 And the Conservative Party has said, yeah, your unwillingness to support public health measures means you don't get to be a candidate in the Conservative Party.

00:06:44.180 Now, I haven't heard the Conservative Party side of the story here.

00:06:48.020 It could be there's more to it.

00:06:49.580 But the reality is stuff like this does not reflect well on a party that wants to be viewed as a serious alternative to Justin Trudeau's government.

00:06:59.120 And whenever I talk about stories like this, I always get response from, I mean, I get two camps.

00:07:04.840 I get PPC people that say, well, are you surprised the Conservatives are corrupt?

00:07:09.020 And then I get Conservatives who know it's wrong, who know it's wrong, who say, yeah, yeah.

00:07:13.980 I mean, but again, do you want to give Trudeau a win?

00:07:15.720 We can't air our dirty laundry.

00:07:17.340 I don't have a team.

00:07:19.120 I'm here to support the facts.

00:07:21.020 I'm here to support truth, and I'm here to speak out on issues that matter.

00:07:25.060 And if Conservatives don't like the dirty laundry being aired, stop dirtying so much laundry.

00:07:32.020 Stop treating people that have been longtime stalwarts of the Conservative Party and the Conservative movement like this,

00:07:38.120 because you don't just alienate them.

00:07:40.000 You alienate all of the people who go along with them, who've supported them, who now say, well, I guess if there's no place in the party for Derek Sloan or Jonas Smith or for Pierre Lemieux, I guess there's no place in the party for me.

00:07:55.360 And eventually you start chipping away more and more at your coalition, and you don't have volunteers left, you don't have donors left, and at a certain point you don't even have voters left.

00:08:05.780 So I know the mainstream media is certainly going to be covering Conservative infighting.

00:08:11.020 They love doing it.

00:08:12.580 But I'm not going to avoid pointing out these things, because I don't think the Conservative Party should be allowed to make these sorts of decisions with impunity.

00:08:21.000 If we're going to play the well rules are rules card, and we don't allow people with two subsequent defeats to run again, great.

00:08:27.520 Enforce that evenly.

00:08:28.540 But when you start picking and choosing who it is that rule applies to, it becomes very easy for people to start raising questions about whether you are only using it as an excuse to get rid of someone who you actually oppose for other reasons.

00:08:43.160 These are not the issues that matter to Canadians.

00:08:46.180 I don't think the average Canadian will care about what the Conservatives do to Pierre Lemieux or to Jonas Smith or whatnot.

00:08:52.960 But they do care about integrity.

00:08:55.160 And if a party is so focused on this, it's not focused on the issues that matter.

00:09:02.440 And just look at what's happening.

00:09:04.120 And not that we want to talk provincial politics with so much happening federally.

00:09:07.620 But in Simcoe Gray, a former MP, Stella Ambler, who represented, I think it was Mississauga-Streetsville, if memory serves.

00:09:15.020 Although I might be wrong about that.

00:09:16.440 From 2011 to 2015, she ran in 2015 and again in 2019 and was unsuccessful.

00:09:22.320 Well, she's seeking the Ontario PC nomination in Simcoe Gray, where she's now relocated.

00:09:28.920 A relatively safe seat for the Ontario Progressive Conservatives.

00:09:33.480 She had been doing the hard work, selling memberships, and was approved as a nomination candidate.

00:09:39.180 And then the party decided, oh, we're not having a nomination anymore.

00:09:42.660 We're going to appoint someone.

00:09:44.960 And she's now suing the party. 1.00

00:09:46.740 I've seen the application.

00:09:48.040 I don't know if she's going to get what she wants in terms of having that appointment overturned.

00:09:54.440 But the reality is stuff like this is entirely avoidable if political parties stop behaving in the way they're behaving.

00:10:02.820 These things are avoidable, but we shouldn't be feeling or coerced into not talking about them because of political tribalism, which is what a lot of people want.

00:10:11.820 So I would say, yeah, let's get the Conservatives to quit with this nonsense and talk about China, talk about free speech, talk about debt, talk about all of these issues that should be the formative and decisive issues of the 2021 election campaign.

00:10:30.100 Elections are often won or lost based on things that don't matter or based on things that barely scratch the surface of what it is that Canadians are dealing with.

00:10:38.760 And that's actually my hope.

