Juno News - September 29, 2021


Pastor Artur Pawlowski has been arrested... again


Episode Stats

Length

33 minutes

Words per Minute

181.72577

Word Count

6,078

Sentence Count

320

Misogynist Sentences

7

Hate Speech Sentences

4


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:00:06.660 This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.
00:00:12.720 Coming up, the divisive nature of vaccine passports and the government's COVID enforcement culture.
00:00:18.540 Plus, what does the federal election mean for Western alienation?
00:00:23.280 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.
00:00:26.880 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:00:32.740 This is the Andrew Lawton Show here on True North.
00:00:35.460 Tuesday, September 28th, 2021.
00:00:39.000 Great to have you aboard the program here as we drift further and further into a culture of enforcement and coercion
00:00:46.960 as opposed to the education-first mindset that we're all in this together mindset
00:00:52.120 back when it was just two weeks and not two years to flatten the curve.
00:00:56.080 Most notably, we have Pastor Artur Pawlowski from Calgary landing in Calgary on a private plane
00:01:04.540 and the first thing that happens to greet him on Canadian soil is he's arrested, met on the tarmac, taken into custody
00:01:11.880 and, according to his lawyer, charged with an outstanding contempt charge or something like that.
00:01:18.160 I mean, it doesn't matter at this point.
00:01:19.580 I mean, the whole thing that they used to say about Al Capone is that they couldn't get him on the big crimes
00:01:24.520 so they got him on tax evasion.
00:01:26.780 That's basically what's happening to all of these so-called COVID criminals.
00:01:30.480 They're going to get you no matter what and they're going to keep going after you
00:01:33.560 and keep going after you and keep going after you
00:01:36.080 and it doesn't really matter at a certain point what the underlying charge that sparked it all was about.
00:01:42.860 I saw this in Ontario when the Ontario government was going after churches
00:01:47.160 such as the Church of God in Elmer or other ones in the Waterloo region in eastern Ontario.
00:01:53.440 Pastors that were arrested in Alberta, not just Pawlowski but also others.
00:01:58.420 And the thing about it that was most notable is that at a certain point it's almost cartoonish.
00:02:04.700 Like, I believe that Pastor Jacob Rayom of Trinity Bible Chapel told me at one point
00:02:09.940 that his church had something like $20 million in fines against it
00:02:14.180 and the government just keeps adding more and more
00:02:16.620 and it's not even a real number at that point
00:02:19.380 because there's no way that the church or its leadership can pay it
00:02:23.240 but the government is just going to keep heaping that on them.
00:02:26.560 And that's the problem is that the government isn't interested in the revenue.
00:02:29.720 They want to shut people down.
00:02:31.560 We've, in Ontario now, had a vaccine passport system in place
00:02:36.080 for indoor dining at restaurants and other things for about a week
00:02:40.200 and now there are some businesses that are saying we're not going to do it
00:02:43.980 and they're facing fines upwards of $10 million.
00:02:48.580 And a small business cannot afford a $10 million fine.
00:02:51.840 A small business cannot afford, even in a lot of cases, a $50,000 or $100,000 fine.
00:02:56.700 So what the government is hoping that anyone non-compliant
00:03:00.000 will just cease to operate.
00:03:02.360 And anyone who decides to do their conscientious objection to this
00:03:05.540 at a certain point will, like those churches in Ontario and Alberta,
00:03:10.020 just have the building locked on them.
00:03:13.660 So if you're trying to protest, you might get a few weeks out of it
00:03:16.680 but you're not going to be able to keep it going for all that much longer
00:03:19.940 just knowing how this is happening,
00:03:22.140 knowing that the government is making enforcement the first priority.
00:03:26.400 Now, I will say there have been a couple of examples where it's just been a warning.
00:03:31.360 Chris Skye, who's like a notable anti-masker, anti-vaccine, anti-lockdown, whatever.
00:03:36.740 He seems to be anti-everything.
00:03:38.840 But he had a group of people at a restaurant in my neck of the woods, in London, Ontario.
00:03:43.480 And they were all there with apparently not having shown their vaccine passport,
00:03:47.840 not wearing a mask on the way in.
00:03:49.660 And the restaurant has, believe it or not,
00:03:52.020 they've been chastised by the London, Ontario mayor.
00:03:55.560 The mayor called them all stupid or something like that.
00:03:58.140 But they haven't been fined.
00:03:59.980 They just had to tell the owner of their parent company,
00:04:03.160 because they're a franchise, as well as the city,
00:04:05.340 that, okay, fine, we'll enforce the law moving forward.
00:04:07.880 So they had their fun.
00:04:09.580 I'm looking at an article about Hamilton that says,
00:04:11.760 11 businesses are under active city investigation.
00:04:16.360 The city is supposedly starting with education, but then ramping up to punishment.
00:04:22.580 So one of the women here quoted in this CBC story,
00:04:25.660 Jenna Graham, who owns a restaurant called the Harbor Diner,
00:04:28.880 says that this is segregation.
00:04:30.780 It's no different than pre-civil rights racism.
00:04:33.700 And she's not going to go down this road.
00:04:35.800 Now she can take that principled stand all she wants.
00:04:38.580 Eventually she's going to be forced to make the choice between shutting the doors
00:04:41.900 or going along with it or paying some exorbitant fine that,
00:04:46.080 I mean, I've never been to the Harbor Diner,
00:04:47.480 but I'm guessing the Harbor Diner can't afford to pay.
00:04:49.700 No one can.
00:04:50.600 When you start talking about fines with how many digits is 10,
00:04:53.560 it's 10 digit fines at a certain point.
