Off the Record - Liberals blame Stephen Harper for everything

00:00:00.000 i saw that like conor mcdavid did like this video where he gave a tour of his have his home in

00:00:04.960 edmonton was pretty nice i'd love there i would imagine so he he got a lot of flack over that

00:00:11.520 video because i don't know he people like oh this guy has no personality and he's just so

00:00:16.320 he's a hockey player he doesn't need to have a personality he's like one of the world's best

00:00:20.000 hockey players and then something funny happened later in an interview this was months later someone

00:00:25.040 asked him about shoveling his his driveway and he's like uh i got heated driveways i don't need

00:00:29.280 to shovel living the dream yeah i love this idea that rich people shouldn't actually spend their

00:00:37.280 money on anything all right guys let's get it started hey everyone welcome back to off the record our

00:00:53.040 friday fun show i am joined today by my true north colleagues william and isaac thank you both for

00:00:59.680 being here thanks for having us yeah thanks for having me as well i'm sure the audience is familiar

00:01:06.000 with with both of you at this point i think you're regular stalwarts on off the record and uh you know

00:01:11.600 some weeks it's less spicy news and other weeks but this week i think we have one of like the biggest

00:01:16.000 news stories of the year where two men in toronto were planning a terrorist attack and incidentally

00:01:23.600 one of the man one of the men had been given canadian citizenship and was later found that

00:01:27.200 he had been allegedly tied to an isis plot and so now questions are swirling um if um you know how he

00:01:34.400 got into canada how he got his citizenship there you know is allegedly a video of him hacking a body i

00:01:39.200 believe and you know people are saying that he was a part of aggravated assault and so obviously this

00:01:45.360 seems like a pretty big miss from the federal government that he was able to come into canada

00:01:49.440 first of all and second of all that he was granted citizenship and i'm personally not terribly surprised

00:01:54.400 to see this because we're letting so many people into the country and the liberals have really ramped up

00:01:59.200 immigration and i think all of us have kind of been watching this very warily saying we're letting

00:02:03.600 too many people in and these people are not going to be properly vetted because we just can't

00:02:07.920 you know keep up with the pace of people that are coming here this is sort of blown up for the

00:02:12.000 liberals this week because i think it really speaks to the frustration that canadians are feeling about

00:02:16.480 immigration right now people are very concerned people are looking at what's happening in the uk

00:02:20.640 they're wondering if something like that could happen in canada and then this story happens

00:02:24.480 and everyone's sort of you know worst worst fears are confirmed that there are people who are living

00:02:28.800 in canada that haven't been properly vetted that want ill for canadian people in this case

00:02:33.280 planning a terrorist attack in toronto which thankfully the police caught before it

00:02:37.760 happened and you know the liberals are now saying they're looking at revoking this man's citizenship

00:02:42.800 but um instead of taking responsibility for the action the liberals are trying to blame former

00:02:50.400 conservative prime minister stephen harper who hasn't been in power for nine years now and uh it's just

00:02:56.400 absurd so here's you know jennifer o'connell speaking about this in a house committee hearing 0.98

00:03:00.960 this week here is is jennifer o'connell blaming stephen harper's government for this absolute failure 0.99

00:03:07.360 i am very pleased to see the conservatives finally realize that their cuts have consequences and

00:03:15.600 previously under the harper government when they cut more than a thousand cbsa employees um at the time

00:03:24.240 the president of the customs and immigration union said quote there will be little and in some cases

00:03:31.040 potentially no investigating or surveillance being done to keep these criminals out of the country

00:03:37.440 and out of our communities 410 also said if the government doesn't change the course and withdraw

00:03:43.920 its plan to implement these cuts the federal government will be putting the national security

00:03:49.360 and public safety of our communities at risk end quote this is precisely why we've been making

00:03:56.560 reinvestments to staff up cbsa to deal with the previous conservative cuts and it's exactly why we

00:04:04.240 continue to make investments through the budget through the fall economic statement which conservatives

00:04:10.320 voted against so we look forward to having these meetings so conservatives can truly appreciate

