Juno News - February 19, 2025


Militarized censorship in Europe CELEBRATED by the media (ft. Barbara Kay)

Guests
Barbara Kay
Mentioned
Mark Carney Donald Trump Justin Trudeau Pierre Poilievre JD Vance Patel Marco Rubio Marine Le Pen Mohammed, Polyev Margaret Brennan Greta Thunberg Nadine Strassen Megan Brenner Javier Malay Andrew Coyne Alice Vidal Anna Polyev Elon Musk Steinberg Legault and 2 more
Mark Carney CAUGHT lying Trudeau’s last SCANDAL on his way out the door

Episode Stats


Length

52 minutes

Words per minute

176.78

Word count

9,259

Sentence count

239

Harmful content

Misogyny

5

sentences flagged

Toxicity

2

sentences flagged

Hate speech

20

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Barbara Kay joins Candice to talk about J.D. Vance's speech at the Munich Security Conference and how it could be a preview of what's to come in our own country. She also talks about the right wing media's reaction to the speech.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00 Hi, I'm Candice Malcolm and welcome to The Candice Malcolm Show. Hope everyone is having a great day so far. We have a wonderful show lined up for you today. Now, usually the focus of our show is on Canadian politics and the Canadian news, and we will get to the Canadian news today.
00:00:23 But I want to start the show by focusing on a broader trend that we're seeing around the
00:00:28 world, and the epicenter of it is in Europe.
00:00:31 And I'm talking about the assault on free speech, this idea that somehow there is hate
00:00:37 speech out there, there is misinformation and disinformation, and we need government
00:00:41 forces to correct the record, to regulate our speech, and to crack down on ideas and
00:00:47 opinions that society or government finds inappropriate.
00:00:50 And I think that this all came to a head with a speech that was given by Vice President
00:00:56 J.D. Vance at the Munich Security Council.
00:00:59 So we're going to walk through the speech.
00:01:01 We're going to talk about the reaction, some of the really deranged takes when it comes
00:01:05 to cheering and celebrating what's happening in countries like Germany by the legacy media
00:01:10 and talk about how it could impact Canada.
00:01:13 We're already seeing signs of this sorts of behavior from the Trudeau government, from
00:01:17 the liberals in Canada.
00:01:18 and it could possibly be a preview of what is to come in our country.
00:01:23 And I'm so pleased today, folks, to be joined by Barbara Kay.
00:01:26 She's here for the whole show.
00:01:27 Barbara is an author and columnist who has written for many publications,
00:01:31 but she's a regular columnist in The National Post,
00:01:35 and she always has the most interesting and intelligent take 0.64
00:01:40 specifically on Canadian culture and values.
00:01:42 So I'm really excited to have her on the show.
00:01:44 Barbara, thank you for joining us today.
00:01:46 Pleasure to be here. Thanks, Candice.
00:01:48 and just one quick note to everybody watching if you're if you're watching the show on youtube
00:01:53 please subscribe to the channel it really helps us out and if you're watching on x don't forget to
00:01:57 share this and repost it if you're listening as a podcast and you enjoy it please consider leaving
00:02:02 us a five-star review all of that really helps us out it doesn't take you much time and it really
00:02:06 helps us find our audience okay so i want to start with jd vance this happened last friday so he was
00:02:12 speaking at the Munich Security Conference in Germany. And he gives a speech, a tremendous
00:02:18 speech, I think. He's right sort of in the belly of the beast in Europe, going into sort of
00:02:24 their environment, going to one of their conferences. And he says something that I
00:02:30 think is entirely true, that there's so much consternation and outrage from the establishment
00:02:37 elites over this idea that somehow free speech is dangerous. This idea that Elon Musk having
00:02:43 X, taking over Twitter and having X, that there's something wrong with it and somehow it creates a
00:02:48 threat to democracy. That when right-wing parties win elections, somehow it's a threat to democracy.
00:02:52 So here is a clip, a brief clip of J.D. Vance that was really going viral, talking about how
00:02:58 expressing your opinion is not a threat to democracy and it's not election interference.
00:03:03 Here's that clip. Expressing opinions isn't election interference. Even when people express
00:03:10 views outside your own country, and even when those people are very influential. And trust me,
00:03:16 I say this with all humor. If American democracy can survive 10 years of Greta Thunberg scolding, 0.83
00:03:23 you guys can survive a few months of Elon Musk. And so, you know, maybe being a little bit
00:03:31 provocative there, Barbara, but the idea remains the same. Like I applaud J.D. Vance for going
00:03:36 into the environment. This is like kind of like how Javier Mele went to the World Economic Forum
00:03:41 and spoke at WAF to tell them that what they were doing was wrong and that we needed change and that
00:03:46 they should stop demonizing citizens for wanting transparency from corrupt government. So I give
00:03:51 J.D. Vance credit for that. And just like to provide more context. So he's talking about the
00:03:57 European Union, which is fully trying to enforce regulations and rules over social media. The
00:04:04 European Union constantly tries to interfere with these social media platforms, enforcing speech
00:04:09 codes, enforcing rules over their platforms. And another story that is happening recently in
00:04:16 Germany, they basically, the country, the top security officials banned a right-wing magazine,
00:04:22 accusing it of spreading hate. So we're talking about Compact Magazine, which is a magazine that's
00:04:27 associated with the political party, the Alternative for Germany, the conservative right-wing
00:04:32 party. The magazine was shut down, okay? The police force went in, raided the offices, raided the
00:04:38 staff of the homes, took their computers and everything else. The magazine had a circulation
00:04:43 of about 40,000 people, a pretty big publication. And again, the AFG, it's not like this Alternative
00:04:52 for Germany is a radical fringe party. It's a mainstream party, Barbara. It got 16% of the vote
00:04:58 in the recent election for the European Parliament, which was the second highest vote count. So we're
00:05:04 not talking about like a fringe 1% party. We're talking about a mainstream party. And I think that
00:05:11 JD Vance going in there and saying that was obviously necessary given what those parties
00:05:18 and what those countries are doing to dissident voices.
00:05:21 And again, I mean, we're seeing signs of those sorts of things happening in Canada as well.