00:04:56.100 No one can afford that.
00:04:58.620 So this is where we're moving.
00:05:00.540 There's no way to challenge it.
00:05:02.520 There's no way to challenge this.
00:05:04.280 Remember that the Ontario government right now is in this interim phase,
00:05:08.120 where you don't have to use the official Ontario government vaccine passport,
00:05:12.020 which doesn't yet exist,
00:05:13.060 but you just have to show your proof of vaccination.
00:05:15.440 Starting near the end of October, this shifts.
00:05:18.920 And all of a sudden,
00:05:19.900 what you'll have to do is use the government's QR code.
00:05:23.280 And the federal government as well has talked about in December,
00:05:26.580 a temporary vaccine passport coming for international travel.
00:05:30.720 And then in about a year's time,
00:05:33.500 maybe they'll have a permanent one.
00:05:35.000 So we're talking about a mechanism here that goes to almost the beginning of 2023.
00:05:43.060 Government is not interested in making this a temporary way of life.
00:05:48.940 And for all the governments and big tech have talked about needing to curb conspiracy theories,
00:05:54.440 government has done more to foster conspiracy theories than it has done to stop them.
00:06:01.040 Because a lot of these conspiracies that the government has been warning us about,
00:06:04.720 like the permanence of these restrictions,
00:06:06.920 the permanence of vaccine passports,
00:06:08.540 these have materialized.
00:06:10.740 These things are not going to go away.
00:06:14.380 So I'm struggling with this.
00:06:17.200 Because I do not believe that it's fair to take this out on businesses.
00:06:21.640 I really don't.
00:06:22.420 I think it's unfair for the government to force the 14 or 16 year old restaurant host
00:06:26.740 to start checking your vaccine paperwork.
00:06:29.060 But similarly, I think it's unfair for people who object to this
00:06:32.760 to take out their ire on these restaurants and other businesses like gyms
00:06:37.040 who are just trying to get by.
00:06:39.020 So if you're getting angry with the restaurant,
00:06:42.180 don't.
00:06:42.880 Just absolutely don't.
00:06:44.020 It is not their problem.
00:06:45.480 They're trying to get by.
00:06:46.500 We should not allow the government to do what it's trying to do,
00:06:50.460 which is divide people and somehow immunize,
00:06:53.380 no pun intended, itself from the criticism
00:06:55.840 and immunize itself from the anger.
00:06:58.720 And you may say, well, you know,
00:07:00.220 why are more restaurants not protesting?
00:07:02.860 It takes a lot of courage.
00:07:05.520 And more importantly, it takes a lot of self-assurance
00:07:08.040 to do what some of these restaurants are doing right now
00:07:10.460 to say, we're not going to check it.
00:07:11.800 We're not going to enforce that.
00:07:13.140 And I don't blame businesses for not wanting to partake in that fight.
00:07:19.080 Because most of the people that are taking up this fight
00:07:21.380 are going to lose it.
00:07:23.480 And it's a sad reality, but that's going to be the reality of it.
00:07:27.560 So the problem is not the businesses.
00:07:29.340 The problem is the government.
00:07:30.940 And unfortunately, Canadians have, in the last election,
00:07:34.760 endorsed a government that is completely fine with this.
00:07:37.780 And they try to say, yeah, it's up to provinces.
00:07:39.740 But what the Liberals have really done
00:07:41.540 is committed to this idea of stratified society.
00:07:44.940 This is why Justin Trudeau is going down the road
00:07:47.260 of trying to make it mandatory to be vaccinated
00:07:49.280 if you want to fly out to see your grandma in British Columbia,
00:07:52.660 or if you want to hop on a train to go back and forth to school or work,
00:07:56.740 or if you want to work in the government.
00:07:59.580 And it's interesting that this is happening
00:08:01.840 when Justin Trudeau has, and the Liberals in general,
00:08:04.960 have done more to nationalize, I'd say, the economy in the past.
00:08:09.180 So it's not just if you're a federal public servant,
00:08:12.000 but also if you work in a federal sector.
00:08:14.800 So theoretically, when I used to host my daily radio show
00:08:17.500 on a CRTC-regulated radio station,
00:08:20.360 I would have been, or my job would have been,
00:08:21.900 consumed up in this idea, this mandate
00:08:24.840 that the federal government is putting forward,
00:08:27.160 which at this point, interestingly enough, hasn't materialized.
00:08:30.700 It's almost as though Justin Trudeau was trying to use it
00:08:32.700 as a wedge for the conservatives
00:08:34.680 and wasn't actually prepared to go the distance on that.
00:08:37.340 So that's going to be the problem here
00:08:39.580 that we're going to see more and more of,
00:08:41.780 which is people finding that, yeah, vaccines aren't mandatory,
00:08:45.640 but society is closed off, employment is closed off,
00:08:49.440 travel is closed off.
00:08:50.880 All of these things that they would do
00:08:52.760 are no longer able to happen.
00:08:56.500 And the people like Artur Pulaski,
00:08:58.560 and interestingly enough,
00:08:59.640 I spoke about Artur Pulaski a little while ago
00:09:01.920 when that one famous video of him being arrested
00:09:04.140 on the highway took place,
00:09:06.620 and police literally had to carry him,
00:09:09.020 like almost, not hogtied,
00:09:10.380 but it looked like he was hogtied.
00:09:11.900 They had to like carry him to their car
00:09:13.760 because he wasn't going along.
00:09:15.120 And I defended him.
00:09:16.480 I defended him because this is not,
00:09:18.200 in a society that protects freedom of religion,
00:09:20.540 the way members of the clergy should be treated
00:09:23.300 for the sole purpose of deciding to open their churches.
00:09:26.960 And I had people reach out to say,
00:09:28.700 oh, well, you know, yeah, you know, maybe,
00:09:30.340 but have you heard what he said about X?
00:09:32.380 And have you heard his messages?
00:09:33.780 And he's not a guy you should be defending.