00:04:16.000 that their cuts have consequences to our national security and the safety of our communities so we

00:04:22.720 are very supportive of these amendments and having that conversation so obviously o'connell is trying to

00:04:29.520 redirect take the attention off of the massive failure of her government and and put it back on the 1.00

00:04:34.560 conservatives william do you think that she's doing this successfully is this something people are

00:04:38.960 actually going to believe yeah i mean nine years is a long time i i think people are starting to really

00:04:47.440 not even remember the harper government in any any you know real sense or clear sense uh just you know

00:04:54.560 an interesting point i suppose it's at least debatable whether or not the harper government uh could or

00:05:01.360 should have done more to prevent the entry of this person uh even though they they entered the country 0.95

00:05:07.440 after the liberals took power in 2015 but it was very much the liberal government that decided to

00:05:13.760 grant citizenship and allow this person to remain in canada which would have been years after that

00:05:19.520 and they would have been empowering years and so i think it's really very uh ironic to see a liberal

00:05:26.160 government trying to blame the harper governments for something that they were clearly responsible for

00:05:31.520 the fact that they're being this desperate the fact that they're trying to pin the blame on

00:05:35.440 someone who hasn't been in office as you stayed for nine years i think reflects a large amount of

00:05:41.360 the desperation they're feeling in terms of their flagging poll results particularly around issues

00:05:46.640 like immigration where they are so off base with where the rest of the canadian population is

00:05:53.200 yeah i think you raise a really good point we were talking just before this show started about

00:05:57.680 justin trudeau during when he was running for when he was running to be prime minister back in 2015 and

00:06:02.960 you know that infamous clip of him debating stephen harper and they're talking about citizenship and

00:06:07.200 harper saying that people who are involved and in sort of these these terrorist incidents should

00:06:11.840 not be given citizenship in canada or in cases their their citizenship should be revoked and just as

00:06:16.000 a canadian is a canadian is a canadian is a canadian is a canadian is a canadian is do you think that

00:06:19.440 that is something the prime minister would say today given the level of scrutiny that canadians are

00:06:25.440 looking at immigration with definitely not you know canada i think historically has been pretty

00:06:33.920 pro-immigration not not only from a a federal policies perspective but from a citizenship

00:06:38.880 perspective in that most canadians uh throughout history i think have been uh favorable of immigration

00:06:44.720 but unfortunately prime minister justin trudeau with his uh deeply flawed policies has kind of turned

00:06:51.200 the tables on that i mean look they're bringing in millions of people a year not none of our social

00:06:57.440 programs can support that and and when you bring in people in such a high volume obviously there are

00:07:02.800 going to be a few bad apples that fall from the tree and something i wanted to add as well was that

00:07:09.360 i remember the parliamentary budget officer he released a report a few months ago which was about uh

00:07:15.040 federal departments and bonuses and but more more importantly their goals were they meeting their

00:07:20.080 goals none of them are none of them are are doing an adequate job as themselves have have uh determined

00:07:27.440 to be so uh obviously that would apply to immigration as well and that beat that being the borders so uh is

00:07:35.360 every single person coming into canada the millions per year being vetted properly uh i would estimate no

00:07:43.680 and just if i could add rachel you know the the whole idea of a canadian is a canadian is a canadian

00:07:49.040 well when you immigrate to this country and become a citizen you take an oath of loyalty

00:07:54.720 you make a solemn vow to be loyal to your new country and to abide by the values of that country

00:08:02.240 committing an act of terrorism is a complete breaking of that oath and so therefore i think

00:08:08.160 the government will be well within its rights to rescind it on the idea that you did not fulfill the

00:08:13.360 commitment you made uh in front of the government and god when you became a citizen of this country

00:08:20.160 so for the prime minister to play like just you know play games like oh a canadian is a canadian

00:08:25.120 canadian well a terrorist is a terrorist is a terrorist and if you've committed an act of

00:08:29.200 terrorism i think canada will be well within the rights to revoke your citizenship and send you packing

00:08:35.200 very well put william you know one of the other aspects of this controversy that