00:05:25 What's your take on all this?
00:05:27 Well, I think that Germany has, unlike most countries in the world, 0.91
00:05:33 has a very special relationship with the whole idea of Nazism 0.84
00:05:39 and people expressing Nazi, what they consider to be neo-Nazi views.
00:05:45 I have a certain sympathy for their, they do have a Holocaust denial law.
00:05:51 You cannot, you may not deny the Holocaust. 0.98
00:05:55 I kind of get it in their case.
00:05:57 That's a horrible legacy to be walking around with.
00:06:00 And you see it playing out in many of their discussions.
00:06:04 In terms of the AFD, I think we should make a distinction between some of the members of their party
00:06:11 or people that intend to vote for them and make it clear that they like the party who are, in fact, neo-Nazis or who have sympathy or who try to minimize Germany's Holocaust history.
00:06:27 People that vote for them is one thing. They should have freedom, total freedom of speech.
00:06:31 And so should, I suppose, people that are within the party.
00:06:34 But those people that have those kind of views within the party, you don't have to shut down their speech, but you do have to get them out of the party.
00:06:41 and that's and they do have a few people within the party that are expressing problematic views
00:06:47 uh if they're smart they'll like Marine Le Pen did you just you just draw a line and you say
00:06:53 you can't do that in our party we're not going to shut down the speech of Germans who vote for us
00:06:57 if it's unfortunate that they like us but uh you know you could say the same about the left-wing
00:07:03 parties they have some uh horrible uh islamo fascists in their party i mean not within the 0.80
00:07:11 party voting for them it's the same with on both sides you have you have um terrible people on both 0.61
00:07:17 sides extremists at the margins but um that's the distinction i would make i i think it's important
00:07:23 uh what you mentioned about how germany obviously has to be careful with their past and they don't
00:07:27 want to go down you know past that they had gone down in the past and drawing the line around for
00:07:33 instance the holocaust that that makes sense it seems to me though barbara that the the consternation
00:07:39 it's it's being like blown out of proportion and this idea that you can't like to me when i look
00:07:45 at the alternative for germany i see a party kind of based on more ideas that are becoming more
00:07:50 mainstream with immigration saying that we don't want mass open borders we are worried about crime
00:07:56 that comes from refugees we're worried about uh people coming that have totally different values 1.00
00:08:01 and the fact that a party that is so regularly demonized by the media as being far right and
00:08:06 i take your point that there are some people probably within the margins or that vote for
00:08:10 the party that are extremists that are nazis that are that should be uh disassociated with
00:08:15 the party uh but i think the reason why they probably got 16 of the vote is because enough
00:08:20 people in the country don't care about those labels anymore like you can call someone far
00:08:24 right all day but if their message resonates with you and you want to send a message to the elite
00:08:30 saying i don't we don't want this to happen to our country anymore i think that that's that that's
00:08:35 that's what's happening i want to read a bit more of the reactions to jd vance's speech so andrew
00:08:40 coin uh comments with the global mail wrote on x he said yankee go home vance meets with the leader
00:08:46 of the far right german party exports mega message we also had uh tom nuttle from the economist who
00:08:53 wrote this he said it's hard to overstate the outrage in munich over jd vance's actions today
00:08:59 a de facto campaign speech on behalf of the afd one week before the election entirely devoid of
00:09:06 substance on security as europe caves um craves an understanding of u.s policy on ukraine then
00:09:12 he goes on to say in some context for my u.s followers the afd is considered sufficiently
00:09:17 extreme that parts of the party are under domestic surveillance and then he says that it's no
00:09:23 trivial matter for the vp uh to meet with them but i think to me barbara this undermines this
00:09:29 underlines the point the idea that the government has weaponized part of its security apparatus to
00:09:34 go after a political party to try to shut down their speech even though they're what i would
00:09:40 call a mainstream party if you're getting 16 of the vote in a multi-party system number two um
00:09:45 out of all the parties it it shouldn't be considered extreme i'm calling it right wing
00:09:50 or far right and them saying that it's under domestic security to me that's that's exactly
00:09:55 the kind of thing that warranted jd vance to be speaking out against it i do think there yes i
00:10:01 think there is certainly a spectrum that that's the trouble when you start to shut down certain
00:10:08 kinds of speech that are really disturbing uh then you'll start you'll start working your way
00:10:13 back to speech that is i think there are too many immigrants which is obviously should be not totally 1.00
00:10:19 uncontroversial and isn't. The leader of the AFD is Alice Vidal. She is herself a lesbian. Her
00:10:28 partner is from Sri Lanka. I mean, I don't think that she is going to be calling for all non-ethnic
00:10:37 Germans to be leaving the country anytime soon. So yes, I agree with you that to be terribly 1.00
00:10:46 frightened about their po i think you should look at their policies and if their their actual
00:10:50 policies don't seem to be terribly different from um a lot of republican policies in the united
00:10:57 states uh so i think it's unfair to keep calling the afd far right far right far right like they
00:11:03 they every time they mention that party there's you know uh there's always that attached to it
00:11:07 although nobody ever says the far left democrats even though a lot of democrats within the party
00:11:14 are extremely uh far left and even in the republican party there are some far right
00:11:20 there's like marjorie green i mean there are far right uh extremists um so i really i i think you
00:11:27 have to watch what but what the policies are uh and if all those people are supporting them then
00:11:33 you have to take a good look at why and why they why they can't find what they're looking for in
00:11:38 the other parties which are completely normal things like too much immigration and all of that 0.96
00:11:44 right and so on top of all of this this is an amusing thing that happens so the american news
00:11:50 network cbs has a show called 60 minutes it's one of the best media and journalism shows that you