00:10:40.580 I don't know if I'm optimistic, but I'm still hopeful.

00:10:43.200 I have hope that this election could be an election about things that matter, not the Seinfeld election, the election about nothing, but an election about key issues.

00:10:52.340 And here's why I'm a little bit hopeful of this.

00:10:55.860 The pandemic has raised the stakes.

00:10:58.160 Whatever you think about COVID, about lockdowns, about restrictions, it's raised the stakes.

00:11:03.000 We had, what, $315 billion deficit posted in the last fiscal year.

00:11:09.500 We have deficits up until 2070, according to the parliamentary budget officer, which means no party, no party, no matter how much they are filled with fiscal hawks, can come in and say, we're going to balance the budget in our next term.

00:11:24.900 It's just not possible.

00:11:26.640 Now, this 2070 projection is terrifying for Canadians.

00:11:30.580 We're talking about trillions of dollars of debt.

00:11:33.540 And even if you are a socialist, even if you're like an NDPer and we'll talk about their platform momentarily, there should be an objection to this.

00:11:42.600 I mean, I know they don't understand economic socialists, but there should be an objection because the more you have to spend on servicing and maintaining your debt, the less you can spend on all of these pie-in-the-sky nationalized programs that you're pushing forward.

00:11:55.520 So left or right should be taking issue with no end in sight for this fiscal hardship that Canada is facing.

00:12:05.920 And here's the thing.

00:12:07.440 I do not fault the Liberal government as much for spending a lot of money during the pandemic.

00:12:12.360 Pretty much every country in the world, every OECD country, every G20 country was dealing with major deficits.

00:12:19.160 I could take issue with individual programs and expenditures, but there were going to be tens of billions, hundreds of billions of dollars in a deficit no matter what.

00:12:28.140 That I think we cannot give a pass for, but we can understand.

00:12:31.700 Here's the problem.

00:12:33.140 When the economy was pretty good, and Trudeau got pretty good books from Stephen Harper when he took over in 2015, he said,

00:12:40.680 well, things are good in Canada right now.

00:12:42.780 We can afford to spend.

00:12:44.060 So they started putting billions into infrastructure, racking up deficits, and that little itty-bitty deficit, so small that you could barely see it, quickly became larger and larger.

00:12:55.280 So we had eliminated any buffer we would have had for economic hardship, which was certainly delivered throughout the course of the pandemic.

00:13:03.880 And you still have a Liberal government that's planning these major big-ticket items like universal pharmacare, a $30 billion childcare program, a gun buyback that's going to cost billions more than is being anticipated, and so on and so forth.

00:13:20.320 And all of this is to say that we don't have a buffer.

00:13:25.420 They're still wanting to spend more and more.

00:13:27.180 So this 2070 projection from the PBO is not something you can just blame on COVID.

00:13:33.840 Justin Trudeau is going to say it is.

00:13:35.940 He's going to say, well, this is all about the pandemic, and we had to look out for Canadians and give them money and let them do all this. 0.96

00:13:41.940 But that is not an accurate representation of where that money is coming from.

00:13:46.060 And the PBO even says it.

00:13:47.420 They've incorporated a lot of Liberal commitments to this.

00:13:51.180 So everything the Liberal government says it's going to do for you or to you in its platform is another expenditure that's going to further and further even the faint hope of a balanced budget, which matters.

00:14:06.880 And Canadians need to start caring more about debt and deficit, even though they may be boring issues, because we're getting to a point where it's beyond caricature.

00:14:14.720 And the effect is going to be significant beyond what can be described.

00:14:19.420 And then we have China.

00:14:21.120 I mean, as much as the COVID crisis revealed a lot of economic woes, it also revealed the global policy woes that Canada has that I delved into on the show on Wednesday.

00:14:32.040 I don't want to rehash all of that here, except to say that China matters.

00:14:37.400 And even people that don't care about foreign policy as much need to understand China is a threat on economic grounds, on security grounds, on public health grounds.

00:14:47.920 When, you know, COVID-19, COVID-19, COVID-19, COVID-19, COVID-19, COVID-19 are being cooked up in the lab, that matters.

00:14:54.340 And China's handling and negligence around these things matters.

00:14:58.440 And just as an interesting aside, I've said that Aaron O'Toole, whatever my frustrations are with, you know, how he treats Pierre Lemieux, he's been solid on China.