00:08:39.040 just kind of bothered me as i felt like it was a little bit misguided from the liberals to put

00:08:43.360 jennifer o'connell as the lead on this i mean i'm surprised her answer wasn't something like boo

00:08:47.840 who get over it this is like not a serious political player i don't think that she's trusted

00:08:53.040 with the canadian people i think she often acts in bad faith and so to see her you know putting the

00:08:58.320 blame back on stephen harper is not surprising to me and i think she's really lost a lot of respect

00:09:03.840 among the canadian people because she's always playing political games and i don't think she 1.00

00:09:07.360 actually wants to see solutions i don't think she's working towards solutions there are some

00:09:11.680 parliamentarians who are better at working with the other side and do so in in good faith and there

00:09:17.120 are others who are only interested in playing politics and she is one of those who's only ever

00:09:20.400 interested in playing in politics and you know we put a compilation together of some of some other bad

00:09:24.800 actors within the liberal party who can can't help themselves and every time there's criticism of

00:09:29.440 their government they blame they blame stephen harper who as we said hasn't been in power

00:09:33.520 for nearly a decade take a look take a look at this i think it's important to remind people that

00:09:39.360 when we formed the government in 2015 there were absolutely no measures in place to detect disrupt

00:09:46.640 and counter foreign interference in the electoral context mr poliev was minister of democratic institutions

00:09:53.680 two years in 2013 cesus publicly identified the risk of interference in democratic processes the

00:10:01.120 previous conservative government did absolutely nothing under my watch personally i've been in

00:10:05.360 this role for about six and a half months i've appointed 64 judges so far and more there are more

00:10:09.840 to comes and the average year under the harper government they appointed 65 per year so on

00:10:14.880 that metric alone i'm working twice as fast as the harper government so that's the first point

00:10:18.160 would the conservatives actually like to know that since 2006 the five years with the highest

00:10:24.960 amount of car thefts in canadian history was under the stephen harper government in 2015 stephen harper

00:10:33.120 presented a budget that had slashed funds for policing slashed funds uh for cbsa officers a

00:10:40.800 slash funding for veterans affairs services and we were there to clean up the mess 0.90

00:10:48.240 i have to say that i really don't think jennifer o'connell wants to be playing the game about 0.99

00:10:52.880 in under which government where car thefts were i can assure you that back in 2015 i was in high

00:10:57.920 school at the time there were no reports about people in toronto taking desperate measures like

00:11:04.320 putting poles at the end of their driveway to stop criminals from driving off with their vehicles that

00:11:08.480 wasn't the reality then back in 2015 there wasn't certain parts of the country that i actively wanted

00:11:13.440 to avoid because i was worried if my vehicle was at a gas station and i was filling up that someone

00:11:18.320 might come along and carjack it things have changed drastically obviously people are feeling

00:11:22.240 much less safe they were now than then but but isaac what's what's your take on this whole situation i

00:11:26.320 mean do you think that this is just sort of par for the course in politics that the new government's

00:11:31.360 always going to blame the previous government when something happens or do you think that there is

00:11:34.800 maybe a window where that's fair to do you know maybe in the first two years maybe depending on the

00:11:39.920 issue a little longer and after that canadians are like you've been in power for over five years now

00:11:44.880 you know it's time to take responsibility for your government's action what would the timeline on that look like

00:11:49.200 yeah uh for just answering the first part of your question i don't know that it's par for the course

00:11:55.760 in politics per se but i definitely think it's par for the course for the liberals uh when when we were

00:12:01.920 talking about compiling a compilation of the liberals uh bashing or blaming the stephen harper

00:12:09.120 government for their mistakes i i was immediately thinking oh there must be hundreds of examples because

00:12:14.400 i'm just thinking of the the many press conferences i've watched over the years i mean i i feel like

00:12:19.200 the liberals do that on a weekly basis almost is blame the harper government or at least in some

00:12:26.880 way the conservative or polyethra government as for the window uh yeah that's a tough one you know

