00:36:42.640In general, you know, we've talked about the usefulness of the Senate, particularly since appointments were independent, quote unquote.
00:36:50.240Does this kind of lead credence to the fact that it's independent or is this still kind of, you know, a lot of pomp and circumstance?
00:36:56.420My best story about the Senate, I ran for Cretien in 97 in North Vancouver, and Royce Fritt, now departed, sadly, was a liberal senator at the time.
00:37:06.900And the morning after he called me, you know, and he said, Warren, the three best words in the English language the morning after an election are, good morning, Senator.
00:37:18.180And I guess that's what Charles is, and I guess that's what Charles is feeling this morning, he's a friend of all of us.
00:37:26.820He and I have been friends for years, and I did not know it was coming.
00:37:31.800Like, you could have knocked me over with a feather yesterday.
00:37:34.580So, you know, I wished him congratulations, but I have not wavered from my view that the Senate is an abomination.
00:37:43.160And, you know, I'm glad for my friend and all that stuff, but in a modern democracy, we should not have a body that is unelected making decisions on legislation in the way that the Senate does.
00:38:00.260And, you know, when you go to the United States, as I'm going to be next week, when you tell them we have senators, they say, yes, so what?
00:39:19.340I'm like, what is, people have nothing better to do than dump on someone who's been, you know, a strong public figure for 30 years and has a lot of gravitas.
00:39:27.860And so, you know, people will say these are just patronage appointments as well, even though they're not patronage, but they're partisan.
00:39:35.780The independent senator idea is not a real idea.
00:39:39.600I don't think, I don't consider Charles Adler a liberal, but many of the senators appointed have had liberal roots.
00:39:46.000And there's been a study done to show that it's, you know, far more than conservative.
00:40:45.260It feels at a place in a modern democracy.
00:40:47.380And a lot of times it is kind of a cap on an amazing career for a lot of Canadians as well.
00:40:53.100So it is, you know, it is a place where we do see a lot of people that have done a lot of important work in this country as well.
00:40:59.020But just in terms of just last one here on Adler as well, because you mentioned here, you know, he sounds a little bit more like a liberal nowadays.
00:41:05.380But that's kind of been his contention right with the party over the course of the past 10 years is that it has moved further to the right and he hasn't been afraid to kind of stand up to that.
00:41:13.780Is there something to kind of say about that?
00:41:15.420I don't know that that idea of independence and the idea that you can criticize your party without, you know, being a cancer to your party as well.
00:41:25.200I don't know who wants to take this, Warren or Tasha.
00:41:27.520Tasha, I guess you find yourself in the same place as well sometimes.
00:41:32.380She's one of those people and she's got she's endured some slings and arrows for it.
00:41:39.120She's been prepared to criticize her own party.
00:41:41.360I'm not a member of any political party.
00:41:43.020I don't think it's proper, you know, but, you know, Tasha has been unafraid to criticize the conservatives.
00:41:51.600And, you know, that's what people want to see.
00:41:54.480Like these panels, you know, that like this has got to be the CFRA Sunday morning political panel.
00:42:01.120It's got to be just sort of deconstructed on air here, Andy, is got to be the only panel in the country that has political people on it who don't just regurgitate talking points.
00:42:14.400Like you're the only guy who does that as far as no, you turn on your TV and they're all the same.
00:42:19.660They just sit there and say what their party want them to say.
00:42:23.100And, you know, we need more people like Tasha in public life.
00:42:25.960And that's what the public saying, too.
00:43:19.780And, you know, it's like, OK, if you have nothing better to do, fine.
00:43:23.280But, you know, I think that caring about the country is more important.
00:43:26.680And that's what when I look at someone like Charles Adler, he cares about Canada and has always been there for it.
00:43:32.960And he'll sling his arrows where they deserve to go and he'll give praise where it deserves to go.
00:43:37.960And that doesn't it doesn't have a partisan hat.
00:43:40.340And I think that is actually a great public service because parties need to hear when they mess up from people who might ideologically be on their side.
00:45:20.420So to me, it's symptomatic of his lack of popularity.