00:09:35.600 And I say that's a load of nonsense.
00:09:38.540 If we start saying, well, you know,
00:09:40.680 I don't support his right to have his church open
00:09:44.040 because he might've said something that I disagree.
00:09:45.660 And to be honest, I don't know much about him.
00:09:47.620 I've never met him.
00:09:48.400 I've never interviewed him.
00:09:49.400 I don't care about that game that people like to play
00:09:52.660 of saying, well, you know, yeah,
00:09:54.140 you can't support the right of free speech, for example,
00:09:56.620 of people who use their right to say mean things.
00:09:58.760 I am an absolutist on these things.
00:10:01.640 I support the right of churches and mosques and synagogues
00:10:04.780 and gujaras and temples and any other religious venue
00:10:08.400 to be open.
00:10:09.080 I support the right of businesses to find a way to be open.
00:10:11.960 I support the right of people to speak their mind,
00:10:14.220 even if I deplore what they use their right
00:10:16.860 to free speech to express.
00:10:19.420 So I'm not going to say, well,
00:10:20.820 Artur Pulaski may not be my cup of tea,
00:10:22.640 so I don't care about his rights.
00:10:24.100 It makes me care about it even more
00:10:25.900 because I want the people that don't like the cut of my jib
00:10:29.100 to stand up for my right to free speech
00:10:30.840 when the liberals decide to go after independent media
00:10:34.200 under Bill C-10 or C-36
00:10:36.580 when those things inevitably make a comeback
00:10:38.740 in the upcoming parliament.
00:10:40.400 So when I look at the arrest of Pastor Artur Pulaski,
00:10:45.860 I absolutely think it is egregious.
00:10:48.580 And here's a guy.
00:10:49.160 Now, I may say I'm a little uneasy
00:10:51.780 about a pastor flying private,
00:10:53.360 but these days that's the only way you can get away
00:10:55.700 with apparently not having to worry
00:10:58.080 about being masked in flight or something like that.
00:11:02.040 I was on a flight not that long ago,
00:11:04.340 and I had the flight attendant that wanted you
00:11:06.080 to put your mask on between sips.
00:11:07.620 So, you know what, if I could afford to fly private,
00:11:10.040 I would do it.
00:11:11.100 I can't fault anyone else for doing that.
00:11:13.540 But what Artur Pulaski's lawyer says,
00:11:16.620 Sarah Miller, who's a great advocate for free speech,
00:11:19.360 is that this was a contempt charge,
00:11:21.900 like I mentioned earlier,
00:11:22.880 an outstanding contempt charge
00:11:24.460 of which there are likely many against him.
00:11:27.240 He was released on bail late last night,
00:11:30.660 and he has to keep the peace and be on good behavior.
00:11:33.740 Now, I don't know how the state in this day and age
00:11:35.980 is defining good behavior,
00:11:38.340 but these are the stipulations
00:11:40.000 that have been heaped upon Artur Pulaski.
00:11:42.820 And he scheduled him and his brother
00:11:45.260 to be sentenced on October 13th
00:11:48.440 for the supposed crime of violating COVID-19 health orders
00:11:52.760 and having illegal gatherings and conducting services
00:11:56.320 without mandating physical distancing
00:11:58.520 and mask mandates and all of these things.
00:12:00.540 So here's a guy who's going to be sentenced.
00:12:02.420 Now, I don't know if they're going to put him in jail.
00:12:04.260 I don't know if they're going to give him a steep fine.
00:12:06.380 I don't know if they're going to sentence him
00:12:07.700 to community service or whatever,
00:12:09.560 but that's coming in two weeks.
00:12:12.100 And we as a country still have to reckon with the idea
00:12:15.860 that we have put pastors behind bars
00:12:19.460 under the auspices of preserving
00:12:22.660 and protecting public health.
00:12:25.780 And a lot of people will point to these stories
00:12:27.960 and say, well, these are the reasons
00:12:29.120 we can't get back to normal.
00:12:30.340 No, people protesting Orwellian orders are not the problem.
00:12:36.200 They're not the barriers to reopening,
00:12:38.560 the reasons that we're not reopening.
00:12:40.020 The reasons we're not reopening,
00:12:41.900 the reasons that normal seems like a distant pipe dream
00:12:44.940 at this point is because of governments
00:12:48.020 that are doing everything they can
00:12:50.840 to prevent and delay normal,
00:12:53.560 to make us forget what normal even is,
00:12:56.220 let alone the idea that it's possible.
00:12:58.160 And that's why there is going to be a permanence to this.
00:13:03.140 Look at it.
00:13:03.820 Israel is a great example.
00:13:05.160 Israel was held up as being the successful story
00:13:07.580 for how you roll out vaccination.
00:13:09.400 They had its population vaccinated
00:13:10.940 before Canada was even putting its pants on in the morning.
00:13:13.880 And now in Israel, you are not fully vaccinated
00:13:16.520 unless you've gotten your third booster shot.
00:13:18.960 Some people are going to be looking at fourth booster shots.
00:13:22.300 In parts of Canada, third boosters are already becoming the norm,
00:13:26.520 including in Ontario and Alberta.
00:13:29.380 Now, so far, you don't need a booster
00:13:30.820 to be considered fully vaccinated,
00:13:32.260 but there's going to be a point at which that flips
00:13:34.520 because these have gone on so long,
00:13:37.480 because these restrictions will have gone on so long
00:13:39.800 that the supposed immunity you have from dose one and two
00:13:42.680 no longer applies.
00:13:43.840 And it's the opposite of endemic.
00:13:47.420 When they talk about living with COVID
00:13:48.960 and just treating it as though it's endemic,
00:13:51.080 which Dina Hinshaw in Alberta was pilloried for saying,
00:13:54.480 now it's going to become the permanent pandemic
00:13:56.940 where you need to get your booster shot
00:13:58.940 every three months, every six months,
00:14:00.640 maybe you can get by a year
00:14:01.940 in order to be seen as fully vaccinated.