00:15:07.040 And just this week, the Conservatives have sought intervener status in the Winnipeg lab case.

00:15:15.160 This is the case of the two scientists, Zhang Guqiu and Kading Chang, who worked at the National Microbiology Lab in Winnipeg, were escorted out by RCMP, then earlier this year fired, and the Liberal government's refusing to hand over any of the documents connected to this.

00:15:34.200 This is something that the Speaker of the House has actually taken to court, and the Conservatives want intervener status.

00:15:41.580 They want to be able to make a filing. It's unclear whether this is going to happen in the course of the election, but as leader of the official opposition, which he still is for the next couple of days, Aaron O'Toole is basically saying,

00:15:54.660 I want to be able to go before this, because there is a role that Parliament is meant to play in the oversight of documents, and the contempt, literal and legal, the contempt in which the Liberal government is holding Parliament, is actually an illegal matter.

00:16:12.380 So I think Aaron O'Toole has every right to intervene. But again, why can he not be the tough guy on other issues? And that's the whole point. Still, the Conservatives are claiming they don't want an election.

00:16:22.720 The NDP claiming they don't want an election, but all of a sudden they release a full platform. Not a good platform, but a full platform for this election.

00:16:31.860 They say, oh, no one's ready for, we can't have, we don't want. And I want to look at this in a little bit of detail, because some of it is just the usual stuff from the NDP.

00:16:40.300 But there's some very weird things here. For starters, it's not costed. It's not costed. So when I mentioned that people on the left should be concerned about rising debt and rising deficits, the NDP is not.

00:16:53.700 So all of these expenditures, all of these line items, they have no way of paying for. And they've got to know that. I just don't think they want Canadians to know it.

00:17:03.000 But then they resort to like the only thing they know how to do, which is talk about the super rich.

00:17:10.360 And this is from one page calling for a new deal for tax fairness.

00:17:14.960 The COVID-19 pandemic has driven inequalities even deeper. While millions of families and small businesses have been pushed to the brink during the pandemic, the super rich are doing better than ever.

00:17:25.960 Canadian billionaires are $78 billion richer since the first lockdown in 2020 and counting.

00:17:31.920 They're making big money while people suffer. The NDP platform says that those who have profited off of the pandemic should pay for the recovery.

00:17:41.240 They want the wealthiest to pay their share. So if you've already started a drinking game, I believe you need to take a shot every time you hear pay their share.

00:17:49.280 So I hope you're not listening to this too early because I feel you're going to be taking a lot of shots.

00:17:53.600 They want new, fair, and progressive taxation.

00:17:59.080 They're going to put a 15% tax on large corporate windfall profits during the pandemic.

00:18:04.400 They're going to go after large corporations that took publicly funded wage subsidies and gave executive bonuses. 0.73

00:18:10.500 That's actually, I think, a reasonable enough policy.

00:18:13.020 And then they're going to also boost the top tax rate, put a luxury goods tax on yachts and private jets.

00:18:21.240 That's another take a drink moment there.

00:18:23.900 And ask that the multimillionaires pay a bit more towards shared services with a wealth tax.

00:18:29.680 Okay.

00:18:30.660 There's a lot going on there.

00:18:32.400 But tax the rich, tax the rich, make them pay their fair share, yachts and private jets. 0.90

00:18:36.680 This is standard NDP fare for a lot of it, but it's devoid of economic knowledge.

00:18:44.240 The NDP's platform is blaming the so-called super rich for the economic harm that was unleashed on average families and businesses during the pandemic.

00:18:54.260 And it's true. 0.56

00:18:54.900 People like Jeff Bezos and the Waltons did very well during the pandemic.

00:18:58.860 But that's because of the lockdowns.

00:19:01.560 Because all of these lockdowns were telling the mom and pop shops they had to close down.

00:19:06.760 Meanwhile, Amazon became the primary grocery vendor supplier for all of these goods and services that were declared non-essential by lockdown-happy governments.

00:19:17.280 By including a lot of NDP voices that were calling for more and more lockdowns.

00:19:23.660 So, yeah, it's unfair that all of these people got wealthy because their businesses were the only ones allowed to stay open.

00:19:31.120 But that's not a reflection of any sort of government economic situation.

00:19:36.000 That's a reflection of how much lockdowns harmed small and medium-sized businesses.