00:11:57 know that has existed for decades and they go in right at the same time and do a special on german
00:12:04 prosecutors who are cracking down on free speech so you know we had the jd vance speech everybody's
00:12:10 talking about making headlines over the weekend and then on sunday cbs airs the 60 minute clip
00:12:16 barbara it is unbelievable to me this segment right so the the premise is that in germany it
00:12:23 is a crime to insult people and it is a crime to lie online even if you don't even know that you're
00:12:29 lying. And so CBS covers this, but not in a critical way at all. They're basically cheerleading
00:12:34 this idea that in Germany, the police can go after people online. I didn't sense even a hint
00:12:43 of criticism or skepticism towards these activities by the German prosecutors that,
00:12:50 you know, from a North American mind, it's like, it's wild that they're doing this. And to have a
00:12:55 journalists are supposed to advocate for free speech and believe in it as a good. I'm going
00:13:02 to show this clip. So this is what it looked like a CBS reporter, Chiron Alfonsi, talking to the
00:13:09 German prosecutors. What they're saying is wild. And her reaction, like not to push back, not to
00:13:14 question it, not to be skeptical, but just to go, oh, wow, that's interesting. Really something to
00:13:18 behold. So let's play that clip. Is it a crime to insult somebody in public? Yes, it is. And
00:13:25 And it's a crime to insult them online as well?
00:13:27 Yes.
00:13:28 The fine could be even higher if you insult someone in the Internet.
00:13:33 Why?
00:13:34 Because in the Internet, it stays there.
00:13:37 If somebody posts something that's not true, and then somebody else reposts it or likes it,
00:13:44 are they committing a crime?
00:13:45 In the case of reposting, it is a crime as well, because the reader can't distinguish
00:13:50 whether you just invented this or just reposted it that's the same for us and so from there from
00:13:58 this interview where you know they they say yes um saying mean things about politicians is against
00:14:04 the law in germany you cannot say it um and it's even worse to do it online uh so from there barbara
00:14:10 we get to see a cbs camera crew join the german police as they raid somebody's house again for
00:14:18 the crime of posting a meme on the internet that the government didn't like let's play that clip
00:14:25 it's 6.01 on a tuesday morning and we were with state police as they
00:14:30 raided this apartment in northwest germany inside six armed officers searched the suspect's home
00:14:40 then seized his laptop and cell phone prosecutors say those electronics may have been used to commit
00:14:47 a crime the crime posting a racist cartoon online
00:14:54 and so i guess this is nothing new we've seen this kind of thing happening in the
00:14:57 uk possibly it'll come to canada soon but the
00:15:00 thing that really blows my mind barbara is to hear the giddy
00:15:04 cbs reporter talking about it like here we are raiding this house
00:15:09 knocking down the door with our with our police squad here
00:15:12 to arrest this person for a meme that we didn't like
00:15:17 It's pretty creepy. It's pretty creepy. I think there are similar laws in the UK. I've seen some same kind of footage, somebody being arrested for having made some, it wasn't even, I mean, it was a very nothing comment on the internet and the whole SWAT team arrives and sees him and his computer.
00:15:38 or the woman who was arrested in England, in London for praying silently outside an abortion
00:15:47 clinic. She wasn't even moving her lips. I mean, and she was arrested for doing that. Yes, I think
00:15:53 free speech is in dire trouble in Europe and the UK. And I don't think that what J.D. Vance said was
00:16:02 so harsh at all. I think it was pretty, I think it was pretty transparent, strong. But I heard
00:16:13 that some members of the audience were actually weeping at what he had to say. So it does give
00:16:20 you a portrait of a Europe that really, what's happened to their values, what's happened to
00:16:28 their their you know if this is what they have to stoop to and they don't even define insult i find
00:16:33 i find it very disturbing when somebody won't define won't automatically define what they mean
00:16:38 well when i say insult i don't mean you know oh you looked fat on tv today or something like that
00:16:45 i mean you know that it has
00:16:47 it's it could be anything it could be anything that you say that it's taken it's the person who
00:16:59 decides right the person who feels insulted that decides this is this is a very slippery slope
00:17:05 there's no question well it's interesting because I think that so many people including sort of
00:17:10 elites in North America and Canada and the U.S. sort of believe that Europeans are more more
00:17:16 enlightened or, you know, more sophisticated in their political views than us in North America.
00:17:22 And they kind of look to Europe like we should be more like them. I just when I when I look at
00:17:27 what's happening in Europe, I mean, the fact that they're cracking down on speech like this,
00:17:32 the fact that they've completely opened their borders and flooded it with migrants that many, 0.97
00:17:38 many cases aren't well suited to live in the West, they're kind of giving it all away.
00:17:42 And to me, it's kind of a terrifying idea that you have someone like Mark Carney, who identifies himself as European, who has a sophisticated views like we need to be more like the Europeans.
00:17:54 I think it's the exact opposite.
00:17:56 It's frightening.
00:17:57 And I think that Canada should do everything it can to move away from this kind of speech regulations and codes and trying to censor the Internet.
00:18:07 Oh, absolutely.
00:18:08 what galls me of course and many other canadians is that they talk a lot about our speech
00:18:15 but they don't seem to care much when you hear speech in our streets in violent demonstrations
00:18:22 of the worst kind of hatred that true nazi style violent speech that is insightful and that is 0.88
00:18:33 is absolutely totally unacceptable and even by the criminal code is considered insightful
00:18:40 incitement to violence. Those people are not arrested in their homes or they don't get SWAT
00:18:47 teams, you know, they don't go to jail, most of them. So the hypocrisy, the double standards are
00:18:53 disturbing to me as well. Okay, I have one more thing from CBS and again to do with Germany. So
00:19:00 on the same evening, Sunday evening, we had CBS News' Margaret Brenner on her show Face the
00:19:06 Nation. She was on with Secretary of State Marco Rubio. And she makes quite a bizarre statement, 0.61