00:14:05.120 Now, this is something that people should have the right to do
00:14:07.680 if you want that protection.
00:14:08.920 But there are a lot of people that were vaccine hesitant,
00:14:13.840 but ultimately went along with the two shots
00:14:15.800 because of whatever reason,
00:14:17.560 maybe they wanted to be able to dine out,
00:14:19.220 maybe they wanted to travel, who cares?
00:14:21.440 People made their call
00:14:22.460 that are not going to go along with that,
00:14:24.240 then all of a sudden the goalposts have moved yet again
00:14:26.160 and you need a third shot.
00:14:27.820 Or it goes to children even younger than 12.
00:14:31.340 Toronto is, Health Canada has not approved the vaccines
00:14:34.680 for use on children under 12.
00:14:36.700 Toronto is already raring to go.
00:14:39.040 They're itching to start vaccinating kids
00:14:40.780 as young as five years old.
00:14:43.040 So Toronto is saying, yeah, we're ready.
00:14:45.160 Just give us the kids.
00:14:45.980 We're going to vaccinate these five-year-olds.
00:14:47.400 A lot of parents that are very pro-vaccine
00:14:49.660 got vaccinated themselves.
00:14:51.300 I've heard from them.
00:14:52.360 They've emailed me.
00:14:53.180 You've emailed me about this saying,
00:14:55.040 yeah, I was fine getting it,
00:14:56.180 but I am not at all subjecting my child to this.
00:14:59.760 And people are going to have to reckon with that.
00:15:02.080 People are going to make their decisions,
00:15:03.280 but this is not going to happen
00:15:05.180 without schools eventually making vaccination mandatory
00:15:08.840 if you want your kid to go to a public
00:15:11.300 or heck, even a private school.
00:15:13.040 They've already done it with post-secondary institutions.
00:15:15.880 It's going to happen as well
00:15:17.540 to public and perhaps non-public schools.
00:15:21.840 So this is where we are headed.
00:15:24.520 And I'm very supportive of the idea
00:15:27.940 that if you don't start standing firm now,
00:15:31.080 you're not going to get a chance later.
00:15:34.740 And this is why I've said,
00:15:36.200 I'm not at all an anti-vaxxer,
00:15:38.900 but I am a civil libertarian.
00:15:41.460 And we need more people who are fully vaccinated,
00:15:44.100 who are completely okay with vaccination
00:15:46.200 to stand up and say,
00:15:47.160 yeah, but what about choice?
00:15:48.900 And not just this mythical idea of choice,
00:15:51.720 but specifically this idea of choice
00:15:54.020 that's been shared with us
00:15:56.060 for the last year and a half by politicians
00:15:58.000 who say, yeah, yeah, it's never going to be mandatory.
00:16:00.100 We encourage it.
00:16:01.100 We're never going to require it.
00:16:03.380 Well, whatever happened to that?
00:16:05.380 We're all in this together
00:16:06.400 becomes we're arresting you on the tarmac
00:16:08.200 because you want to have church services,
00:16:09.820 which becomes we're fining you $10 million
00:16:11.660 if you don't want to check the vaccine paperwork
00:16:13.900 of people dining at your restaurant.
00:16:15.940 So that we're all in this together
00:16:17.100 has never been a bigger lie than it is right now.
00:16:20.460 We've got to take a quick break.
00:16:22.000 When we come back,
00:16:22.660 more of The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:16:24.140 Stay tuned.
00:16:24.600 You're tuned in to The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:16:30.100 Welcome back to The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:16:32.420 Now that we have the federal election behind us,
00:16:35.340 and I think all the ballots
00:16:36.360 or at least almost all of the ballots
00:16:38.280 have been counted,
00:16:39.320 I wanted to turn to some provincial politics
00:16:42.500 that may have some national implications,
00:16:45.200 specifically in Alberta.
00:16:47.140 In October, Albertans will on October 18th,
00:16:50.140 specifically alongside their municipal elections,
00:16:53.160 vote for Senate candidates,
00:16:54.600 and they'll also vote in a referendum
00:16:56.600 on whether equalization should be abolished.
00:17:00.300 Now, equalization is, of course,
00:17:01.840 the constitutional mechanism
00:17:03.560 that has money taken from the wealthy provinces
00:17:06.680 and redistributed to the poorer provinces.
00:17:09.800 Alberta has always been on the losing end
00:17:11.940 of this transaction,
00:17:12.920 whereas Quebec has always been
00:17:14.180 on the winning end of it.
00:17:15.540 Now, the problem is,
00:17:16.920 even if 100% of Albertans
00:17:18.640 were to vote yes on this,
00:17:21.120 it isn't binding.
00:17:22.120 The constitution cannot be unilaterally changed
00:17:24.920 by provinces,
00:17:25.660 although what the Alberta government
00:17:27.440 has long held
00:17:28.420 and what Premier Jason Kenney has long held
00:17:30.540 is that such a move
00:17:32.280 would at least give a mandate,
00:17:34.220 and there is precedent that says
00:17:36.080 the federal government
00:17:37.180 would have to negotiate in good faith.
00:17:39.760 So if that many people are saying
00:17:41.080 something's got to change here,
00:17:42.600 the federal government
00:17:43.380 would have a legal obligation
00:17:45.220 to at the very least engage with them.
00:17:47.700 So that's where this would be,
00:17:49.040 and Jason Kenney has said
00:17:50.180 the referendum would give
00:17:51.480 a bargaining chip for this.
00:17:53.360 The problem here is that
00:17:54.580 Western alienation
00:17:55.680 in the last federal election
00:17:57.320 didn't really seem to be
00:17:59.280 all that big a thing.
00:18:00.500 And I'm not saying it's not a thing.
00:18:01.660 I'm just saying it didn't manifest as such.
00:18:03.740 The Maverick Party
00:18:04.740 did not do particularly well.
00:18:06.860 Part of that was because
00:18:07.720 they had a small group of candidates,
00:18:09.600 but more importantly,
00:18:10.860 a lot of the narratives
00:18:11.780 that are around the West
00:18:13.320 were not discussed.
00:18:14.420 No one in the federal election