00:45:24.300Maybe the RCMP are in the mix, too, saying we don't want you to advertise this event because we can't guarantee your safety because protesters have become crazy in recent days, particularly since October 7th.
00:45:38.640But, you know, if that's the case, then PMO should say, OK, well, we're just, you know, we're keeping that part of his schedule under wraps, you know, because we've got a security issue.
00:46:43.220They don't want to have optics of people booing, throwing things or being like, you know, we've seen some in some cases he's had really rough receptions.
00:46:50.280And protesters and that would make for good visuals.
00:46:58.240And it makes I guess it makes political sense.
00:47:00.340But I guess it's also kind of difficult, I guess, in the same vein, Warren, if you're trying to get a message out and you're trying to, I guess, rebound in the polls here, if you're also kind of hiding at the same time, does it not make this, I don't know, cycle where it's kind of difficult to break out to actually try to.
00:47:13.180I don't know if there is hope that he can break out, but it kind of makes it more difficult, it would seem.
00:47:17.840Well, yeah, no, what you're saying is true.
00:47:19.740If you've got a leader who is popular, but the liberals just don't.
00:47:24.320You know, we saw this in in Toronto in the by-election in St. Paul's where you needed, you know, a microscope to find Trudeau's name on Leslie Church's signs.
00:47:35.720You know, I think they're just recognizing the reality.
00:47:40.500The thing I don't understand is why Justin Trudeau doesn't.
00:47:43.740Like everybody in his party knows they are nearly 20 points behind for more than a year behind Paulieff because of the leader is the main reason.
00:47:53.300There's policies in the mix and scandal and, you know, the usual stuff, but it's mainly him.
00:48:00.000And, you know, they're hiding him in all other ways.
00:48:03.900So, you know, why doesn't somebody have kind of the come to mother chat with Justin and say, hey, look, big guy, it's time to go because the rest of us would like to keep doing this political stuff.
00:48:16.680The Senate appointments, though, yesterday, you know, because Tasha mentioned, you know, she got a lot of vitriol and so did I when we mentioned our friend Charles was being elevated to the Senate.
00:48:27.880And, you know, that may be part of it as well, that we're going to see, you know, Senator, basically people within his office, you know, Katie Telford or whomever elevated to the Senate.
00:48:43.720It's the same thing that you see happen at the end of a lot of prime ministerial tenures.
00:48:48.920Yeah, and we'll see, I guess, how they kind of shake that out of the fence ends up being a little bit more very clearly partisan during the next round of appointments.
00:48:58.120But for right now, I wanted to ask a little bit about Pierre Polyev.
00:49:01.900He's made a, he's made a, a, let me see here, a pledge here, trying to find the right words, to rave tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles by 100%.
00:49:14.720Now, what I found interesting about this is this something that the U.S. has looked at, if not initiated in many senses.
00:49:22.680Yeah, so we've got Justin Trudeau not just kind of putting this off, but kind of dismissing it in many senses, which I thought was fascinating.
00:49:29.220Tasha, I know you've written about this extensively this week.
00:49:31.320What did you make of kind of that reaction over something that we've seen, you know, our biggest, you know, partner in the U.S. kind of already do?
00:49:37.740Well, here, you know, I said Polyev is right.
00:49:40.000Hey, conservatives, I said Polyev was right because I think that it, he's actually, this is the right thing to do, and not just as the U.S. is doing it.
00:49:48.980The dumping of EVs into Canada is not being done for any other reason than basically like the sort of economic warfare that China is waging on all other countries.
00:50:01.000They're would like to see go down, mostly the United States and other Western democracies.
00:50:05.460But in this case, it's to crush the auto industry, which Canada depends on.
00:50:11.860These cars are subsidized by the government.
00:50:14.520And there's also a security issue, and the U.S. is investigating this.
00:50:18.480They are concerned because our cars now come with so many, you know, microprocessors and chips and they're connected to the Internet that this could be used to steal data.
00:50:51.460And I think Trudeau, it's shameful that Trudeau, instead of standing up and saying, yeah, you know, we've got a point, dumps and makes us a partisan thing.