00:12:32.960 i think it really varies on the issue obviously here we were talking about a terrorist who came

00:12:39.600 uh into canada under the liberals's watch so i mean at that point you think you at least have

00:12:45.520 to take some of the accountability even if it is in reality a shared responsibility which i don't even

00:12:50.640 know if it is but the liberals taking accountability for any mistakes or errors that they make is not

00:12:57.280 something i often see them do they they instead of take accountability deflect the blame to others uh so

00:13:04.240 yeah i think that there's probably some room when you form government to say listen we're trying to

00:13:09.200 fix these issues that were created by the previous government but truthfully i think that canadians

00:13:14.560 writ large are not really interested in these types of excuses and it's in the best interest of any

00:13:19.440 government to do that as little as possible and if you are going to do that you need to clearly explain

00:13:24.400 what your plan is to fix these solutions in a timeline as to when we could see these issues being

00:13:28.240 abated i think it's used far too often in politics and in politics as an excuse for governments

00:13:33.280 not to be held accountable for their crappy and ineffective policies but while we're on the

00:13:37.840 topic of bad actors william true north commission to poll i know that you have the juicy details on

00:13:44.080 this what have we learned about the cbc this week yeah well the cbc and its quest to become ever more

00:13:51.200 hated by canadian taxpayers did another great job of convincing taxpayers that they're getting absolutely

00:13:58.320 fleeced uh when it comes to how their money's being spent they decided to pay their

00:14:02.880 bonus their executives big multi-million dollar bonuses 18.4 million in bonuses despite the fact

00:14:10.960 that according to their own analysis fewer and fewer people are actually watching cbc particularly cbc news

00:14:21.120 so uh i don't know what the metric is to decide whether or not bonuses are warranted you would think

00:14:27.600 people actually watching cbc might be one of the factors considered but as it turns out nobody is

00:14:34.880 watching cbc but but that didn't stop them from giving themselves an awful lot of our money as a job

00:14:40.560 well done in their view i think we see this time and time again when the government when something's

00:14:47.840 funded by the government whether it's a government entity or simply receiving government subsidies all

00:14:52.080 of a sudden there's no need for that entity to actually be successful because the government

00:14:56.880 dollars have been promised and they almost always keep coming anyways isaac was just talking about

00:15:01.840 this with the report from the parliamentary budget officer who found that you know government services

00:15:07.360 were not meeting their criteria they were not doing what they set out to do and the people who are

00:15:12.000 responsible for them are not facing any consequences for their actions oftentimes because it has to do with

00:15:16.640 protection in unions and things like that but instead in this case they're being given radical budgets and i

00:15:21.440 can't help but look at the story and wonder you know does the cbc could they help themselves a little

00:15:27.520 bit if they were to turn off the tops on the budgets maybe canadians would have more sympathy for this

00:15:31.840 or maybe this is just a situation where they actually see the writing on the wall they they see that it's

00:15:36.640 going to be a conservative government canadians the public has largely turned against them and they're

00:15:41.440 just trying to take everything they can on the way out what do you think isaac yeah something i wanted to

00:15:47.120 add quickly was obviously these bonuses come after recently laying off it was seven or eight hundred

00:15:52.880 employees so i mean that that timeline of events really doesn't make any sense to me how can you go from

00:15:58.240 laying off employees to dishing out tens of millions of dollars in bonuses as for the cbc taking 0.83

00:16:06.480 accountability i i don't even think it's really a possibility when they're getting the amount of funding that they are which is yes 1.4

00:16:13.120 billion dollars a year you're never going to have to be accountable because you can essentially deliver

00:16:19.440 a poor service uh your your ratings can all go down you the money keeps coming in and more and more of

00:16:26.080 it so why would you adapt to the ever-changing market that is the media industry which obviously

00:16:31.920 the cbc hasn't done which is why more canadians are coming to independent outlets like true north

00:16:38.080 instead of government funded taxpayer subsidized outlets like the cbc

00:16:44.640 yeah and we actually look at the bonuses correct me if i'm wrong william but wasn't it like an average

