Why Alberta's LEAVING Canada - Update! INDEPENDENCE Over Decades of Abuse ｜ Dr. Michael Wagner
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Summary
In this episode, we have an interview with Dr. Michael Wagner, a PhD in Political Science from the University of Alberta, who wrote a book called No Other Option about Alberta's sovereignty and why at this point, Alberta has two options, two choices really. One is to continue the status quo, which Canada has been doing for decades, or do we obtain our independence and carve our own path?
Transcript
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Hey everybody, PJ here. It's Thursday, more than halfway through the week. Hope you're all having
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a good week, a productive one hopefully. Today's video I like to talk about something that often
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gets ignored when it comes to the Alberta independence movement. Many people think that
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this cause was started because of the loss, the federal loss of the conservatives and I often say
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on this channel that that was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. Basically the last
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nail in a coffin many of us saw coming. And of course the liberal win after 10 years of terrible
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policies and having ruined our country in more ways than one contributed to the amount of support
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and momentum that the cause for independence has. However this is something that has been brewing
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for many decades. It is nothing new for Albertans to want to separate from Canada
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considering the fact that Alberta has been given. Alberta and Western Canada in general
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but especially Alberta and I mean especially Alberta and its industries have been given a raw deal
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for many decades. Literally since shortly after Confederation and joining Confederation in 1905.
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There is a picture that depicts, explains the sentiment and it's called the Milch Cow Campaign.
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I believe that picture is from the 1920s, 1930s and again Alberta joined Confederation or basically was forced
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to join Confederation in 1905 along with Saskatchewan. So in this video we're going to have,
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we're going to be watching an interview with Dr. Michael Wagner. He's a PhD in political science
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from the University of Alberta. He wrote a book called No Other Option about Alberta's sovereignty
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and why at this point Alberta has two options, two choices really. One is to continue the status quo
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because Canada is a system that cannot be fixed from within or independence and we carve our own path.
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Do we continue trying to fix Canada from within which we've been doing for decades with no results,
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no positive results anyway or do we obtain our independence and carve our own path? Let's watch.
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All right so the interview is by the YouTube channel called Alberta Unfiltered. I'm going to leave the link
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in the description below to the full video. We're going to be reacting to the interview and providing
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commentary as we go. Let's take a look. So tell us about what you were speaking of about the
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wise for these many years. A voice crying in the wilderness so to speak. Yeah well first of all I
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want to acknowledge the conception of Canada that you're talking about as something that was great
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in the past. Canada was great. Canada offered freedom to so many millions of people even to my
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ancestors who came to the prairies a little bit before yours. So there is much to appreciate about
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Canada and especially the past. Canada that I was born into was a wonderful freedom loving country
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of prosperity with reasonably good government compared to better than it is today that's for
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sure. But Canada has changed and that's one of the fundamental things. The Canada that we live in
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today is not the Canada that gave refuge to our ancestors because there have been significant changes
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especially again with pure Trudeau. Now when we look at the history of the prairies there's always
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been discontent with central Canada right from the very beginning. So in the early decades of the
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20th century you'd have reform movements spring up looking for political reform especially in the
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form of alternative political parties. Westerners and especially Albertans rejected the mainstream
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political parties. You know during the 1920s Alberta had a United Farmers of Alberta government
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and federally the main party in Alberta at that time was the Progressive Party of Canada which was a
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farmers party based mostly in the west. So the west would fight back against central Canada through
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different political movements. So there was this discontent it wasn't a real happy relationship
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with the east but things weren't really really bad in the sense that they became. Okay. So the idea of
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Alberta becoming its own country or the west becoming its own country didn't really take off until Pierre
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Trudeau became prime minister. Is that right? Yes. Okay. Like I say there was discontent you can go you
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can find discontent on the prairies all the way from the very beginning. Okay. But you can't find a movement
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for independence until Pierre Trudeau becomes prime minister. What year was that? Well he became prime
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minister in 1968. Okay. And so the first kind of a formative separatist movement began in 1970. So
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the early part of the separatist movement resulted from Trudeau adopting the official languages act
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which made French much more prominent across Canada and on the prairies and some people on the prairies
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saw it as having French thrust down their throat. The Trudeaus have been screwing Alberta for decades.