00:19:12 Barbara. She says that free speech was weaponized in Nazi Germany and that that is what caused the
00:19:19 Holocaust. Marco Rubio very, very calmly and very correctly sets the record straight here. 0.73
00:19:26 But let's play this clip and then I'll have you react to it, Barbara. 0.60
00:19:30 He was standing in a country where free speech was weaponized to conduct a genocide.
00:19:36 And he met with the head of a political party that has far right views and some historic ties to extreme groups.
00:19:47 The context of that was changing the tone of it.
00:19:53 And you know that, that the censorship was specifically about the right.
00:19:57 No, I have to disagree with you.
00:19:58 free speech was not used to conduct a genocide the genocide was conducted by an authoritarian
00:20:04 nazi regime that happened to also be genocidal because they hated jews and they hated minorities
00:20:09 and they hated those that they had a list of people they hated but primarily the jews
00:20:13 there was no free speech in nazi germany there was none well and it's even more interesting than 0.90
00:20:18 that because it was actually uh censorship laws in the weimar republic that in many ways led to
00:20:25 the rise of nazism because they had such strict codes on speech in germany between the first and
00:20:31 second world war so i just want to play a quick clip um this is from an organization called fire
00:20:36 the foundation uh for i think it's independent research and education um an american free speech
00:20:41 group they uh this clip started uh circulating it was from a year a year or two ago um but here we
00:20:48 have basically a scholar at, sorry, a fire senior fellow, Nadim Strawson, explaining how the history
00:20:59 of censorship actually made anti-Semitism much worse and it paved the way for the Nazis. Let's 1.00
00:21:05 play that clip. We obviously know that despite the speech suppression, the punishment of speech,
00:21:14 it was hardly effective in preventing the rise of Nazism.
00:21:20 To the contrary, the Nazis themselves, as well as many historians,
00:21:25 believe that the net impact of those laws censoring Nazi speech
00:21:31 was to amplify their message.
00:21:36 Megan Brenner was completely wrong, the exact opposite, actually.
00:21:40 the things that they're doing today to censor you could argue led more to the rise of nazis than
00:21:45 this idea that somehow nazi germany was like a free speech utopia and that's how they managed 0.59
00:21:51 to carry out the slaughter um what was your take on all that barbara i think you're absolutely
00:21:56 right uh she she's very wrong about by the time the nazis uh gained power nobody was uh everybody
00:22:04 was very careful of what they were i mean they had absolute control and uh the punishment could
00:22:11 be quite dire if you you know expressed hatred of them or you or or criticism of them so she was
00:22:18 she was totally off base there and i do believe that the second speaker nadine strawson was right
00:22:24 in that uh the more you try to suppress certain things uh the more pushback you're going to get
00:22:29 and if it's a free society and people can vote they will vote against you i think look you just
00:22:34 look at our past history and in the last nine years people that weren't allowed to talk say
00:22:39 what they felt about issues gender and i mean the whole dei thing is suppression of speech
00:22:45 cancel culture culture all of that um and they are reaping you know the liberal party has has
00:22:52 reaped their just reward in becoming more and more unpopular and it's largely due to and the
00:22:58 same in the United States and accounts for Trump's victory. A lot of it was cultural.
00:23:03 They people were tired of, you know, having to keep their mouth shut about this, that, and the
00:23:08 other. And that was their former rebellion. And who can blame them? Well, I hope you're right. I
00:23:14 hope that this leads us away from this regime of the, you know, the online harms bill that
00:23:19 Justin Trudeau and his government are introducing, along with, you know, a whole host of other
00:23:24 regulations and legislation designed to try to regulate the internet to try to crack down on
00:23:30 so-called hate speech or misinformation terms that are always very vaguely defined Barbara
00:23:35 I want to pivot now to talk about Pierre Polyev because he gave a speech on Saturday night and we
00:23:43 did discuss it on the show on Monday but I think that there was so much to the speech that it's
00:23:48 worth going through it in a little more depth and also just to talk about this moment right because
00:23:53 here we are in 2025, all of a sudden, patriotism and Canadian
00:23:58 pride are back in style, after five years or even longer of
00:24:03 liberals and elitists and left wingers saying that there's
00:24:06 something disgraceful about Canada, that Canada is genocidal,
00:24:09 that there's shame in being Canadian, that we shouldn't 0.60
00:24:11 celebrate Canada Day, we should have our flags that have
00:24:13 staff, all this stuff. And then now all of a sudden, Donald
00:24:17 Trump, you know, makes makes an offhand comment, and proposes a
00:24:21 trade tariff and suddenly uh you know you have people uh policing products in supermarkets saying
00:24:27 don't buy american goods buy the canadian goods and uh suddenly everyone wants to fly the maple
00:24:32 leaf again so in in that context we had pierre polyev give us a a very strong speech on saturday
00:24:39 evening he held his canada first rally this was uh on the anniversary of the 60th anniversary
00:24:45 of the maple leaf flag being introduced in canada so he held the event in ottawa hundreds of thousands
00:24:52 of people were watching it live online we had i think upwards of 10 000 people in person uh watching
00:24:59 this event um and i mean you can just see the the visuals of it barbara before we get into the
00:25:06 context of it it looked beautiful right this beautiful big flag um this kind of like youthful
00:25:12 candidate with his beautiful wife they come out you had anna polyev give an amazing introduction
00:25:18 she's an inspiring person herself and then she she introduces her husband and i i really
00:25:24 appreciated the way he started out the speech he sort of made a self-deprecating joke saying
00:25:28 you know everybody always asks like what is she doing with him um which was which was very like
00:25:34 humble and and sweet um and so you know just just without even talking about the um the con the
00:25:41 content um just the way it looked i think that it really kind of breathed a lot of energy into
00:25:47 the conservative side when it comes to canadian patriotism conservatives were the one that
00:25:52 maintained our patriotism throughout the last 10 years while the liberals were telling us not to do