00:16:48.720 of 74 000 like that's more than an average canadian makes in a year so we're looking at all the bonuses

00:16:55.040 that were laid out after people were laid off it's like why couldn't those bonuses simply have been used

00:16:58.720 to keep employees on the payroll for longer no you're absolutely right i mean it is just laughable

00:17:03.840 that a bunch of cbc bigwigs sat around the board table and said i think we've done a terrific job 0.53

00:17:09.120 let's give ourselves bonuses um now we by the way we three aren't the only three who agree that

00:17:15.920 something is deeply wrong at the cbc true north commissioned a poll uh that was performed by one

00:17:21.600 persuasion and it found that more than 60 percent of canadians are in favor of either partially defunding

00:17:28.560 or fully defunding the canadian broadcasting corporation uh only a only a a minority of

00:17:35.520 people were in favor of maintaining the full funding for the cbc fewer than four in ten so

00:17:42.080 the fact that more than 60 percent of the country agree that cbc should not be fully funded i think is

00:17:49.040 very strong message to uh mr polyevra saying you had better do something about the cbc when you get

00:17:55.920 elected to office and i will say at a personal level if the cbc remains intact exactly the way it

00:18:01.360 is right now after the polyevra government has done its first term in office i personally will be very

00:18:07.200 disappointed in them and their lack of action yeah william i think that's a good point to raise is that

00:18:13.120 often we see you know conservatives running for office they they come out with these very strong

00:18:18.160 conservative positions and policies and then once they're elected with that typical move to the center

00:18:23.040 and a lot of their promises are abandoned you know we we saw this obviously with aaron o'toole

00:18:27.520 when he was running for conservative leader very conservative once he became the conservative leader

00:18:31.520 he was much more centrist and uh i think the party and the conservative base rightfully lambasted and

00:18:37.360 eventually tossed him for that but uh you know polyev has been very strong i think if you've ever been

00:18:43.360 to a pierre polyev rally or if you've seen one you you'll notice he always has that call to defund the cbc he

00:18:50.240 usually talks about it in the context of the housing crisis he'll say you know i can't i can't wait to

00:18:55.440 see a young family moving into the cbc headquarters in ottawa after i've defunded it talks about how he

00:19:01.760 wants to convert into housing and that typically gets the largest cheer like no matter what he says

00:19:06.320 in a given rally that is a thing that riles people up most is the thought of him defunding the cbc and um

00:19:14.160 you know he's gonna have to do something about it if he wants to hold on to his base i guess isaac

00:19:17.840 now turning to you conservatives are up in the polls 20 points everyone's expecting a conservative

00:19:22.880 government at this point do you think that pierre polyev would follow through on on that promise to

00:19:28.000 defund the cbc in some capacity yeah even when william was talking about after the first time i was

00:19:34.320 thinking to myself there's absolutely no world i can see wherein pierre polyev doesn't defund the cbc

00:19:42.320 with as quick as he possibly can obviously there are some processes he may have to go through but uh

00:19:47.600 this has obviously been one of his largest talking points uh i don't know axe attacks

00:19:52.640 defund the cbc and you pick the third most popular but look yeah you can't you can't

00:19:59.600 uh focus on something so much during your election campaign and then not follow through with it i mean

00:20:05.840 that's just obviously a recipe for self-destruction and i i don't see why polyev would even consider

00:20:13.040 that for for for a millisecond i i and i really think he is not only uh talking about it a lot

00:20:19.920 on his election campaign but actually deeply passionate about defunding the cbc it's something

00:20:23.760 he actually wants to do so then then why wouldn't he go and follow through with it right yeah and it

00:20:29.840 makes sense for him from a political standpoint as well uh not just because he's promised this to

00:20:34.400 canadians to conservatives but also because we know that the cbc and its coverage of the

00:20:39.120 conservatives will essentially be campaigning for the liberals so you know if he was able to to get

00:20:43.760 rid of some of that coverage that would be a very good thing for for his government should he be

00:20:48.640 elected and certainly first party either way um i think you know when we're talking about the cbc and