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Before it was Justin it was his dad in the 70s and 80s. So this is nothing new. Stage of the movement but it was
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still very very small at that time. Okay. It began to get legs in 1973 because there was a war in the
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Middle East which led to the price of oil skyrocketing. And then OPEC. Yeah what OPEC was part of that yes.
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Okay. See there was a war in the Middle East you know Israel against Arab countries. Okay. And so the
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West many of the many of the Western countries were supporting Israel. So Arab countries and OPEC would
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cut off oil to Western countries. Yes. And that lack of supply led to a skyrocketing of the oil
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price. Gotcha. So up until that time the price of oil was about three dollars a barrel. Like it was a
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it was a good resource for Alberta to have but it wasn't the the jewel that would be later. So
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the price of oil went from about three dollars a barrel to about twelve dollars a barrel in just a
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few weeks. So suddenly Alberta was about to reap huge amounts of money from its oil. Sure. But
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Pierre Trudeau as Prime Minister he put an export tax on Alberta's oil. Oh okay. So in Alberta
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Alberta was exporting oil to the United States and we were going to get all this money from that
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but the federal government would take a huge percentage of the oil of the money that Alberta
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should get for exporting its oil. That was unprecedented in Canadian history at that time. Yes. And our
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Premier Peter Lougheed called it the biggest ripoff in Confederation's history because we weren't
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getting the money for our provincial resource like the oil is provincial resource. And let's just
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clarify that. Oil is a provincial resource. I'm glad that they're making that clarification
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because a lot of people especially those on the other side of the argument say that well it's
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Canada's oil. It's Canada's energy. No constitutionally it's actually Alberta's. Exactly. And so the
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export tax on oil was unfair to Alberta because the federal government was taking money that Alberta
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deserved. And there was one other thing. That Alberta had a right. Alberta had an absolute right to.
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The other thing was like Alberta sold a lot of oil within Canada itself and Trudeau mandated a lower
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price for Canadian oil than the world price. So when Alberta sold its oil within Canada we didn't get
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the world price. When we exported the oil to the United States we didn't get the world price. We were
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not getting the price for our oil that we ought to have. So that caused a big uproar in Alberta.
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And so the first significant separatist organization called the Independent Alberta
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Association was formed in 1974 you know with with oil men and professionals. Now it didn't get a lot of
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traction at that time but it was did have a public face to it and they would conduct studies to show you
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know how Alberta would be better off as an independent country. So that's kind of the that's how the
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movement got going. It built a little bit during the 1970s but still during the 70s when they did surveys
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on support for independence it would be like single digit support like four or five or six percent.
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And what changed things was in 1980 there was a federal election and Pierre Trudeau was campaigning
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to get back as prime minister and he campaigned against Alberta essentially telling Canada vote
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for me and I'll put Alberta in its place. Like the ouch one of the main uh liberal campaign activists at
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the time was a guy named Keith Davey who would later become a senator and he he brought in the slogan
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uh screw the west we'll take the rest. He literally said that. Yes that's that's a quote from him.
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So that was their campaign strategy. They'll campaign against the west against the west energy
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resources. That's been the mentality of central Canada. Central and eastern Canada for decades.
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Again this is nothing new guys. Screw the west we'll take the rest was the campaign slogan
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in the 80s for Trudeau the father. That's really why I have a hard time understanding how there
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there are Albertans real Albertans who support Canada and the federal government who support
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the idea of staying in Canada against Alberta gaining its sovereignty. It's incredible it makes
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no sense to me other than they ignore this historical facts. We'll get you cheaper oil if you
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vote us into power and that's kind of how Trudeau was re-elected in 1980 with a majority government
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campaigning and so people in western Canada especially Alberta were quite upset about that
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and so you get the springing up of separatist groups just because of the election. That was a few
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months later in October of 1980 he brought in the national energy program which was a federal power
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grab on Alberta's energy industry. Yes. At the time they said they needed to Canadianize Alberta's
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oil industry or Canada's oil industry because it was mostly American companies that uh you know
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were running the oil industry. So they said we need to Canadianize it by having more federal government
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control and also would give us more energy security. Those are the public reasons they gave.