00:18:15.920 was really talking about them.
00:18:17.280 So if you were a Westerner,
00:18:18.440 you didn't really have a reason
00:18:19.640 to get up and start talking about,
00:18:21.980 oh, well, we need to support
00:18:22.860 this candidate or that candidate.
00:18:25.080 Perhaps the absence of this discussion
00:18:26.960 would have moved people.
00:18:28.280 But I know from covering this issue
00:18:30.260 and spending time out West
00:18:31.700 that a lot of people have said,
00:18:33.380 you know what,
00:18:33.780 if Justin Trudeau gets in again,
00:18:35.160 it's done.
00:18:35.820 We're just over.
00:18:36.820 We want to separate.
00:18:37.980 And nothing short of that will work.
00:18:41.320 Jason Kenney, the Alberta Premier,
00:18:42.920 had a press conference last week.
00:18:44.580 And I wanted to put that question to him.
00:18:46.180 Listen, what does the federal election mean,
00:18:48.260 not just for Alberta
00:18:49.160 in the context of the Alberta economy,
00:18:51.700 but specifically,
00:18:52.540 what does it mean
00:18:53.620 when we're looking at
00:18:54.660 how Western alienation will manifest
00:18:56.960 and that upcoming referendum?
00:18:58.620 This is that exchange
00:18:59.620 with Premier Kenney.
00:19:00.920 Good evening, Premier.
00:19:02.480 Curious about what the federal election
00:19:05.240 means for Albertans.
00:19:07.400 We have a growing problem
00:19:08.920 of Western alienation.
00:19:10.340 A lot of people that were on the fence
00:19:11.780 between simply voting yes
00:19:13.760 on the referendum
00:19:14.520 and pushing for a more aggressive
00:19:16.440 independence or separation measure
00:19:18.420 have often said
00:19:20.060 that if Justin Trudeau gets re-elected,
00:19:22.080 that's it.
00:19:22.800 Curious what this means
00:19:23.820 for your plans moving forward
00:19:25.260 with the referendum
00:19:26.100 and trying to keep the peace.
00:19:27.640 Well, I would note, Andrew,
00:19:30.140 that the de facto Western separatist party,
00:19:34.260 the Maverick party,
00:19:35.140 got only about 1% of the vote
00:19:36.960 in Alberta last night
00:19:38.440 and they couldn't even field
00:19:39.660 a full slate of candidates.
00:19:40.820 I think that's probably understates
00:19:45.760 support for separation
00:19:47.100 in this province significantly,
00:19:48.720 but it is a signal
00:19:50.800 that I believe the vast majority
00:19:53.960 of Albertans are frustrated
00:19:55.800 with how the country works.
00:19:59.000 What frustrates them most
00:20:00.700 is the expectation from Ottawa
00:20:04.620 that we generate so much wealth,
00:20:08.060 so much tax revenue,
00:20:09.300 so many jobs,
00:20:10.840 and yet are hampered
00:20:12.200 by policy after policy
00:20:14.240 clobbering our biggest industry.
00:20:16.860 And so that's the heart
00:20:18.500 of the frustration.
00:20:19.280 As you know,
00:20:19.880 it has a long history.
00:20:23.320 And yet, despite that frustration,
00:20:26.820 I believe that the vast majority
00:20:28.800 of Albertans are also proud Canadians.
00:20:32.240 The majority of Albertans went out
00:20:33.680 and voted in a federal election yesterday.
00:20:35.980 And as I say,
00:20:36.880 1% voted for a separatist party.
00:20:39.300 So what Jason Kenney takes
00:20:40.680 from that poor maverick showing,
00:20:42.120 which he concedes likely understates
00:20:43.900 the effect of independence
00:20:45.460 and separation,
00:20:46.660 is that most Albertans
00:20:48.060 are happy to be in Canada
00:20:49.160 and that if they were unhappy,
00:20:51.060 they would have voted
00:20:51.540 for the maverick party.
00:20:52.540 Now, one of the dynamics
00:20:53.720 that I've talked about in the past
00:20:55.200 is that a lot of the independence-minded people
00:20:57.460 are more interested
00:20:58.740 in provincial change.
00:21:00.040 They're more interested
00:21:00.780 in voting for
00:21:01.540 the Wild Rose Independence Party,
00:21:03.820 led by Paul Hinman,
00:21:05.000 who's been on the show
00:21:05.620 a couple of times
00:21:06.400 than they are in seeking
00:21:08.000 a federal alternative
00:21:09.300 in a party that didn't really manage
00:21:11.420 to get off the ground.
00:21:12.940 Now, I mean,
00:21:13.360 we'll see on October 18th,
00:21:14.940 and we'll talk in a moment
00:21:16.100 with someone who's running the campaign
00:21:18.060 or a campaign
00:21:19.200 to get people to vote yes
00:21:20.900 on that referendum,
00:21:22.660 to get yes on that idea
00:21:25.200 of ending equalization,
00:21:26.960 of stripping it from the Constitution.
00:21:28.940 So I would actually be very nervous
00:21:31.360 about doing what Premier Kenney
00:21:33.360 is doing here
00:21:34.300 in downplaying the anger
00:21:36.700 and frustration,
00:21:37.640 especially with the Liberals
00:21:39.520 having been re-elected.
00:21:40.880 Remember, it was a great shame,
00:21:42.860 I think,
00:21:43.180 that Western integrity,
00:21:45.200 Western alienation,
00:21:46.460 keeping the country together
00:21:47.600 was not really discussed.
00:21:49.380 No one cared about it.
00:21:50.580 There was so much oxygen
00:21:51.680 being given to Quebec
00:21:52.620 from the Liberals
00:21:53.480 and the Conservatives
00:21:54.340 and none given to the West,
00:21:56.160 except for some passing references
00:21:57.620 to pipelines
00:21:58.540 which certainly are important
00:22:00.260 to Alberta
00:22:00.960 but are not the be-all and end-all.
00:22:03.600 They're not the exclusive area of focus.
00:22:05.760 Even within the energy sector,
00:22:07.500 pipelines are not the sole area of concern.
00:22:10.760 So we have a Liberal government
00:22:12.380 that doesn't need Western votes,
00:22:14.600 a Liberal government
00:22:15.440 that doesn't particularly care
00:22:16.800 about Western lives
00:22:17.740 and Western jobs,
00:22:18.920 a Liberal government
00:22:19.740 that wants to subject everyone
00:22:21.200 to a carbon tax
00:22:22.540 to vilify the type of energy
00:22:24.680 on which the West relies,
00:22:26.540 and more importantly,