00:50:58.540And dumps over on Polyev for doing that.
00:51:02.560He should have stood up and said, yeah, we're going to do what the U.S. is doing.
00:51:06.060And, you know, Polyev is right, but he doesn't even say that.
00:51:08.960Just we're going to do what the U.S. is doing and moving, you know, end of story.
00:51:12.240Yeah, and Warren, to kind of attach this point here, Trudeau not really taking a stance on the tariffs themselves.
00:51:17.120He's just kind of taking an attack on Polyev and the conservatives against the auto industry saying, oh, you never cared until right now, right?
00:51:23.800Like, now you're worried about EVs, whatever.
00:51:25.600Are you surprised to just dismiss something out of hand like that?
00:51:29.100That's clearly an important issue to both us and our allies.
00:51:34.320And, you know, like, believe me, he's going to end up emulating what President Biden did in May anyway.
00:51:41.140Like, it's just ridiculous because that's what he typically does when it comes to trade matters or diplomacy.
00:51:51.100You know, we end up more, most of the time, maybe Israel's the exception, being in lockstep with the Americans.
00:51:57.200And so I found it mystifying that he would say this because Biden and Polyev are right, you know.
00:52:04.880And by the way, it was smart politics by Polyev to get there first because it, you know, addresses the criticism that on economic and trade policy, he's super right wing.
00:52:20.180So I thought it was smart politics on the conservatives' part.
00:52:23.340Yeah, politically, it didn't seem like there was much you could really grab onto this on this particular issue and kind of hit back on Polyev.
00:52:29.020Maybe that's why Justin Trudeau reacted the way he did in many senses.
00:52:32.420But I wanted to try to sneak at least another story in here.
00:52:35.360Warren, you were writing about this this week, and we've mentioned this a couple of times because you've been kind of looking into some of the nonprofit statuses and charitable statuses of some pro-Palestinian groups that perhaps may be raising some questions to you.
00:52:46.420I noticed your latest story this week.
00:52:56.460So there's definitely a benefit with that.
00:52:58.560And Samidun is a nonprofit in Vancouver led by an American woman who just a few weeks ago stood on the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery and said the following.
00:53:13.520We stand with the brave Palestinian resistance and their heroic and brave action on October 7th, right?
00:53:20.100And so the heroic and brave action that she's referring to, Charlotte Cates, was murder and rape and torture and kidnapping on a massive scale.
00:53:31.140Why is Samidun, this pro-Palestinian nonprofit, given that status in Canada?
00:53:39.440And, you know, particularly as I asked in the column, why is she here?
00:53:44.760She is not a Canadian citizen as far as we know.
00:53:47.540So, you know, I think, again, it is in a sharp contrast this week.
00:53:53.540We've got the Trudeau government decertifying, taking away the charity status of two respected Jewish charities, one of which has been in existence for 100 years, and looking the other way on pro-Palestinian charities or nonprofits who were involved in some stuff that I think anybody would regard as inappropriate.
00:54:16.160So that's a question the Trudeau guys have to answer, and I'll be interested to see if the opposition take that up.
00:54:22.260And I know there's, I guess, quick follow, Warren, there's also just a general murkiness surrounding finances to nonprofits as well.
00:54:28.660It's very hard to track down in terms of where money is coming from, too.
00:54:33.040Yeah, and in the United States, they're much more diligent about this with both respect to charities and nonprofits, and Canada, we're not.
00:54:41.020We just don't know where the money's coming from.
00:54:43.380We don't know where the money's going.
00:54:44.660The story I had in Post Media a few days ago was about four different pro-Palestinian charities that were either directly or indirectly sending money overseas, and it was ending up in the bank accounts of terrorist organizations.
00:55:01.040That's contrary to Canadian law, and we need to stop it.
00:55:04.020And if you are interested in reading more about that, you can read Warren's latest in the Toronto Sun.
00:55:08.300We'll just have to stop there because it's time this morning, but Warren Kinsella, Tasha Carradine, thanks so much once again for taking some time this morning.