00:19:42.180 How much lockdowns harmed families.

00:19:44.700 And the platform even concedes that, yes, there was an effect in the lockdown of these people getting richer.

00:19:51.660 But it doesn't make that leap that is so necessary, which is to put the blame for that gap on government intervention and put that blame on lockdowns themselves.

00:20:04.220 And, yeah, I mean, when you look at, like, you see this all the time.

00:20:07.760 If you look at some NDP Twitter accounts, they'll say, outlaw billionaires.

00:20:10.660 They say these words that I don't even think they know what they mean.

00:20:15.400 But they sound nice.

00:20:16.580 And people look at Jeff Bezos going to space and think, well, that's not fair.

00:20:19.880 Why should he get to go to space when I've had to shut down my restaurant or shut down my hair salon?

00:20:24.520 Well, Jeff Bezos may have a lot of issues that you could take aim with.

00:20:28.580 And I would encourage you to do that.

00:20:30.360 But he is not the reason that businesses are suffering.

00:20:33.340 And politicians have a great tendency to scapegoat things that they should shoulder the blame for onto the so-called super rich.

00:20:42.940 I shouldn't say so.

00:20:43.600 I mean, they are super rich.

00:20:44.720 But I just don't like the moral judgment in that term.

00:20:48.020 But governments and politicians and people like Jagmeet Singh and the NDP here are blaming the wealthy for what it's actually politicians that have to shoulder.

00:20:57.000 And even though the NDP has not been in power, the NDP has basically endorsed the Justin Trudeau permanent emergency mentality in Parliament.

00:21:06.100 And provincial NDP in Ontario and Alberta and elsewhere have also pushed for more and more of these restrictions that have allowed this gap that they take such aim with in this platform to get as large as it has over the last 16 months.

00:21:20.760 Before we take a break here, I want to talk about a great new book from our friends over at SecondStreet.org, Life After COVID.

00:21:29.820 Yes, elections give lots of news on the day to day, but we can't lose sight of the bigger picture and the longer term questions like what can be done about rising government debt, about long health care waiting lists, about unemployment,

00:21:42.000 about all of these things that have to be confronted by the country in the life after COVID, hence the name of the book.

00:21:48.500 You can get this free e-book by heading over to SecondStreet.org.

00:21:52.960 That's lifeafterCOVID at SecondStreet.org.

00:21:56.060 We'll be back in a moment.

00:22:00.600 You're tuned in to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:22:06.500 Welcome back to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:22:09.300 The cultural battle on mandatory vaccines and vaccine passports is ramping up significantly.

00:22:16.960 And I actually wanted to address a couple of key parts of this that I feel were causing some confusion.

00:22:23.940 Because on one hand, we had Justin Trudeau a few months back saying that vaccine passports are divisive and he wouldn't go anywhere near them.

00:22:32.620 And then on the other hand, you had just last week, Justin Trudeau talking about mandating mandatory vaccines for federally regulated workers.

00:22:40.540 And now you have the immigration minister, Marco Mendicino, announcing that the federal government is putting the finishing touches on its vaccine passport for international travel.

00:22:53.400 Now, there are two parts of this discussion.

00:22:55.980 There's the domestic vaccine passport and then there's the international vaccine passport.

00:23:01.000 And while the two are different, I think they're part of the same overarching discussion here.

00:23:05.740 But I want to do a little bit of I told you so first.

00:23:08.240 Because months ago, I got a lot of backlash from people when I said vaccine passports are inevitable.

00:23:13.480 People said, well, no, you're wrong.

00:23:14.840 We can fight them.

00:23:15.520 I said, no, they're coming whether you like it or not.

00:23:17.760 But Canadians have a right to go into an individual country. 0.98

00:23:47.760 But Canadians have the right to try.

00:23:50.180 So if India says we need proof of vaccination or Italy says we need proof of vaccination or the Maldives, I pluck these countries out pretty randomly, then Canadians should not be excluded, which they would be if their government doesn't play ball.

00:24:04.880 So in that way, the government has to respond to this because otherwise Canadians are going to have parts of the world closed off to them.

00:24:11.480 The issue is that a federal vaccine passport will no doubt be used at a local or provincial level, even if provinces are not pursuing them.

00:24:23.720 Jason Kenney has said heck no to issuing Alberta vaccine passports.

