PJ The Belt - October 07, 2026


Canada WILL NOT Come out of This United..

Mentioned
Scott Besson Donald Trump Sovereignist
SO IT BEGINS! — Liberals Face The BREAKUP of Canada This WON'T END WELL For Mark Carney..

Episode Stats


Length

8 minutes

Words per minute

142.28

Word count

1,193

Sentence count

76

Harmful content

Toxicity

2

sentences flagged


Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Ladies and gentlemen, something huge just happened in Canada, and the timing could not be bigger for us here in Alberta.
00:00:06.600 Less than two weeks before we vote, on October 19th, Quebec just elected a separatist government.
00:00:13.080 Now, the big question for us is, does this change anything? Does it help? Does it hurt? Or does it do absolutely nothing?
00:00:21.060 Because, think about the timing here.
00:00:22.740 At the exact moment we're about to decide whether our government should begin the legal process toward separation,
00:00:29.680 Quebec just handed 59 seats to the party Quebecois, an openly Sovereignist party.
00:00:36.540 And here's where this gets really interesting.
00:00:38.660 They did it with about 28% of the popular vote.
00:00:43.120 I still can't believe it.
00:00:44.520 Under 30%.
00:00:45.980 And I want you to remember that number because I think there's a much bigger story developing
00:00:50.860 here than just an election in Quebec.
00:00:53.260 And whether you support Alberta separation, whether you hate the idea, or whether you're
00:00:57.440 just sitting somewhere in the middle saying, I don't know what the hell we should do. Quebec may
00:01:01.620 have just given us a real-time example of how a sovereignty movement can continue to shape politics
00:01:07.400 even without actually leaving Canada. And that brings us to October 19th, because I keep hearing
00:01:12.580 this discussion framed like there are only two possible outcomes for Alberta. Either we win or
00:01:18.380 we lose, 50% plus one, or the whole thing was in vain. But is that actually true? Because there are
00:01:26.220 very different political consequences depending on what exactly Albertans do. If a majority of us
00:01:32.120 choose the option telling the government to begin the legal process towards separation,
00:01:37.320 let's be very clear. Alberta doesn't wake up as an independent country the next morning.
00:01:42.580 That's not what we're voting on at this point. But politically, holy crap, that would be an 0.98
00:01:48.840 enormous signal. That would be the shot heard around the world. Because now you're not talking 0.99
00:01:54.380 about a poll. You're not talking about a petition. You're not talking about somebody angry on
00:01:59.420 Facebook. You have an actual result from Albertans saying, we are ready to begin the process of
00:02:05.780 getting the hell out of Canada. And that wouldn't just get Ottawa's attention. It will get Washington's
00:02:10.640 attention too. And this is where my American viewers come into the story. Because the United
00:02:16.480 States has a massive stake in what happens in Western Canada, particularly in Alberta. And
00:02:22.660 And we've already heard multiple comments from people inside the Trump administration
00:02:26.600 about Alberta.
00:02:28.120 Treasury Secretary Scott Besson has publicly described Alberta as a natural partner for
00:02:33.000 the United States.
00:02:34.000 Well, Alberta is a wealth of natural resources, but they won't let them build a pipeline to
00:02:40.940 the Pacific.
00:02:42.340 I think we should let them come down into the U.S. and Alberta is a natural partner
00:02:49.140 for the U.S.
00:02:51.340 have great resources the albertans are very independent people and president trump himself
00:02:56.780 has talked about western canada as something distinct from eastern canada now think about
00:03:02.060 what that means if albertans actually put a majority on the board because if this process
00:03:07.740 ever does result in an independent alberta recognition from other countries would matter
00:03:13.900 trade would matter security energy would matter and in my opinion i can't think of an american
00:03:20.540 president more likely than Donald Trump to at least seriously entertain a relationship with an
00:03:27.500 independent Alberta. Especially when his own treasury secretary is already talking about
00:03:32.500 Alberta as a natural partner to the United States. So this isn't just an Alberta story, and it isn't
00:03:39.620 just a Canada story even. If this thing gets big enough, the United States becomes part of the
00:03:45.480 conversation too and that's why october 19th could have consequences way beyond our borders but here's
00:03:51.380 where quebec makes that even more interesting what if the number isn't 50 what if it's 30 what if
00:03:57.800 it's 35 or even 40 what then we came up short we didn't actually win the battle i'm not gonna lie
00:04:05.180 to you and pretend otherwise but 30 35 maybe even 40 that's still a crazy number when you actually
00:04:11.620 think about what it represents because you know exactly what would happen the next morning people
00:04:16.900 on the other side of the conversation would immediately say alberta rejected separation
00:04:21.060 it's over move on but hold on a second 30 to 40 percent of an entire province doesn't just
00:04:26.980 disappear because you wish them to that's a massive political constituency and that's why
00:04:32.020 that 28 number from quebec matters so much the party quebecois just formed a minority government
00:04:38.260 after receiving about 28% of the province-wide vote. Now, of course, I'm not saying that 28%
00:04:44.280 in Alberta equals 28% in Quebec. It's a different government, different political landscape, but
00:04:50.000 I mean, look at what it does show. A sovereignty movement at that size can become a serious
00:04:56.340 and permanent political force. Quebec has been having this fight for decades, right? You all
00:05:01.540 know that. Two referendums, decades of arguments, decades of people saying it's dead, it's over,
00:05:07.080 move on. And now look at what just happened. The separatist party is back in power. That's the
00:05:13.600 event I want Albertans to look at. Because after October 19th, whatever the result, everybody's
00:05:19.500 going to know something we don't know today. We are finally going to have an actual number,
00:05:25.040 not a poll, not someone's estimate, not speculation, an actual vote showing how many Albertans are
00:05:31.660 ready to begin taking that next step. And if that number represents a large share of this province,
00:05:37.820 then what happens to those people on October the 20th? Do we disappear? Do we go home? Do we say,
00:05:43.860 well, that was fun and never talk about it again? Or does that become a permanent political movement
00:05:49.220 in Alberta? And by extension, Canadian politics? Does it produce new organizations, new political
00:05:55.320 parties? Does it force existing parties to change? Does it put new pressure on Ottawa over
00:06:01.060 equalization, representation, the Senate, provincial autonomy. Because here's something
00:06:06.940 else I think people really need to understand. I support Alberta pursuing separation. I think
00:06:13.520 Alberta would be much better off as an independent country. But I know there's people watching me
00:06:17.740 right now who say, PJ, I agree, Alberta's getting screwed, but I love Canada. I don't want to destroy
00:06:22.620 my country. And I understand that. I understand the nostalgia. I understand loving the country
00:06:28.080 you grew up in and that you were born in. But even if your ultimate goal is to keep Alberta
00:06:33.280 inside Canada, ask yourself this, what would give Alberta more leverage than Ottawa realizing that a
00:06:40.700 huge portion of this province is actually prepared to leave? Because maybe that pressure right there
00:06:47.380 produces something else. Maybe it forces a real conversation about equal representation in this
00:06:53.120 country for a change, about ending equalization, about Senate reform, about the way this country
00:06:59.500 treats the provinces that actually create wealth. And maybe, just maybe, the threat of losing Alberta
00:07:06.500 becomes the shot Canada needs to actually fix itself. And if that happens, that's a huge
00:07:12.220 accomplishment for independent supporters.
00:07:23.120 I don't know where to go.
00:07:53.120 Thank you.