00:25:57 it um and so it was kind of nice to see him maintain that so i'll i'll do like what did you
00:26:02 what was your overall takeaway from the uh the speech there i i i did love his speech and i i
00:26:08 actually posted it on x and said i think it was the best political speech i ever heard and i and
00:26:15 i agree the visuals were great i think that his uh choice to kind of echo the america first you
00:26:22 know donald trump's america first message with canada first was uh bold but he did it with class
00:26:27 and he did it uh you know he sort of got above the fray doing it and i thought he did it very well
00:26:33 um i i love the speech i thought the trajectory of the speech he took he took us on a journey
00:26:40 and that's what a good speech should do and uh he elicited many many different reactions he's
00:26:45 certainly in me and i'm i've seen a lot of speeches in my time and i'm generally sit sitting back and
00:26:50 listening i like that i don't like that but at this time i sort of got carried away not carried
00:26:55 away but i got carried along by um his his uh very very well constructed very well crafted
00:27:04 uh a journey of ideas but and emotions intertwined and i thought he did a brilliant job and he
00:27:10 started off um with the personal as one should uh and i'm by the way i think all of it was
00:27:16 calculated not only he was not only speaking to canadians um he was speaking to donald trump but
00:27:22 he was also speaking to mark carney so he had he had a triple message um and uh it had to be
00:27:29 effective on on many different levels so he began with the personal uh he and his wife his wife is
00:27:35 an immigrant and came to this country and he is from very ordinary um you know kind of uh up from 1.00
00:27:41 poverty background um and the the the message here was we're not elite we're not we don't come from
00:27:48 privilege like mark kearney uh but we uh we know that we we we knew that canada would keep its
00:27:58 promise to us anna came to canada because she believed in canada's promise and canada he said
00:28:05 canada kept its promise to us so we are products of a canada that is a good place a great country
00:28:13 so the whole thing is going to get back to how can we recapture the greatness of canada so he
00:28:18 set it up as uh that and then uh he moves into but but presently we're under threat so now now
00:28:24 we're getting a little nervous what is the threat and he explains the threat uh we know what the
00:28:28 threat is um but we can do something about that so you know don't worry uh we we can deal with
00:28:35 that threat yes uh we have energy we have leverage don't be afraid that's the next message then the
00:28:42 next one is a statement to the american people he does not mention donald trump by name through
00:28:48 most of his speech he was above trump uh and and deals uh talks directly to the american people
00:28:55 and he says you americans we are both suffering we are both going to suffer and he uh he says
00:29:03 you know so that's we're together on this we're not we should not be enemies we're together we
00:29:08 can fix this um we're not asking for pity and um and uh then on to uh our shared history who would
00:29:18 you rather have as a neighbor we have great shared history military uh now he gets into
00:29:25 a warning we will never be the 51st state and now now he's starting to sort of come out like an
00:29:31 you know with the gloves on uh we will bear any burden he still hasn't mentioned donald trump
00:29:36 now it's um we are going to be the road ahead we are going to be the wealthiest country
00:29:43 uh but now he's pivoting to carney and trudeau and uh and all our problems that they created
00:29:50 and how now here's the list of problems energy homes taxes all those now we pivot to the
00:29:56 conservatives we were right about everything we we were we knew what those problems were we have a
00:30:02 solution to fix them so we were right they were wrong and he's now including from now on everything
00:30:08 is carney trudeau carney trudeau carney trudeau the media they were wrong about us and they said
00:30:14 this not true uh then it's on to be afraid of mark carney not only afraid you don't have to be just
00:30:20 afraid of don't trump you have to be afraid of mark carney too and here's why um and in a sense
00:30:25 you know, Carney's moving his headquarters to New York. So actually, you know, Carney and Donald
00:30:32 Trump, they have a certain amount of certain things in common, but it's the first mention of
00:30:37 Donald Trump's name. And then he has a very strong, it's a bit scary, very strong paragraph.
00:30:43 He says, Mark Carney's going to plagiarize all our stuff. And he put his profit before our people.
00:30:50 if he wins canada loses this is i think a very strong statement but don't be afraid now we move
00:30:57 into his bring it home economic plan and the detail and precision is really excellent because
00:31:03 carney is not talking in precision in details or being precise at all sorry i'm rambling on and on
00:31:09 but now we get into uh you know uh trade barriers and the border security and the uh fentanyl he
00:31:21 can be tough we're gonna have harsher punishments but he has compassion because we're gonna deal
00:31:25 with treatment um now it's defense um and wasteful aid to i mean there's so many policy things that
00:31:33 he's covering here i think that's remarkable in a speech like this where he's not he's really
00:31:38 putting out a very full platform now we're coming to the climax patriotism citizenship
00:31:45 we're going to end cancel culture we're going to end the war on history 1.00
00:31:48 we are the greatest country in the world we're going to reinstate statues you know he's i mean
00:31:56 the details are are fantastic we're going to bring back our proud military traditions we're going to
00:32:01 promote now this I liked a lot oh now we're into inspiration so it's we're very climactic here
00:32:08 we're into inspiration for what's going to be here's my tactics we're going to promote common
00:32:13 national identity we're going to bridge differences rather than create differences
00:32:18 and he talks about our citizenship is precious I loved what he said when he said we're going to
00:32:26 have a new part of the citizenship oath. We're going to have in-person citizenship. I mean,
00:32:30 isn't it awful that we've got to the point where we actually, you know, it's like, oh yeah, we'll
00:32:34 just zoom it in here. Well, yeah, yeah, here's your, we'll send your certificate by email. You
00:32:38 know, really? In-person citizenship oaths and added to the oath will be the theme of gratitude.
00:32:48 Gratitude for being part of the greatest country in the world. And you should know that and you