00:22:27.520 a government
00:22:28.020 that is capitulating to Quebec
00:22:29.540 which basically wants
00:22:31.160 to just claim a veto
00:22:32.400 over any energy projects
00:22:34.160 which thinks that
00:22:34.800 it's all dirty energy.
00:22:36.440 And like I said,
00:22:37.220 we'll talk about this
00:22:37.800 in a moment with Kevin Lacey,
00:22:39.140 but the whole point is
00:22:40.280 the West has nothing
00:22:41.900 going for it right now
00:22:43.240 in the federal government.
00:22:44.980 Oh, no, no, no.
00:22:45.580 The Liberals elected
00:22:46.340 a couple of MPs
00:22:47.320 in Alberta.
00:22:48.220 Great.
00:22:48.580 That is not going to do anything.
00:22:50.060 If like Randy Boissoneau
00:22:51.220 is all of a sudden
00:22:51.880 like the Minister
00:22:52.500 of Western Economic Diversification,
00:22:54.940 I don't think anyone
00:22:55.900 in the West
00:22:56.480 will be further ahead
00:22:57.780 than they are
00:22:58.940 prior to that re-election
00:23:00.700 or even had Conservatives
00:23:02.380 managed to win.
00:23:04.000 So all of this
00:23:04.740 just to say
00:23:05.220 it's bad news for the West
00:23:06.620 and right now
00:23:07.320 the only outlet
00:23:08.520 they really have
00:23:09.700 is that referendum vote.
00:23:11.780 But again,
00:23:12.260 it's not binding.
00:23:13.160 It's not compelling.
00:23:14.080 What's going to happen
00:23:15.100 if Justin Trudeau
00:23:16.120 looks at a referendum
00:23:17.440 that was successful
00:23:18.460 and only has to just say,
00:23:20.800 yeah, yeah,
00:23:21.160 I'll hear you out.
00:23:22.360 I mean,
00:23:22.640 bargaining in good faith.
00:23:23.540 He has to sit down with them.
00:23:24.920 It's not compelling any action.
00:23:26.820 So nevertheless,
00:23:27.820 that's not to say
00:23:28.540 it isn't important
00:23:29.320 which is why
00:23:29.900 there has been this campaign
00:23:31.100 launched by Kevin Lacey
00:23:33.220 who is the Alberta Director
00:23:34.420 of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation
00:23:36.200 called Fight Equalization
00:23:38.760 telling Albertans
00:23:40.120 why they should vote
00:23:41.320 against equalization.
00:23:43.000 Kevin Lacey joins me now.
00:23:44.780 Kevin,
00:23:45.080 it's good to talk to you.
00:23:45.860 Thanks for coming on today.
00:23:47.380 Andrew,
00:23:47.720 thanks for having me.
00:23:48.740 So we've got a few weeks left
00:23:50.620 until the referendum.
00:23:51.540 For those who haven't
00:23:52.360 been following it here,
00:23:53.540 I know the question
00:23:54.360 is about removing it
00:23:55.860 from the Constitution
00:23:56.700 but fundamentally,
00:23:58.560 what is really at play
00:23:59.680 here for people?
00:24:00.780 Fundamentally,
00:24:01.300 it's about the unfairness
00:24:02.400 of the equalization formula
00:24:03.800 to the province of Alberta
00:24:05.220 and what the problem is
00:24:07.600 is that Alberta for years
00:24:09.540 has been contributing
00:24:10.640 far more
00:24:11.720 than we've been getting back
00:24:13.320 and you would think
00:24:14.020 that that good,
00:24:15.060 that contributing
00:24:16.360 that amount of money
00:24:17.260 would buy you
00:24:17.980 some goodwill,
00:24:19.100 that it would get you
00:24:19.840 something in return
00:24:20.760 and instead,
00:24:21.540 all we've gotten
00:24:22.240 as a result
00:24:23.280 of all those contributions
00:24:24.380 is we've seen
00:24:25.460 our energy blocked
00:24:26.620 in respect to pipelines.
00:24:28.500 We've battled
00:24:29.380 with British Columbia
00:24:31.140 and Quebec
00:24:31.600 both with regards
00:24:32.720 to getting those pipelines built.
00:24:34.700 We've seen a carbon tax
00:24:36.080 from Ottawa.
00:24:37.080 So we keep contributing
00:24:38.540 and contributing
00:24:39.440 and contributing
00:24:40.260 and being generous.
00:24:42.260 Yet at the same time,
00:24:43.900 provinces
00:24:44.640 and the federal government
00:24:45.660 are basically sticking it to us
00:24:47.780 and not giving us
00:24:50.020 the things
00:24:50.400 that we need to succeed.
00:24:52.220 Yeah,
00:24:52.720 and I think Quebec
00:24:53.340 is a particularly notable
00:24:54.760 example of this.
00:24:55.880 The Quebec government,
00:24:56.840 even an ostensibly
00:24:57.680 conservative government
00:24:58.700 in Quebec,
00:24:59.380 has come in
00:25:00.160 with a very anti-Canadian
00:25:01.680 energy agenda and plan.
00:25:03.580 We have the Premier,
00:25:04.860 Francois Legault,
00:25:05.640 calling Alberta oil
00:25:06.700 dirty energy.
00:25:08.040 Yet Quebec still insists
00:25:09.660 on the money from Alberta
00:25:11.300 that only comes,
00:25:12.360 generally speaking,
00:25:12.980 because of the success
00:25:14.100 of this sector.
00:25:15.760 Well, that's exactly right.
00:25:17.100 And, you know,
00:25:17.540 so the entire equalization envelope
00:25:20.320 is about $20 billion.
00:25:22.020 Quebec gets about $13 billion
00:25:23.820 of that,
00:25:24.220 which means they get 65%
00:25:26.640 of all the equalization dollars.
00:25:28.980 And to put that in perspective,
00:25:30.780 each Quebec resident,
00:25:32.100 that equals about $1,500 per person.
00:25:35.700 That's a lot of money
00:25:36.880 that Quebec is getting
00:25:38.380 from the rest of Canada.
00:25:40.040 At the same time then,
00:25:41.500 Quebec,
00:25:41.920 while it takes this amount
00:25:42.900 of money from Canada,
00:25:44.820 rejects Canada's resources
00:25:46.600 and rejects particularly
00:25:48.640 Alberta's resources,
00:25:49.900 the one that's contributing
00:25:50.960 a large portion
00:25:52.160 of that money to it.
00:25:53.260 Imagine if it was,
00:25:54.420 if, Andrew,
00:25:55.940 you were meeting your friends
00:25:57.500 and you were generous enough
00:25:59.440 to provide them
00:26:01.240 some extra,
00:26:02.560 a little extra cash
00:26:03.420 and then you asked them
00:26:04.100 for a little favor
00:26:04.840 and they told you
00:26:05.440 to go pound sand.
00:26:07.200 That's essentially
00:26:08.140 what Quebec is doing
00:26:09.340 to Alberta.