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But several years later excuse me Mark Lalonde who was energy minister would admit that those weren't
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the real reasons. What were the real reasons? The real reason was the federal government was afraid of
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Alberta getting too much money. Getting too rich. Getting too much power. Alberta getting too rich and too
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powerful. So the federal government wanted to crop out that money from Alberta and that was kind of the
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essential um reason for the national energy program. So we want to keep Alberta neutered.
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That's literally how these people viewed Alberta. This is how they viewed it. We can't allow Alberta to
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get too much money. Can't allow Alberta to get too wealthy. Can't allow Alberta to get too much power.
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And again Alberta is supposed to be a province within this country. And the federal government is
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looking at the province basically as an enemy. We cannot allow the west. We cannot allow Alberta
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to become too wealthy and prosperous. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine for those of you south of the
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border that Washington says we cannot allow Montana to get too wealthy. We cannot allow Oklahoma to get
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too wealthy. We cannot allow Florida to get too wealthy or powerful or prosperous. We cannot allow that.
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And your federal government purposefully blocks the development of that particular jurisdiction within
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its country. Literally fighting it as if it was a a hostile enemy or a hostile country. Crazy to think.
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So they want to keep Alberta neutered. Yeah they want to keep Alberta down and give that money to the
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federal government. All right. So what happened with the national energy program is that um many many people
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lost their jobs. I mean it was it was very much a strike against the oil industry. Yes. People lost their jobs,
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their homes, their businesses. It was very harmful for thousands of Albertans and the Alberta economy began
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to go down. Now later on a year or so later there would be um a drop in the oil price that would lead to a
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general recession in Alberta. But it would but the problems began with the national energy program. Like leftists
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will say it's the recession that led to the problems not the national energy program. But when experts have
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compared the Canadian energy industry with the American one they can see uh an immediate result
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from the national energy program. For for example Texas and Oklahoma did not suffer the same downturn
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Alberta did in 1980-81 because of the national energy program. Later they would suffer because of the
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recession and the drop in oil prices. But that was you know a year or two later whereas Alberta suffered
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it immediately because of the national energy program. And you're saying it was absolutely intentional
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by Pierre Trudeau to kick Alberta down. Yes I would say that exactly that was intentional. That was his
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purpose. That's why the importance of unity this time around. We cannot let this movement go to waste.
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We cannot let this momentum get squandered. We have to seek unity. Unity is the most important
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thing right now. There's going to be all kinds of powers fighting against Alberta independence.
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All kinds. You're going to have the feds, you're going to have the media, you're going to have
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unions, you're going to have local politicians, provincial politicians, you're going to have
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the private sector, those who receive subsidies and are in the pockets of the feds. We get one shot of
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this thing. This is going to be the first ever referendum that Alberta's likely going to have in 2026.
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And we should make it one and done. We should make it a successful one the very first time because
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this kind of referendum of referendums happen once per generation basically.
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Quebec had its latest one in the 90s and it's been 30 years and they haven't had another one.
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And then we had a federal election in 1984 and Brian Mulroney's progressive conservatives were
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elected as government. Now this also hurt the separatist movement in the sense that people
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in Alberta generally thought that Mulroney was going to be good for us, that he was going to
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be much better than Pierre Trudeau and remove the national energy program and do other things that
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are beneficial to the West. How long did the national energy program last?
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I guess like it was announced in October of 1980 and then when Brian Mulroney came in,
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I think they probably finally phased out the last of it in 1986. It's a long time.
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It was and this is one of the complaints actually against Mulroney was you know he did
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put an end to the national energy program but he didn't do it really quickly. He kind of,
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you know what I mean, he could have done it more quickly than he did. Yeah.