00:24:28.620 He's also said that he doesn't want to even recognize them in a domestic context, although he's saying that obviously Albertans can use them for international travel.

00:24:37.800 What this means is that the existence of a federal vaccine passport could very easily be used by some business in Alberta that says, yeah, you know what?

00:24:48.880 I want proof of vaccination if you want to come here, if you want to dine at this restaurant, go to this gym.

00:24:53.620 And now that there exists a government issued card, it's basically an end run around the provinces.

00:25:00.840 So now we can have a national vaccine passport rather than simply a federal vaccine passport.

00:25:07.580 And that's the danger of this.

00:25:09.060 Now, if you believe, as I do, that businesses should have the right to make these determinations for themselves, just as individuals have the right to go elsewhere, you may say, what's the big deal?

00:25:16.960 The point is, Justin Trudeau has to own this because he said a few months back that no, this is a provincial responsibility, not the federal government's job.

00:25:25.960 And now he's facilitating what I think is fair to call that end run around provinces to have a national vaccine passport, even if on the surface, the point of it is simply to facilitate international travel.

00:25:40.520 It's downright creepy the direction that some of the activists are taking this.

00:25:44.840 Let's just look at Quebec for a moment.

00:25:46.960 Quebec will ban unvaccinated people from non-essential public places.

00:25:51.840 So Quebec's doing the France thing, where if you want to go to a gym, if you want to go to a restaurant, you will have to be vaccinated.

00:25:58.800 And that means that you're going to have to scan that code, a digital vaccine passport on a smartphone app for validation,

00:26:06.740 which means that if you want to do anything that comes along with living in a supposedly free society, you have to disclose your vaccination status to the barista, to the bartender, to the host at the restaurant, to the concert ticket taker.

00:26:20.840 Terrifying stuff.

00:26:21.860 This stratification of society along the lines of vaccination.

00:26:25.680 This was imposed without any debate whatsoever.

00:26:30.700 And the reason for it, Francois Legault said, is that if you have debate on vaccine passports, it would expose Quebecers to conspiracy theories.

00:26:42.680 This is, you can't even make this stuff up.

00:26:45.740 So what Francois Legault said is that debate's not needed.

00:26:48.660 It's a health order.

00:26:49.620 We're putting it into effect on September 1st.

00:26:51.700 He says, I don't want certain people to come explain that there's a conspiracy, that it's not good to be vaccinated,

00:26:58.880 that in the end we're putting a microchip in people's arms to follow what they're doing, stories like that.

00:27:03.500 I don't think we need that in Quebec.

00:27:06.520 So he doesn't want to open up a debate or committee hearings because he's claiming,

00:27:11.020 oh, someone crazy will just come and say crazy things and Quebecers will hear it.

00:27:15.320 Yeah, crazy things like if the Quebec government has a vaccine passport, 0.56

00:27:19.380 people will have to disclose their vaccination status before going into a restaurant.

00:27:23.860 That would be crazy.

00:27:25.020 That would be a conspiracy.

00:27:26.500 What's that?

00:27:28.020 Oh, that's actually the policy.

00:27:29.700 Oh, my bad.

00:27:30.560 Okay.

00:27:31.180 Yeah, so they're not concerned about microchipping in the arms conspiracy theories.

00:27:35.760 They're concerned about backlash based on the factual nature of the program.

00:27:41.120 They don't want people to tell them no,

00:27:43.660 because I think they know that they're in the minority on this,

00:27:46.320 but they have to cling to this power.

00:27:47.860 So all of these governments that are doing things like this are playing into what is not going to go away.

00:27:55.960 You don't abandon infrastructure quickly.

00:27:59.000 So all of these governments that are investing millions of dollars into developing these apps,

00:28:04.140 these programs, these regimes, they're going to want to get their money's worth out of them,

00:28:08.740 which means that there's not going to be a flip of a switch on December 31st at the end of the year

00:28:13.600 where, okay, no longer do we need to disclose all this.

00:28:17.160 Once you have these apps, it's okay.

00:28:18.920 Well, maybe we work the flu shot into it.

00:28:21.740 Maybe we work the next coronavirus into it.

00:28:24.540 Maybe we work all of these other things into it.

00:28:26.620 And before you know it, it becomes not this temporary fleeting measure,

00:28:31.280 but a part of day-to-day life, the new normal.