00:26:09.920 And for years,
00:26:11.400 Alberta's just kind of
00:26:12.700 put up with it
00:26:13.420 and sure,
00:26:14.100 they've made a few statements
00:26:15.240 here and there.
00:26:16.080 This goes way back
00:26:16.860 to Peter Lougheed
00:26:17.700 in the 1980s
00:26:18.800 when Lougheed,
00:26:20.280 during both the Charlottetown Accord
00:26:22.040 and the Meech Lake Accord,
00:26:23.440 put his foot down
00:26:24.280 and said that Alberta
00:26:25.120 wasn't going to contribute
00:26:26.100 more than their fair share,
00:26:28.120 but yet it continued.
00:26:29.880 Then Ralph Klein came in,
00:26:31.900 he stood up to Ottawa,
00:26:33.600 but then the payments
00:26:34.420 kept continued
00:26:35.400 after Klein.
00:26:36.840 Then the government changed
00:26:38.340 and even Premier Notley,
00:26:39.720 who was an NDP Premier,
00:26:41.980 she put her foot down
00:26:43.060 and said this equalization
00:26:44.080 formula is not fair
00:26:44.960 to Alberta
00:26:45.460 and nothing ever changed.
00:26:47.860 So to Jason Kenney's credit,
00:26:49.900 the current Premier of Alberta,
00:26:51.760 he's decided that,
00:26:53.280 look,
00:26:53.600 enough is enough.
00:26:55.480 We can keep going to Canada
00:26:57.180 and complaining
00:26:58.000 about the equalization formula
00:26:59.300 and complaining
00:26:59.840 about what Quebec's saying,
00:27:01.260 but we're not getting anywhere.
00:27:02.900 So we need to go out
00:27:03.980 and have this referendum,
00:27:05.020 which is happening
00:27:05.780 on October 18th,
00:27:07.220 and show Canada
00:27:08.580 that Albertans are mad
00:27:10.420 that their money
00:27:11.080 is being mistreated
00:27:12.140 and they want to see real change.
00:27:14.480 And to be honest,
00:27:15.260 at this point,
00:27:16.040 I'm not sure
00:27:16.560 what is really left
00:27:17.740 for the government
00:27:18.340 of Alberta to do.
00:27:19.620 They're really at a last straw
00:27:21.040 and this is a last ditch effort
00:27:23.160 to try to make
00:27:23.840 some real changes.
00:27:25.160 Is the issue
00:27:26.120 the formula for equalization
00:27:28.140 or the existence
00:27:29.020 of equalization itself
00:27:30.540 with the caveat
00:27:31.260 for those not familiar
00:27:32.320 that actually getting rid of it
00:27:34.320 would require
00:27:34.900 a constitutional amendment,
00:27:36.080 but amending the formula
00:27:37.200 is actually relatively simple.
00:27:39.780 Yeah, I think for us
00:27:41.320 in particular,
00:27:42.040 what we want to see
00:27:42.740 is reform of the system.
00:27:45.180 And we also,
00:27:45.980 I think a lot of this,
00:27:47.000 Andrew,
00:27:47.280 is actually political,
00:27:48.860 which is we want to assert
00:27:50.220 what the grievance
00:27:52.360 of Alberta is
00:27:53.400 in the hope
00:27:54.300 that recipient provinces
00:27:56.020 will understand
00:27:56.920 the position
00:27:57.540 of the province
00:27:58.260 and start to embrace
00:28:00.060 some of the things
00:28:01.100 that is allowing this money
00:28:03.000 to come into their province.
00:28:04.060 So really what I think
00:28:05.520 we're looking for
00:28:06.220 is some goodwill
00:28:07.140 on behalf of many
00:28:08.260 of these premiers
00:28:09.000 who are sticking it
00:28:10.580 to Alberta.
00:28:12.320 So reform is part of it.
00:28:14.300 The equalization question
00:28:15.540 actually asks,
00:28:16.560 do we support
00:28:17.160 removing the constitution,
00:28:19.420 removing equalization
00:28:20.520 from the constitution?
00:28:22.740 And I think that's really
00:28:24.380 the whole point of that
00:28:25.720 is to just kind of
00:28:26.580 lay the marker
00:28:27.440 for what Alberta expects
00:28:29.260 in the upcoming years
00:28:30.240 with regards to
00:28:30.900 continued negotiations
00:28:32.200 on equalization.
00:28:34.440 Yeah, and one thing
00:28:35.640 that I think is important
00:28:36.440 to point out here
00:28:37.240 is that Alberta's obviously
00:28:38.320 had some great times
00:28:39.400 over the years,
00:28:40.220 but in the last few years
00:28:41.700 with the downturn
00:28:42.500 in the sector,
00:28:43.740 the oil and gas sector,
00:28:44.960 which is the predominant
00:28:46.160 source of wealth
00:28:46.780 in Alberta,
00:28:47.420 things have been a bit tough.
00:28:48.660 But the province
00:28:49.260 has still been on the hook
00:28:50.300 for equalization
00:28:51.160 in those more difficult years.
00:28:53.700 Yeah, and that's been
00:28:54.300 a really tough pill
00:28:55.400 to swallow
00:28:56.120 because you haven't,
00:28:57.300 like over the last
00:28:58.020 six and a half year,
00:28:59.320 Alberta's really had
00:29:00.420 a rough go.
00:29:01.380 And many, you know,
00:29:02.440 at one point
00:29:03.040 we were in double digits
00:29:04.080 in unemployment,
00:29:05.380 one of the highest
00:29:06.340 unemployment rates
00:29:07.040 in all of Canada.
00:29:10.480 So we've had
00:29:11.180 a really rough time.
00:29:12.720 Some of that is
00:29:13.580 as a result of
00:29:14.680 poor policies
00:29:16.740 out of Ottawa.
00:29:18.080 Some of that
00:29:18.580 is also related
00:29:20.160 outside the border,
00:29:21.380 which is just
00:29:21.860 the cost of energy
00:29:23.360 and the price of oil.
00:29:26.160 But families
00:29:27.340 Sevilla had
00:29:27.860 a really hard time.
00:29:29.060 The province
00:29:29.860 has not had the money
00:29:30.720 to fund, say,
00:29:31.460 schools and hospitals
00:29:32.780 and building new roads.
00:29:35.280 Yet they see
00:29:36.240 down a few,
00:29:38.180 you know,
00:29:38.460 down a few flights
00:29:39.660 away in Quebec,
00:29:41.120 things are going
00:29:41.800 really, really well.
00:29:42.920 And meanwhile,
00:29:43.820 our money,
00:29:44.400 when it's needed
00:29:44.880 here at home,
00:29:45.560 is going to
00:29:46.340 a province like Quebec,
00:29:47.780 which doesn't need it.
00:29:49.340 So that's the type
00:29:50.780 of reform
00:29:51.380 that I think
00:29:52.040 we need to see.
00:29:53.720 And I think
00:29:54.080 if you're one