00:32:54 should express it in words you have to say so um and then he says you have to leave your hate behind
00:32:59 whatever your hate and he names a whole bunch of names to indicate all the different ethnic you
00:33:04 know uh sources of hatred in the world and and he says leave it behind you are canadian first
00:33:09 this is a fantastic message um so and then now back to the summary but it's a great summary
00:33:17 because he adds a new thought to it he reprises much as what he said in the speech but then he
00:33:23 add something very new and he says um a warning this is it's not going to be easy to reachieve
00:33:32 the canadian promise it's not going to be easy but it's going to be hard but what's going to help
00:33:40 us in that journey the past is going to teach us how to be strong in bearing the burden of what
00:33:48 you know to get back to our our canadian promise and then he mentions was it do you think it was
00:33:54 easy for the indigenous people to live in minus 30 or 40 degree and build their igloos and like 1.00
00:33:59 you know uh what about immigrants who built the railway what about the military and the world wars
00:34:06 and what about individuals like terry fox we are part of something bigger than ourselves he said
00:34:12 This is beautiful because who made Canada? And he's, he just lists everybody, including brave, courageous individuals with a strong message of hope and everything else that you want to hear. I thought it was a brilliant speech. I, I felt myself going with him. I thought I, I, he took me along and I, I was, I was willing to suspend any kind of, you know, like there was no point at which I said, wait a minute, wait a minute.
00:34:40 hey now you're now you're getting corny or now you're getting you know this is your you're
00:34:45 promising too much or any of that so i yes i loved it as you can see well i know i i loved the the
00:34:52 story that you told about it and you really uh made some clear points that i i hadn't even really
00:34:58 thought about i think i think you're right when it comes to this is an alternative to the nine
00:35:02 years of liberals that we can all look forward to we can all get excited about i have the blueprint
00:35:07 I have the plan. And it's not something new. He didn't just come up with it in the wake
00:35:11 of the tariff threats from President Trump. These are the things that he's been talking about and
00:35:16 advocating for his entire career. And I do agree that those are the least that we can do. Those
00:35:24 are the first steps towards regaining our country, taking back our country and restoring it. I think
00:35:30 that it's also interesting just to add a point that the legacy media will claim that Pierre
00:35:35 Polyev doesn't have a plan, that he doesn't have depth, that he just speaks in talking points and
00:35:40 bumper stickers. And that's sort of what the liberals have said as well, Mark Carney. But
00:35:45 here you have, you know, Pierre Polyev get up on a Saturday night and speak in great detail for an
00:35:50 hour and a half about his plans and his and his policies in really even telling us how he's going
00:35:57 to pay for them, right? Like, yes, I'm going to beef up our military. We're going to start patrolling
00:36:02 the arctic we're going to build in the north and i'm going to pay for it by defunding foreign aid
00:36:07 and defunding unra and and here you go here's how i'm going to pay for it and then you can
00:36:12 contrast that with mark carney who everybody thinks is super smart and sophisticated um but
00:36:17 he hasn't given a plan at all and a few points that he's put out there often seem to contradict
00:36:23 each other like his you know will he get rid of the carbon tax no it's going to be changed to an
00:36:28 an industrial thing that he says that won't trickle down to consumers, but then he has to
00:36:32 admit that, yes, it is the consumers that will pay more. He has a very limited and confused
00:36:38 policy right now. I just want to go back to Pierre Polyev, because I agree with you. And I think that
00:36:44 some of the ideas like citizenship ceremonies in person, yes, obviously, I love the idea of adding
00:36:49 gratitude. In some ways, it felt a little bit like it was too little too late, though, Barbara,
00:36:54 I think that part of the problem with the Trudeau government is that they completely opened the gate and anyone could become a citizen.
00:37:00 And I've been critical of this since Trudeau came to office.
00:37:04 So one of the first things he did when he became prime minister back in 2015 is he changed the citizenship laws.
00:37:10 He made it so that you can become a citizen basically fast tracked after just four years.
00:37:14 And you don't even have to live in Canada full time to become a citizen.
00:37:18 So he's given citizenship away, which has cheapened it for all of us.
00:37:22 And I didn't, I didn't hear even, so I sat down with Pierre Polyev last week and I asked him about his immigration plan. He said it would look a lot more like the Harper government, but he didn't give me specifics. And, you know, one of the things I'm worried about is the changes that have happened to our country over the last nine years with people not really caring about Canada, people being able to become citizens of our country without showing any kind of love for Canada, any kind of respect for Canada.
00:37:51 There's one part in the speech, and I'm going to play it and I'll get you to react.
00:37:56 This was making the rounds a lot sort of on the more like right wing circles online by kind of more Canadian nationalists who took issue with this one clip.
00:38:06 So, Sean, this is clip number eight.
00:38:08 Pierre Polyev says that our nationalism is not based on bloodlines, birthplace or backgrounds.
00:38:14 Let's play that clip.
00:38:15 Ours is a nationalism not based on bloodlines, birthplace, or background, whether your name
00:38:22 is Martin or Mohammed, Paliyev or Patel, Tremblay, hi there Mr. Patel, good to see you, it's
00:38:34 like Smith, or like Tremblay, Tremblay, Singh, Smith, or Steinberg, whether you're from
00:38:44 Taktayaktak or Trois-Rivières, Okanagan or Oromocto, Calgary or Cavendish. We are all Canadians and
00:38:52 Canadians first. I think it was a little charming how he said that and how he talked about Mr. Patel.
00:39:01 But my issue here is it's starting to sound a little bit like Trudeau's post-national
00:39:06 everyone's a Canadian, Canadian's nothing, Canadian's a Canadian's Canadian. If you say 0.97
00:39:10 that our nationalism is not based on bloodlines, birthplace, or background. I mean, it has to be
00:39:15 based on one of those three, right? I mean, what is Canadian if it has nothing to do with, like,
00:39:21 who your family and who your parents were, where you're born, your background? Like, to me, there