00:20:54.000 the criticism of them doling out these donuts is another big criticism of them was isaac i know this is

00:20:58.480 more your wheelhouse i'll let you speak to this but didn't they recently refuse to stream some of the nhl

00:21:03.840 games and you know that's something that canadians like would all obviously want to watch like i don't

00:21:08.720 even watch hockey i'll be totally transparent with you i don't watch hockey but i would totally flip on

00:21:13.200 the nhl game if it was easily accessible to me and and i if i'm not mistaken was that not a big

00:21:18.880 controversy from just a few weeks ago yeah it was even so big that it made it to a a committee debate

00:21:25.680 and obviously i wrote about that story a while ago but uh just from my memory i mean it's kind of

00:21:31.440 complicated in the sense that sportsnet holds the exclusive rights to stream nhl games but

00:21:36.560 they have a partnership that basically says the cbc can stream nhl playoff games whenever they want

00:21:42.880 and and then the big the big debate about around the cbc not streaming in this instance was the

00:21:47.840 oilers games and even worse yet when the oilers were playing the vancouver canucks they didn't

00:21:52.800 stream some games that's two canadian teams right so and and people were were listing the shows they

00:21:57.920 were streaming instead which was like random reruns and i mean they're like oh we committed

00:22:01.840 to these shows but really that's more important than an nhl playoff game and all the while the

00:22:08.400 nhl playoff games were setting viewership records bringing in tens of millions of viewers and i can

00:22:13.040 only imagine a handful of people watching what the cbc was streaming at the time

00:22:19.760 yeah i was just gonna laughingly say maybe they worried that too many people would start to watch the cbc

00:22:25.920 because apparently having viewers isn't a priority for the canadian broadcasting corporation at least

00:22:31.760 according to their own bonus metrics uh just you know there was one other interesting statistic true

00:22:36.880 north got from the poll it did on canada's media landscape and that was a cheap criticism people

00:22:43.040 level against the cbc is that they are simply biased that they do not fairly portray canada's

00:22:48.640 conservatives uh they paint them as as far right and as extremist and to be clear the cbc went so

00:22:55.200 far as to sue the conservative party actually in the last election and i think for a lot of people

00:23:03.040 that was the straw that broke the camel's back well the idea that getting taxpayer funding

00:23:08.800 biases reporting is not restricted just to cbc that same poll that we did and i think we just flashed

00:23:16.800 some of those uh metrics on but i'll bring the poll back up there 55 percent of taxpayers believe

00:23:23.360 that if you take government or taxpayer subsidies then you become unable to impartially report the news

00:23:32.320 and i think that shouldn't come as a huge surprise for people but it is really the endemic reason why

00:23:39.280 people don't trust the cbc is because they know that only one of those two parties really wants to give

00:23:45.040 them unlimited funding but for all of canada's media who do take taxpayer subsidies it harms their

00:23:52.000 credibility and we now know that 55 of canadians believe that they cannot take taxpayer subsidies

00:23:58.720 and report the news fairly true north of course we do not take government funding we rely on support

00:24:04.240 of individual canadians and that's why when we report we keep them in mind not the government

00:24:10.080 handing out the checks to the other media in this country i appreciate you saying that william because

00:24:15.440 i think even in the context of independent media you know that's something that is really special

00:24:21.520 about true north is that we don't take you know any advertising dollars or donors or sponsorships or

00:24:27.760 anything like that from uh from the federal government and it's just becoming increasingly we're

00:24:32.800 becoming increasingly unique and alone in that and it's something that i think is important and that we

00:24:36.960 should be proud of and that we should continue to remind people of because it is really such a rare

00:24:40.640 thing also very difficult to do in today's day and age you know one thing i i want to just touch

00:24:45.280 on quickly before we get back to the nhl because i know isaac has a good story about that is one thing

00:24:49.280 we might all miss with the decline of the mainstream media and you know if if pierre polyev does indeed

00:24:55.040 turn off the taps for them is sort of this really combative approach that he's taken to to media and

00:25:00.560 just the way that he has really learned to undress their comments and we were talking about canadians are