00:28:34.720 And interestingly enough, I may be wrong because I haven't read all of the French language coverage on this,

00:28:41.040 but I've not even seen any reference to this as being a temporary measure.

00:28:46.700 Some people might say, oh, well, it's implied it's temporary.

00:28:49.320 You're not going to need it after the pandemic.

00:28:50.860 But I've not seen governments say that.

00:28:52.760 I've not seen a government build a sunset clause into this.

00:28:56.460 If I were them, I would, you know, put like a ticking time bomb literally on the server they use to run the app

00:29:02.520 that says, well, I wouldn't have the app in the first place,

00:29:05.140 but if I were going to, I would put a time bomb on it that says,

00:29:08.300 yeah, on December 31st at whatever time, this thing is going to blow up

00:29:13.200 and we lose the app, we lose everything, we can never run it again.

00:29:16.280 Because that's the only way, and even then, I mean, the backups could be stored somewhere, you never know.

00:29:22.060 But facetiously speaking, we know that they need to be told this cannot be the new normal.

00:29:28.560 And no one's telling them that.

00:29:29.780 That's why they don't want the debate on this.

00:29:32.140 That's why they don't want to have a discussion about this

00:29:35.740 because they know they're going to be on the losing side of that discussion.

00:29:41.040 Just look at how they've tried to shrink the bounds of debate.

00:29:44.000 I mentioned earlier that candidate in Yukon for the Conservatives

00:29:47.400 turfed because of his opposition to vaccine passports.

00:29:50.960 Now you have in Quebec, not just the decision to impose a vaccine passport,

00:29:55.980 but the refusal to allow people to discuss it.

00:29:59.920 So what the Quebec government is effectively saying here

00:30:02.580 is that there is only one correct state-approved position to have on this issue.

00:30:08.780 Which is why I get so passionate when we're talking about free speech.

00:30:12.660 It's why I've said that free speech is the conduit to any other issue

00:30:17.060 because if you can't speak freely, you can't debate the other issues

00:30:20.500 and all of a sudden you can't debate anything.

00:30:23.580 So Quebec is taking aim at your personal mobility if you're an unvaccinated person

00:30:28.140 or even a vaccinated person who doesn't want to have to beg for permission

00:30:32.600 to go and grab a cup of coffee at a bistro or something.

00:30:36.300 And moreover, they have this other attack on free speech

00:30:39.600 where you can't even engage or debate it.

00:30:42.460 You have to just accept it and go along with it because the government tells you so.

00:30:47.240 I don't know if you remember going back to, I don't know, what was it?

00:30:50.600 April 2020, maybe May 2020, when we were being warned of the second wave.

00:30:55.740 And then it became the third wave.

00:30:57.460 And now Theresa Tam, the Chief Public Health Officer of Canada,

00:31:00.680 has said we are in the midst of the fourth wave.

00:31:03.200 And if you think that's the last one, I'm pretty sure in about two months' time,

00:31:07.120 when we get close to Christmas, we'll be hearing about the fifth wave,

00:31:10.300 the sixth wave, the seventh wave.

00:31:12.080 Basically, it's like the Hanukkah menorah where, you know, 0.82

00:31:15.180 you had just a little bit of oil and it just let the candle burn for eight whole waves.

00:31:19.340 That's the best way I can think of to describe this here.

00:31:23.900 So however many waves there are going to be,

00:31:25.780 it's never going to be a wave that dissipates,

00:31:29.740 which is why we need to resist any attempts to bring us into the realm of the new normal.

00:31:34.480 And it's why Alberta's position, I think, is laudable here by saying,

00:31:38.860 we are simply not going to allow this federal government credential

00:31:42.920 for international travel to be used in a domestic context.

00:31:46.740 Now, how much they can enforce that, I don't know.

00:31:49.220 But they need to advance on that and move beyond just making that a rhetorical position.

00:31:54.680 Look at the Globe and Mail's editorial board.

00:31:57.560 Yes to vaccine mandates.

00:31:59.960 Yes to vaccine passports.

00:32:01.660 This is a media outlet that is content with segregating and stratifying society,

00:32:07.940 just like some of these other companies that are basically firing people

00:32:11.260 if they don't go along with it.

