MUST WATCH: Montrealers support communism, anti-Trump party outside French leaders' debate
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Summary
In this episode, we talk to people on the street about the French election debate and what they expect to happen in the upcoming election. We also talk about what they would like to see happen during the debate, and how they feel about the current state of the country.
Transcript
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Alex Zoltan reporting from True North. Today is Wednesday, April 16th. We are covering the
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French election leaders debate from the heart of darkness, the CBC radio building. We're going to
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be talking to people on the street, asking them what are the most important issues in the upcoming
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election, as well as the debate today, and what they anticipate will happen during the French
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debate. The system is outdated. The ideology of the liberal and conservative, I think the people
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don't want that at all. They want to change another philosophy of administration. What about the
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communism party? I noticed that they have a sign up there. Will you be voting for the communist party?
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Communism is more of a deeper understanding of things, okay? The Russian communism, the past,
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they didn't use it properly. It wasn't the right, the right communism, okay? China, same thing,
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borrow. But Karl Marx and his writings, he explained exactly what it should be. But it will take time
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before the general public rise and become more intelligent and understand things. Education
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is very important. Is there anything that you would like to see be asked during the debate?
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I prefer to be with the people and tell the people to wake up. They don't want to make decisions
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in their private lives, okay? Give you an example. Like the city of Montreal, I never bought a car
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because I don't need it, because I'm probably, which is excellent. So what is all these things doing
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in the streets? Well, that's the people. The people have to wake up. Trump is excellent to get the people
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to wake up. Carney, I like Carney. He's bringing Canada kind of in the right direction. He's putting
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his eggs in more baskets, except in one basket. I like that. That's good for Canada.
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What's the most important thing in this election to you? I'd say housing and not becoming,
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not electing another Trump. Personally, I think that, you know, corporations shouldn't be allowed to
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own like housing, like single family houses, houses especially. But I even think in general, like,
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you know, housing units, if they were only allowed to be owned by the people who lived in them, that
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would make a huge difference, obviously. Maybe that's dramatic for our capitalist world, but
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yeah, I mean, you know, the rents are just out of control. And like, I just think that at some point,
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that's hurting our society in a way that I don't hear talked about. I mean, yeah, I guess it's talked
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about, but like, you know, if my rent doubles, I'm not going to have any time to try and start a business
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business or, or, or go to the restaurant or anything really. So I think the housing and
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even commercial rent, you know, crisis adds up to just like stalling society, basically,
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you know, I see the street in my neighborhood, like, go from, you know, having lots of like,
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like, like mom and pop shops and stuff like that to
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Now a lot of the spaces are emptying out because I think they're just asking for
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for too high of rents. And actually, I think commercial property should have more regulations.
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I have a recording studio and you just never know every year, like, is the landlord just going to
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decide I'm going to double your rent and you're out of luck. So like you're investing into a business.
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I've seen it with restaurants, you know, people going in, starting a business, having a successful
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cafe or whatever it is. And then two years later, they're told, Oh, we're going to double your rent.
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So the, what, you know, $100,000 they invested into their kitchen and their decor is just like
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out the window, you know, not even that long ago, people were like, Montreal is awesome. Quebec's
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awesome. Cause we don't have that problem. Like, you know, we used, I used to be like,
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you know, my partner is from the U S I was like, let's just go live in, in Montreal. Cause it's,
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you know, it's cheap. It's great. Uh, and then that kind of just switched so fast. I mean,
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obviously if you buy a building today, you're going to have to rent for a lot because it's so expensive.
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You know, having, it used to not even be a thing to get a con like constant, uh, like a raise,
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like a price price hike or whatever, like each year, you know, like now landlords have started
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sending a letter every year and bringing up the price as much as they possibly can. And that used
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to not even really be like that much of a thing. I remember renting for many years and not having
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my price ever go up, you know, and it just seems to have become a trend wherever all the,
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the landlords just think, Oh, like it's fine. I can now I can just make as much as I possibly
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can out of this, you know, cause if you're, if you own the place and you're renting upstairs,
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you know, you're going to try and treat your, your tenant well, but when it's like anonymous
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corporate landlords or whatever, they don't, they don't care. I think that the problem is just,
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there's just greed, you know, and like uncontrolled capitalism. It's not like,
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it's not like this thing that just can't not like, can't or, you know, can't not happen.
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You know, like, I guess the NDP would be who, who aligns the most with my values, but yeah.
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Who do you think is doing the best job of going against Donald Trump? And who do you think would
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be best prepared to lead the country in negotiations with the orange man?
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The one that has the most knowledge about, uh, you know, economy, not the one that has the most
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knowledge about politics. We could see that politics is just beside now the other, the, uh,
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Canadian. The Canadians are at six o'clock. So they move the Canadian a little bit lower
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to make it sure that everybody will look at it. So, and Trump is not that nice for nothing Canada.
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So I would say, you know, we have to think about that, but even if it's Trump goes to Canada,
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they won't win in Canada because we don't like him. So we'll throw them away.
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So that's the case. You know, we're a little bit like California. California is,
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is the one that likes the most to be, you know, on our side. So let's see what's going on.
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We have been talking to people on the street, in the Metro, all around this neighborhood about
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what are the top issues for them during this election. Top of mind for most people, Donald Trump.
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Second biggest issue I would say is probably housing or more broadly affordability.
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The third biggest issue is the environment. I would say it would be a fair summary of the
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people that we've spoken to. And the fourth biggest issue, surprisingly, Marxism. I believe
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that I actually spoke to a reincarnated version of Karl Marx earlier today, just outside the Metro
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station. Nice enough fella. And yeah, we're just going to see if we can get some more,
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more opinions from this neighborhood. Just asking people on the street today,
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what is the most important issue in this election to you?
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I think it would be like, who can kind of stand up for Canada's sovereignty.
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I sort of feel bad for the parties that I like to vote for, which would be like typically the NDP.
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And I will probably vote for them again because I'm in a neighborhood that's going to go liberal
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anyways. I haven't really listened to a lot of Polyev's talk during the campaign, but I am curious
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how he separates himself from the kind of like right wing Trump ideology. You know, I think
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he's in trouble because he linked himself to that a while ago and now Canadians are really pushing back
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against it and he's stuck. I think it's like part of his brand. The election debate is coming up in just
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a few hours. What are the most important issues to you for this election? Well, probably like almost
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every other Canadian, just to make sure that our values are preserved in this time of great uncertainty.
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I'm going to watch it just to see if somebody slips, but otherwise my opinion is already made.
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Your opinion is already made. You know who you're voting for.
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I'm between NPD and liberal because in my conscription, NPD has a chance to get a seat
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and I don't think it's going to affect the whole outcome of the thing. So I might go that way.
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But if I see that things are a bit too much heated, then I'm going to go liberal.
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It's been an eventful day here in Montreal. We have been walking around the neighborhood,
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asking people questions, what's important to them about this election. Ironically,
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most of the people that we asked happened to be journalists themselves, many of them working for
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the CBC. Several others that we talked to were communists, some of them both. We are now in the
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election center or the election debate center, I should say, the media center for the election.
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And we are waiting for things to begin. We are going to try to ask some of our own questions of the
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major party leaders. From True North, this is Alex Zoltan.