00:29:54.620 of those families
00:29:55.240 that's struggling
00:29:55.860 to make ends meet
00:29:56.760 and watching
00:29:57.560 your tax dollars
00:29:58.280 go to other parts
00:29:59.080 of the country
00:29:59.540 while at the same time
00:30:00.460 your schools
00:30:01.100 are suffering,
00:30:02.320 you've got a big
00:30:03.260 problem with that.
00:30:04.840 Yeah, and I know
00:30:05.880 that just looking
00:30:06.580 at the numbers here,
00:30:07.360 you mentioned
00:30:07.780 how much
00:30:08.320 the average Quebecer,
00:30:09.820 how much it works
00:30:10.480 out to be on average
00:30:11.440 that a Quebecer
00:30:12.540 is receiving from this.
00:30:13.640 On the flip side
00:30:14.420 of it,
00:30:14.740 you have the average
00:30:15.540 Albertan
00:30:16.100 having to pay
00:30:18.840 $600,
00:30:19.780 I believe it is,
00:30:20.640 on this.
00:30:20.920 $3 billion a year
00:30:22.040 that the province
00:30:22.640 is spending.
00:30:23.180 And if you're
00:30:23.420 an Alberta taxpayer,
00:30:24.640 that's $3 billion
00:30:25.700 that's not going
00:30:26.420 to fix the roads,
00:30:27.360 that's not going
00:30:27.880 into the healthcare system,
00:30:28.980 which we've been hearing
00:30:29.620 a lot about in Alberta,
00:30:31.040 that's not going
00:30:31.640 into schools.
00:30:32.260 That's a lot of money.
00:30:33.720 Yeah, and then
00:30:34.320 the fiscal situation
00:30:35.400 here isn't that hot either.
00:30:37.600 And, you know,
00:30:38.340 that's maybe a debate
00:30:39.220 for another show
00:30:39.920 of how we ended up there.
00:30:42.240 But given that
00:30:43.440 Alberta families
00:30:44.520 are struggling themselves,
00:30:46.540 and I think
00:30:46.980 if most families
00:30:48.700 and most Albertans
00:30:49.560 are willing to be generous
00:30:50.600 with the rest of the country,
00:30:51.740 they have been
00:30:52.220 for many, many years.
00:30:54.200 But given these tough times
00:30:56.080 when everyone else
00:30:57.680 is cutting back,
00:30:58.980 the equalization formula
00:31:00.080 actually with the way
00:31:00.980 it's set up
00:31:01.460 is going to increase
00:31:02.540 over the next few years.
00:31:03.740 So this commitment
00:31:04.620 that Albertans are under
00:31:06.700 at a time
00:31:07.340 when they don't have
00:31:08.020 any money
00:31:08.380 is actually just increasing.
00:31:10.240 And that puts a strain
00:31:11.960 on the public services
00:31:13.060 even higher
00:31:13.860 and makes it more difficult
00:31:15.520 to take that this money
00:31:17.020 is being sent to Ottawa.
00:31:18.600 So let's talk about
00:31:19.660 the campaign itself.
00:31:20.820 I'm assuming you're doing
00:31:21.440 more than just chatting
00:31:22.280 with me,
00:31:22.740 although I love
00:31:23.520 having you on the show.
00:31:24.660 What are you going
00:31:25.220 to be doing
00:31:25.560 between now
00:31:26.220 and October 18th?
00:31:27.680 So we've launched
00:31:28.580 a separate society
00:31:31.420 called Society
00:31:32.160 for Albertans
00:31:33.620 Against Equalization.
00:31:35.180 We're going to be
00:31:35.920 heading out
00:31:36.500 and campaigning
00:31:37.300 on the road
00:31:37.960 trying to convince
00:31:39.120 Albertans to vote yes
00:31:40.520 in this referendum
00:31:41.420 to remove equalization
00:31:43.880 from the Constitution.
00:31:45.860 We've just launched
00:31:46.740 new radio ads
00:31:47.640 that are on our website.
00:31:48.820 Feel free to check them out
00:31:50.380 that are talking
00:31:52.700 about this issue.
00:31:53.720 Our new billboards
00:31:54.440 will be going up
00:31:54.980 later on in the week
00:31:55.840 and we'll be continuing
00:31:57.340 to do things like
00:31:58.280 you and I are doing today,
00:31:59.600 Andrew,
00:31:59.780 just to try to talk
00:32:00.580 to more and more Canadians
00:32:02.080 and more and more,
00:32:02.840 particularly Albertans,
00:32:04.040 about getting out to vote
00:32:05.240 on October 18th,
00:32:06.480 voting yes
00:32:07.200 in the referendum
00:32:08.800 and finally
00:32:10.260 standing up for Alberta
00:32:12.060 so that Alberta
00:32:13.100 can make a stand
00:32:14.080 and don't continually
00:32:15.420 see our money go
00:32:16.480 to when our money
00:32:18.420 is not respected.
00:32:20.000 And what constitutes
00:32:20.740 a win for you on this?
00:32:22.820 I think, look,
00:32:23.680 I think we're going
00:32:24.760 to have to see
00:32:25.240 election night
00:32:25.920 what the win is.
00:32:27.840 These, let's be honest,
00:32:30.120 referendums in Canada
00:32:31.180 are always unpredictable
00:32:32.240 and there's a lot
00:32:34.040 of politics going on
00:32:35.960 in Alberta
00:32:36.400 that's far outside
00:32:38.180 of the referendum
00:32:39.000 but really anything
00:32:40.500 over 50%
00:32:41.360 is a victory for us.
00:32:42.840 Yeah, that's the majority
00:32:43.660 of Albertan saying
00:32:44.520 that they can't really
00:32:45.300 abide by the status quo.
00:32:47.000 So, very well said.
00:32:48.200 You can find out more
00:32:48.960 about the campaign
00:32:49.680 at fightequalization.ca.
00:32:51.740 Kevin Lacey
00:32:52.240 is the campaign director
00:32:53.820 and Alberta director
00:32:54.800 for the Canadian
00:32:55.620 Taxpayers Federation.
00:32:57.000 Kevin, thanks for coming on today.
00:32:58.180 Good to talk to you as always.
00:32:59.280 Thanks for having me.
00:33:00.500 We will certainly be covering that
00:33:02.300 in the weeks to come.
00:33:03.460 My thanks to all of you
00:33:04.420 for tuning into the show
00:33:05.660 and to Kevin Lacey
00:33:06.960 for coming on.
00:33:07.800 We will talk to you later this week
00:33:09.300 with more of Canada's
00:33:10.540 most irreverent talk show.
00:33:12.020 Thank you, God bless
00:33:12.860 and good day to you all.
00:33:14.520 Thanks for listening
00:33:15.200 to The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:33:16.720 Support the program
00:33:17.440 by donating to True North
00:33:18.680 at www.tnc.news.
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