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And so people you know questioned that but he did get rid of it as he said. Sure.
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In 1986 though, there was a very big issue that Mulroney did improperly in the sense of
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favouring central Canada over the West. And that was Canada had recently bought CF-18 fighter jets.
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Okay. And it was a very big federal contract to maintain those jets. There was only two cities
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in Canada with the facilities to maintain the jets, Winnipeg and Montreal. So the federal government
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held a competition to see which city should win the contract. And according to the government's
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criteria, Winnipeg won the contract and Brian Mulroney awarded the contract to Montreal.
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Oh my goodness. Of course he did. So this guy, Brian Mulroney, former Prime Minister
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of Canada, he was elected in big part thanks to Western provinces, Alberta, Saskatchewan. He was
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supposed to be our guy. He was supposed to defend the interests of the West. He was conservative and
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he was again elected in big part thanks to Alberta. And there's a competition for the maintenance,
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for the contract for maintenance of the CF-18s that Canada had just acquired back in the 80s.
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And the two competing cities were Montreal and Winnipeg. Montreal in Quebec, Winnipeg and Manitoba
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in the West. Winnipeg met all the qualifications, all the prerequisites and he awarded it to Montreal.
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Incredible. And that right there shows the way that Canada operates as a country. Screw the West,
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we'll take the rest. This is nothing new. I can't think of any other country in the developed world
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that treats a region of its own country like second-class citizens. I can't think of one,
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at least not in the G7. Obviously, Mulroney was favoring Central Canada. But what was worse than that
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was that we had voted for Mulroney. We didn't vote for Pierre Trudeau. So when he was attacking us,
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you know, we always saw him as our enemy. But Brian Mulroney was supposed to be our friend. Every Alberta
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member of parliament was progressive conservative and most of the other Prairie MPs were progressive
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conservative as well. So Mulroney was supposed to be our guy. So he stabbed us in the back
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when he awarded that contract to Montreal. The uproar led to the creation of the Reform Party of
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Canada, which was formed in 1987. That was kind of the biggest single thing. There were some other
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underlying factors, but that was the biggest single factor that led to the creation of the Reform Party
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of Canada. And I think this actually communicates the truest intentions of most Westerners for the
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entire time we've been part of Canada, that we want our voices heard in the national government.
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Like why won't they listen to us? And that's been the problem all along with the policies,
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whether it's the national energy program or the CFE team or whatever, they don't listen to us.
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And so Western Canadians would want our voice heard in the national government. And that was the idea
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of the Reform Party in its initials, in its inception. The West wants in. I'm thinking of
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central Canada, the central Canadian politicians. Like when you look actually at the media,
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I used to have a book that had political cartoons from Eastern Canada from the time of that 1993
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election. I mean, yes. And I don't know what happened to it, but it had political cartoons
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making fun of the Reform Party. Like if you remember the Beverly Hillbillies TV program,
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which there was one cartoon of the Reform MPs were like the Beverly Hillbillies riding in this
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old car, you know what I mean? It's just really mocking them and making fun of them. And that was
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kind of the Eastern establishment view of them, whether it's the media or the political
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establishment or whatever. What year is this now? 1993. 1993, 11 years after the Charter of Rights
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and Freedoms came in. Yeah, that's right. Stephen Harper was bringing these bills forward
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to make these kinds of changes in Canada. And Quebec launched a court case, a reference court case,
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to challenge the constitutionality of reforms that Stephen Harper wanted. So Stephen Harper then,
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kind of to do an end run around the Quebec court case, he launched a reference case to the Supreme
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Court of Canada to get an authoritative decision before Quebec's case could get it up, get up to
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the top. He thought the reason for doing that was so he could be the one asking the questions.
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Go figure. Quebec didn't want Canada to have elected senators. Now, why would that be? Simple.
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Quebec does not want to give up all the leverage it has on this country. They don't want to make the
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changes to make it an actual fair and working and functioning country. They want it lopsided the
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way it's been for decades, where Quebec gets whatever it wants.