00:25:06.000 recognizing that the cbc is biased and that's one of the reasons they want to defund them

00:25:09.680 is pierre polyev is really an expert in knowing how to to uh to really reveal the the what the

00:25:16.080 media's questions are and to and to get the heart of the fact that they are biased they often don't

00:25:20.080 know what they're talking about at these press conferences they often have very loaded questions

00:25:24.160 with a lot of inflammatory rhetoric that they can't back up i'm thinking of course about the infamous

00:25:28.400 munching on the apple scene when the reporter says canadians think and then he actually didn't know

00:25:32.240 a single canadian who thinks that it's they use that type of language to push their own

00:25:36.560 left-wing agenda and often are not aware of what canadian thinks because they're so out of touch

00:25:41.440 with canadians so that's something i i personally will miss although i suspect it'll still be several

00:25:45.840 years before uh you know before we see a big correction a big correction in in media generally speaking

00:25:53.200 isaac uh why don't you go ahead and talk about you know the nhl we've saw a little bit of a feud

00:25:58.000 brewing between um between trudeau and probably uh my favorite uh american governor so so go ahead

00:26:04.960 and break that down for us yeah so you were speaking about being out of touch with canadians

00:26:09.840 but now we're gonna shift to uh desantis who of course is becoming more and more in touch with

00:26:15.120 canadians as he embraces uh the hockey culture uh and this clip that we're about to show was in response

00:26:22.160 to a question at the uh eric erickson conference which is a an american conference of conservative

00:26:27.760 politicians scholars and the like and the the person asked they they sent an email to eric

00:26:34.640 erickson and they said can you please ask my favorite american governor that being ron desantis

00:26:40.000 about my least favorite canadian that being prime minister justin trudeau so uh we could play the clip

00:26:45.680 right now if you'd like so all i can say is this um justin trudeau since he has been prime minister

00:26:53.280 of canada number of stanley cups for canada zero governor ron desantis number of stanley cups for

00:27:02.480 the state of florida since i've been governor three who's winning that battle

00:27:06.720 yeah so obviously uh canada hasn't won the stanley cup in like 20 20 years and uh desantis is lucky

00:27:17.760 enough to have two nhl teams in his state that being the tampa bay lightning and the florida panthers

00:27:23.920 of course and they've won three stanley cups in the last uh four or five years as he's been governor so

00:27:29.680 so yeah what do you guys think about governor i mean uh ron desantis kind of making a funny funny jab

00:27:36.240 trudeau you know it's not that serious serious i think i mean far be it from me to defend trudeau

00:27:42.560 for anything but in this case i initially when i heard this clip my initial reaction was i had

00:27:47.680 you know i said as i said i don't really watch hockey but i spoke into many hockey players and

00:27:51.680 they said oh it's very hard for canada to attract the best players because american players typically

00:27:57.120 get paid more we actually looked into this and i guess there's a cap how much you can get paid in

00:28:01.280 the nhl and i thought well taxes in canada are so much higher but it's not necessarily the case it

00:28:05.600 looks like among nhl players taxes are actually lowest in alberta go alberta and um highest

00:28:11.840 jurisdictions like quebec followed by you know new york and la so that wasn't really a fair comparison

00:28:16.800 however i do think that the quality of life in the states is probably just a little bit better

00:28:22.160 because your money gets you so much more in the states and also if you live in a southern state

00:28:27.120 warmer climate if that's something that's important to you might not be important to hockey players

00:28:31.280 and then also with the canadian market like canadians are just so interested and crazy about

00:28:37.120 hockey and so if you're a hockey player who really just loves hockey but doesn't enjoy the limelight

00:28:42.880 you might be more interested in playing for an american team where fans are not quite invested in your

00:28:48.320 personal life they're not quite as invested in your family you know we were just talking about that that

00:28:54.080 clip with uh conor mcdavid when he showed his his house in edmonton and he was criticized for not

00:28:59.040 not having like enough personality like just stuff like that you know some some players might just be