00:32:14.060 I was originally tracking individual universities in Canada

00:32:18.280 that were coming out with vaccine mandates for students and staff.

00:32:21.620 I stopped counting this week.

00:32:23.220 There was a wave of them.

00:32:24.400 I'm pretty sure there's some collusion taking place.

00:32:26.780 Of most, if not all, Ontario universities coming out in the last 48 hours

00:32:32.880 and saying that they're requiring vaccinations from students.

00:32:35.920 You know, everyone started with Waterloo.

00:32:38.240 And now we're looking at University of Toronto, Western, University of Ottawa, York University.

00:32:44.420 I mean, pretty much every Ontario university is now mandating vaccination for its students.

00:32:50.700 And if you have an exemption, the concession they offer you is, you know,

00:32:55.280 we'll, you know, come to your bedroom in the middle of the night

00:32:58.100 and we'll, you know, give you like three COVID tests

00:33:00.240 and, you know, two on your way to your car

00:33:02.120 and one in the drive-thru when you're getting your coffee

00:33:03.980 and, you know, every five minutes in class.

00:33:05.900 Not necessarily that bad, but pretty close.

00:33:08.000 It's non-stop testing.

00:33:09.640 So they're basically trying to make your life so miserable

00:33:12.720 that you're just going to get the shot or drop out anyway.

00:33:15.220 That's what they want.

00:33:16.160 If you're not vaccinated, they just don't want you there.

00:33:18.400 The Globe and Mail, if you don't want to get vaccinated for whatever reason,

00:33:23.540 they just don't think you have a part in society.

00:33:27.640 Quebec government, you should not have the right to go and get a coffee.

00:33:31.440 You shouldn't have the right to go to a concert.

00:33:33.280 All of these things.

00:33:35.200 And I'm not convinced.

00:33:37.040 And here's what I would like to see some polling on.

00:33:40.720 That what they're banking on is truly accurate,

00:33:43.900 which is that everyone who's vaccinated supports mandatory vaccination.

00:33:48.400 Because I've always said I'm pro-vaccine, but I'm pro-vaccine choice as well.

00:33:51.940 People make decisions for themselves.

00:33:53.900 You shouldn't have to tell everyone.

00:33:55.520 I was trying to go.

00:33:57.260 Where was it?

00:33:57.760 I was trying to go to a mall a couple of weeks ago,

00:34:00.040 which in and of itself is an odd thing for me.

00:34:02.200 And they asked me at the checking counter, you know,

00:34:04.680 the standard screening questions of, you know,

00:34:07.080 have you been out of the country?

00:34:07.980 Have you done this?

00:34:08.520 And are you vaccinated?

00:34:09.560 And I said, why does it matter?

00:34:11.560 Does it affect my ability to go in?

00:34:14.320 They're like, well, no, we're just asking.

00:34:16.260 I'm like, well, none of your business.

00:34:17.620 And I carried on and got whatever it was I needed at the mall.

00:34:20.020 I needed to go there.

00:34:21.200 Like, I try not to make a point of frequenting malls

00:34:23.400 just for reasons that have nothing to do with the pandemic.

00:34:26.300 But do we want that in society?

00:34:30.040 Originally, when I asked that question months ago,

00:34:32.560 I thought it was rhetorical.

00:34:34.000 But now it's increasingly clear how many people actually do want that.

00:34:38.760 And when we talk about in an electoral context,

00:34:42.360 all the issues that do not matter,

00:34:44.300 never lose sight of the ones that do.

00:34:47.420 Of individual liberty, once you chip away at it,

00:34:49.980 once you allow it to be whittled down to nothing,

00:34:52.940 it's very difficult, if not impossible, to get it back.

00:34:56.920 So if any politicians happen to knock on your door in the upcoming election,

00:35:00.540 make sure to ask them where they stand

00:35:02.620 on these key things that matter to your freedoms in this country.

00:35:07.020 We've got to end things there.

00:35:08.260 My thanks to you all.

00:35:09.260 We'll have lots more for you next week

00:35:10.760 as we hit the road for election 2021.

00:35:13.560 This is Canada's most forever talk show,

00:35:16.260 The Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.

00:35:17.940 Thank you, God bless, and good day to you all.

00:35:20.400 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:35:22.460 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

Juno News - August 13, 2021

Fighting mandatory vaccines needs to be an election issue

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