00:39:26 needs to be more to that. You have to say, in order to be Canadian, you know, you can come from
00:39:30 these other places, but you have to commit to Canada. You have to believe in Canada. You have
00:39:35 to, and I just think there could have been a lot more that he had added to that bit. What do you
00:39:40 think. He could have doubled down on it. I drew from what he said that bloodlines should not be
00:39:49 important on that you can become Canadian. I think partly he was saying that with like his wife is
00:39:58 an immigrant. I mean, she's from Venezuela. That doesn't mean she's not Canadian. She became
00:40:02 Canadian because she joined the common culture. And I think maybe he should have, all right,
00:40:08 he could have could have emphasized that we have a common culture it was built by you know people
00:40:15 from all over people who built the railways and people you know indigenous people like i mean he
00:40:19 said it but he said it in a kind of roundabout way is that we became who we were by
00:40:27 all these different energies and forces he could have said uh we we began as uh
00:40:37 a common culture based on British values.
00:40:43 I mean, we're, you know, heritage values, British and French because of.
00:40:48 But I think by now, all these years later, that I don't know if that would have gone over very well,
00:40:57 even with heritage Canadians.
00:40:59 I don't think any heritage Canadian has a problem with somebody from Venezuela or from India or from China or anywhere.
00:41:07 who becomes very Canadian and I know lots of people from other places they love Canada if
00:41:16 you love Canada and you love the reason that you if you came to Canada to have freedom and an
00:41:22 opportunity and for the Canadian promise then you've already acknowledged if you don't have
00:41:27 doesn't have to be in words you have acknowledged that Canada has what you're not getting where you
00:41:33 came from um whether that that maybe that should be more explicit but then it might sound a little
00:41:40 bit patronizing or mean-spirited to you know say it say it you know but yeah i mean i think he said
00:41:48 we to me it seemed like we have a common culture and we will be stronger for all the people that
00:41:54 come from different places if they leave whatever was bugging them about other people behind leave
00:42:02 your hatred behind and bring your best self to Canada and um internalize our common culture
00:42:11 that that gave us the Canadian promise and that fulfilled it for me and my wife like
00:42:16 maybe I'm reading too much into it but that was my takeaway from it yeah no I think you're right
00:42:24 maybe that's what I wanted him to be saying well I think if you show the clip that I just did
00:42:30 completely out of context you could see hey well wait a minute like what what does it mean to be
00:42:34 canadian if anyone can be canadian anyone can come here it doesn't matter like anything about you
00:42:38 uh but i think you know together with the other points that you raised about how
00:42:44 he wants people to do citizenship ceremonies and he wants to bring in gratitude and he tells you
00:42:48 that if you come from a war-torn place don't bring your tribal hatreds to canada like leave that all
00:42:54 away i think that all that tied together does tell that kind of positive um patriotism that
00:43:00 we do have shared values we're not a multicultural um utopia where mark carney says a lot that that
00:43:07 the americans are a melting pot and that canada is a mosaic um that's an old but that's an old
00:43:12 that's a very old paradigm right no i'm saying like that i used to hear that uh maybe 20 years
00:43:18 ago and and i never liked it right because the idea is that with a melting pot every culture
00:43:23 comes together and it changes the flavor right so it's not just like you know you have to become
00:43:29 british or in in the in the u.s you have to become american and then and then everything else gets
00:43:33 melted away it's like every culture that comes changes america a little bit and we're all together
00:43:38 in this stew i i like that metaphor better than a mosaic a mosaic where you can just cut out somebody
00:43:44 and each piece is completely separate and removed from every other piece i mean mark carney says
00:43:50 that and i don't think i think he he has a positive like you know 20 years ago people used to say it
00:43:55 but but to me it's very negative it's like we live in these silos you don't have to interact
00:44:00 with anybody you can actually hate the person in the in the in the picture next door to you
00:44:04 it doesn't matter you don't have anything in common you just happen to be side by side
00:44:08 which i think is the sort of like liberal idea of canada um that that you know canada i think um
00:44:14 yan martel once said canada is the world's greatest hotel um this idea that like you can
00:44:19 just come and stay and go and doesn't mean anything and like you know a hotel doesn't
00:44:23 have any warmth it's not a home it's just a place you come and go and it's the old good intentions
00:44:29 thing it's the old good intentions thing is that uh you know we we we can remain who we were and
00:44:36 at the same time be totally canadian it it was the beginning of multiculturalism and i i had the same
00:44:42 reaction as you when i when i would hear that mosaic mosaic well that's kind of like chopped
00:44:47 up little tiles like i would see a bathroom wall you know and uh i liked the melting pot thing
00:44:52 because I think that's the only way you're going to get true patriotism
00:44:57 is when people say American culture, they kind of know what they mean.
00:45:04 They may not love the culture, but they kind of know that those waves of immigration,
00:45:10 you know, and the Italians and the Irish and the Jews and this and that,
00:45:14 they had tough beginnings.
00:45:16 They were very rough.
00:45:17 It was a rough process.
00:45:19 uh so many hundreds of thousands of people coming uh but they said no you're going to become
00:45:25 american you know they they were very adamant about it and people did by the second third
00:45:29 generation um everybody became very happy to say they were proud americans uh so this this mosaic
00:45:37 idea is no the most important thing about you is your the identity you you were before you came
00:45:44 here so don't lose that so we'll just we'll just you know we'll fit you in we'll cock it the
00:45:50 cocking will be like between us all and that'll be the bridge but no it doesn't work and what we
00:45:57 thought it would work i think a lot of people thought multiculturalism would work it didn't
00:46:01 work and and it didn't work in a very dramatic fashion in europe uh and and the uk and uh in