00:29:03.040 really interested in playing in the game playing the game but not interested in all the drama that

00:29:06.560 comes along with them but as i said you know i don't want to be lambasted for my comments about

00:29:10.960 hockey because my my knowledge is is rather limited and i wouldn't consider myself a hockey foreign by

00:29:16.160 any stretch of the imagination uh william what about you what's your take i mean i think it rankles

00:29:22.640 us up in canada a lot more when it's places that don't have ice that are succeeding in hockey that

00:29:30.240 really bothers us intellectually and emotionally to know that a place where there is no ice except

00:29:35.440 which is artificially created is winning scantily cups as opposed to the land of ice we have ice

00:29:41.520 everywhere for a large chunk of the year and so that i know is always a bit frustrating and as for

00:29:48.400 uh i i definitely think you're right that that being a uh nhl player is a bigger deal in canada

00:29:53.840 we treat those nhl players differently than uh they do in the states i suppose they have kardashians

00:30:00.320 and we have hockey players that's that's our difference and britain are royals yeah yes they do

00:30:08.800 um isaac i guess another criticism i've heard is you know and you might know a little bit more about

00:30:13.280 this is that the cra tends to go after hockey players there was sort of a case with the cra going

00:30:18.880 after a former toronto maple leafs captain uh john taveras and and i guess whether or not you know

00:30:24.400 signing bonuses are something that they should be paying taxes on so i guess you know even from a

00:30:28.480 financial standpoint tax is quite low in alberta but i just can't help but feel like generally in

00:30:32.640 the states unless you're living somewhere like really radical last like new york and la you'll probably

00:30:37.680 take home a little more of your money in the states that's just my two cents yeah i always thought

00:30:43.280 bonuses not just signing bonuses but all types of bonuses uh were tax or tax free or less taxed at

00:30:50.240 least which is why they were even an added incentive for players on top of just the money itself i i

00:30:55.840 remember seeing yeah john taveras going to war with the uh cra but i don't know how that's gone but

00:31:01.600 thinking of places without ice yeah i oh i remember a few years ago when uh austin matthews uh

00:31:06.800 the leafs captain obviously who is from arizona was the number one overall draft and i thought to

00:31:11.840 myself you know how does that happen eric he's coming from arizona which i can't imagine has a

00:31:18.000 strong child hockey market which is why we see so many kids from ontario drafted into the nhl because

00:31:25.120 they have such a strong hockey community these people these children are able to access the best

00:31:30.080 coaches in the world i mean right like austin matthews i mean he's a an anomaly in that sense that

00:31:35.440 he i really think he had to be more independent than say a child would have had to been in ontario

00:31:42.080 i don't know i think maybe we should get like a new hockey show or like a sports show going over

00:31:45.920 at north isa could take the lead on they obviously know a lot about this and i think there's always

00:31:49.760 like interesting ties for how it plays into politics but that's just an idea maybe our audience can let

00:31:55.120 me know if there would be english and something like that um all right everyone that's all we have time

00:31:59.920 to cover today on off the record thank you so much for tolerating us for the last 35 minutes

00:32:05.440 or so i hope that you guys have a great weekend we'll see you later and don't forget that everything

00:32:10.160 you heard today was off the record

00:32:20.640 well i had to laugh at that one story where the liberals were uh accusing pierre palievra of not

00:32:27.840 doing anything about foreign election interference they said pierre had two years and then he didn't

00:32:32.400 do anything election election interference as opposed to the liberal government we had eight years where we

00:32:37.040 did nothing about election interference which is a lot longer and then of course when they they

00:32:41.920 didn't want to do anything about election interference they had to be pulled kicking and screaming towards

00:32:47.120 actually taking the issue seriously so uh you know there's a bold claim for the for the trudeau government

00:32:52.960 to make but only is it a bold claim but it's like pierre paliev was never the prime minister

00:32:58.000 well sure he was a conservative mp but like ridiculous yeah just details

00:33:07.040 well sure

00:33:19.200 then

Off the Record - August 16, 2024

Liberals blame Stephen Harper for everything

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