00:46:10 other places um it's it's very bad so uh okay well yeah i'm gonna ask you one one last question and
00:46:21 uh it might lead to a broader conversation so if it does we might have to save it for the next time
00:46:26 you join the show but i think that with trump president trump's tariff threats this whole
00:46:32 newfound patriotism uh love of country on the political left and in the center um you know it
00:46:39 it kind of raises old questions. When you think of what it is to be Canadian, what do we love
00:46:46 about Canada? You know, Justin Trudeau defined Canada twice on U.S. television earlier this year
00:46:51 as a Canadian is defined as just not an American. You wrote on X, and this was, I think, one of your
00:46:58 typically very thought-provoking, controversial takes. You wrote that if Quebec officially left
00:47:04 confederation and became a nation canada would cease to exist as a nation montreal is a port city
00:47:10 a big advantage quebec has natural resources strong sense of its own identity it would survive
00:47:15 and could easily flourish under certain circumstances be careful what you wish for
00:47:18 um so i i think you're saying that that can the canadian identity you know the french are the
00:47:25 ones that have the identity more so than us english canadians maybe we can learn a bit about
00:47:30 them. You wrote that before all of the tariff threats in the 51st state thing. So what's your
00:47:36 current thinking on this? Well, my current thinking is that there's going to be a big
00:47:39 pause in the whole rush. You know, I don't think this will be very good for the Parti Québécois.
00:47:45 At the time that I wrote that, they were quite ascendant in the polls and Premier Legault was
00:47:52 like behind the eight ball. But I think that the tariff thing may change it. But what I meant by
00:47:57 that was you know i've lived in montreal for like 60 over 60 years and i've had my ups and downs with
00:48:04 quebec and i you know i've gone back and forth on a lot of things but i can say this they because
00:48:11 they speak french and because a lot of their influences that their journalists and their
00:48:17 intellectuals uh they don't take their marching orders from north america's you know uh uh
00:48:25 whatever's going on here and multiculturalism and all of that i think they were a little bit
00:48:30 immunized from that um they they feel like a nation they say they are a nation i think in
00:48:37 in all the respects that matter they are a nation diluted because they've so many of them you know
00:48:42 the church has been absent for a long time for most of their lives but still um they don't need
00:48:50 threats of terrorists or anything else they feel threatened all the time because of the language
00:48:54 and you know they feel like they're an island in a sea of so they've had that for a long time
00:49:01 when people said that they were racist because of the bill 21 you know with the niqab law and 0.98
00:49:06 not wearing a hijab in classes and all that uh they were wrong they were protecting their culture 1.00
00:49:12 and uh they that's still very important to them um and they they would retain and i think if they
00:49:20 did separate they have so many natural blessings um that they would they would remain a cult they
00:49:25 would remain a nation but the rest of canada would be like now what what do we do what do
00:49:30 we do we have this gigantic hole in the middle of our country um i think that would be a tragedy
00:49:36 for the rest of canada far greater than it would be for quebec i think quebec would actually get
00:49:41 their act together and i mean they'd have to overcome a lot of things like they've got all
00:49:45 you know i won't even start to go into it all the compromises that have to be made but
00:49:50 the fact is um people think that they would flop but no they i don't think they would i don't think
00:49:57 they would i think they have a inner moral i i think they have an inner sense of who they are
00:50:01 much more than than many canadians well i don't necessarily agree with you barbara i think that
00:50:07 particularly from an economic standpoint it's hard to imagine how they could function uh as
00:50:12 I think to the contrary, if Alberta were to separate from Canada, the rest of the country would go bankrupt because basically Alberta's resources prop up socialism in the rest of the country and allow the proliferation of government spending throughout the economy.
00:50:29 I mean, same goes with the American security apparatus.
00:50:33 Like if we actually had to secure our own borders
00:50:35 and we lost the sort of nuclear umbrella
00:50:39 provided by the Americans,
00:50:41 I don't think that Canada could have
00:50:42 such a generous welfare state.
00:50:45 And that's so much of a part of the identity.
00:50:48 So I think-
00:50:49 Economically, wouldn't you say that Quebec,
00:50:52 they have untapped natural resources,
00:50:56 minerals, rare earths,
00:50:57 like all kinds of incredible stuff
00:50:59 still in the ground and the electricity they supply the northern states with i mean incredible
00:51:05 hydro uh which means that they could say no to oil and you know a lot of stuff that that other
00:51:12 provinces can't um i i i mean i think it has incredible wealth and it's a port city port
00:51:17 cities always thrive but but there'd have to be a will to actually develop the natural resources
00:51:22 which i mean there's been quotes from quebec premiers going back uh saying that like why
00:51:26 would we develop our natural resources we don't need to um and if they were going to be if they
00:51:31 were going to be a separate country they would that would be i guess we need to now they would
00:51:36 need to yeah and and well maybe that would maybe that would cause them to to to sort of look at
00:51:42 the fiscal picture a little differently because i think without all the transfer payments um quebec
00:51:46 would never have a balance budget a super interesting thought experiment and i think that
00:51:50 you're right when it comes to understanding their identity and protecting their culture quebec is
00:51:54 ahead of the rest of Canada. We can learn a lot, us English Canadians, from our French Canadian
00:52:00 counterparts. So, Barbara, we'll leave it there. We'll have to have you back again to further the 0.62
00:52:04 discussion and the conversation again, but it's always a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank
00:52:08 you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me, Candice. Always a pleasure for me to be here.
00:52:13 All right, so we will leave it at that today. I'm your host, Candice Malcolm. This is the Candice
00:52:17 Malcolm Show. Thank you so much for tuning in. We'll be back again tomorrow with all the news.
00:52:21 Thank you and God bless.