Rebel News Podcast - DAVID MENZIES ｜ COVID Jail Lawsuit Appeal, Masking Up For Video Gamers

00:00:00.000 Hello, Rebels. You're listening to a free audio-only recording of my show, Rebel Roundup.

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00:01:14.320 Welcome to Rebel Roundup, ladies and gentlemen, and the rest of you,

00:01:32.440 in which we look back at some of the very best commentaries of the week by your favorite Rebels.

00:01:37.120 I'm your host, David Menzies.

00:01:38.820 Well, we hit a road bump in our lawsuit regarding Justin Trudeau's COVID quarantine hotels.

00:01:45.520 You know, those facilities that have far less to do with science and far more to do with political street theater.

00:01:52.980 Alas, the judge sided with the feds.

00:01:55.360 But that's okay.

00:01:56.360 Well, we may be down.

00:01:57.500 We're not out.

00:01:58.180 Which is to say, we are going to appeal this decision.

00:02:01.720 Rebel Commander Ezra Levent will join me to discuss all the nitty-gritty.

00:02:05.980 Sadly, it's almost a given that bureaucrats virtually dream up ways in which to squander your tax dollars on useless initiatives. 0.98

00:02:16.060 But just wait till you hear what Sheila Gunn-Reed has to say about two separate federal programs that implored video gamers to stay home and stay masked.

00:02:28.000 No, I swear I'm not making this up, folks.

00:02:31.300 And letters, we get your letters.

00:02:32.800 We get them every minute of every day.

00:02:34.720 And you had plenty to say about one of my most recent tickets via law enforcement, which is to say Hamilton bylaw enforcement officer Ranjeni RJ Reddy, she, her, slapped me with a $560 ticket for practicing journalism in Steel Town.

00:02:53.040 But there's a twist, folks.

00:02:54.980 This is a very special kind of ticket, a ticket that you cannot fight in a court of law.

00:03:02.620 When exactly did Canada become Cuba?

00:03:06.140 Those are your rebels.

00:03:07.360 Now let's round them up.

00:03:08.500 The judge, Chief Justice Paul Crampton, ruled that jailing healthy people, law-abiding people, citizens who have done nothing wrong, jailing them for up to three days and billing them thousands of dollars for the cost of it, is just a minor inconvenience.

00:03:31.660 Not an important violation of our liberties.

00:03:34.320 I'm guessing he himself hasn't had to stay in one.

00:03:38.600 And the fact that the quarantine makes no sense from a health point of view, it's no safer to send someone to a hotel for three days where they will have contact with many people as opposed to sending them straight home by themselves.

00:03:51.360 Well, the judge didn't mind.

00:03:52.920 He actually wrote that it's Canadians' duty to suffer through such indignities to save lives, even though the government provided no evidence that these costly schemes have saved lives.

00:04:04.800 In fact, there was evidence that the COVID jails are dangerous, whether it's COVID outbreaks at these COVID hotel jails or cases of alleged rape there that the judge acknowledged.

00:04:16.440 Justin Trudeau and the rest of the ruling class themselves don't have to follow these rules.

00:04:22.780 The president of the CBC, for example, flies back and forth to Canada from her home in New York City every week.

00:04:30.640 She doesn't quarantine anywhere, certainly not in an airport hotel.

00:04:34.880 Trudeau himself just got back from a week of boozy parties in Europe, violating every quarantine rule.

00:04:41.060 So mask rules, social distancing rules.

00:04:45.320 And when he came back to Canada, he reportedly spent a few hours in one of these COVID airport hotels and then just left.

00:04:52.980 So, yeah, rules are for the little people. 0.64

00:04:55.940 We sued the government because we had sent our then reporter, Kian Bexty, to report in Florida.

00:05:01.760 And he had to come back to Canada through one of these COVID jails in Calgary.

00:05:06.640 When he was in the hotel, he came into contact with no less than 14 people, as opposed to just taking his own car home from the airport. 0.90

00:05:14.960 It's ridiculous.

00:05:16.360 Our lawyers did an excellent job. 0.73

00:05:19.120 Sarah Miller and Robert Hawks ran circles around the government's lawyers.

00:05:23.120 In cross-examination, they were able to get some incredible admissions from the government's witnesses.

00:05:28.380 And they really grilled the health bureaucrats the government sent out to defend the law.

00:05:32.440 But in the end, Crampton sided with the establishment and against the people.

00:05:38.480 I've read the ruling.

00:05:39.360 In my opinion, it's a political document designed to make this problem go away.

00:05:44.480 And fair enough.

00:05:45.920 If the entire media and entire political establishment and the airline industry itself seem fine with all this and the other awful parts of the lockdown,

00:05:54.820 so why would a top judge go out on a limb by himself and what?

00:05:58.780 Become a pariah at all the Ottawa cocktail parties?

00:06:01.740 Our lawyers were in court alongside lawyers from the Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms.

00:06:07.360 And there were a handful of other individuals who sued on their own.

00:06:11.260 All of our cases were bundled together and heard at once.

00:06:14.280 But I note, there wasn't a single lawyer in court from a liberal civil liberties group.

00:06:20.860 There were no tourism or travel or business groups, no chambers of commerce there,

00:06:26.080 no political group, no opposition political party, nobody.

00:06:31.100 Nobody who we ought to rely on in society to protect us from authoritarian measures.

00:06:37.200 I think the government got the message loud and clear.

00:06:39.700 No one important cares about this.

00:06:42.720 Well, I care about it and I hope you care about it too.

00:06:45.380 So we're going to appeal.

00:06:46.300 Well, there you have it, folks.

00:06:47.520 Despite the fact that these Justin Trudeau COVID quarantine hotels have less to do with science

00:06:54.300 and more to do with political street theatre,

00:06:57.580 well, the judge bought the government's argument hook, line and stinker.

00:07:01.960 But the question arises, why?

00:07:04.700 Well, here to answer that query and more is Rebel News Commander Ezra LeVant.

00:07:10.480 Well, Ezra, a disappointing day in court for us last week, but it's not over.

00:07:15.500 We're going to appeal this.

00:07:16.640 That's right.

00:07:17.340 We were one of a group of clients and lawyers in federal court.

00:07:23.080 A number of people chose to appeal the constitutionality of these COVID jails.

00:07:28.560 Some individual people, there was a cannabis entrepreneur who was offended by it and he

00:07:34.780 was fighting on his own.

00:07:36.700 Our friends at the Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms were there.

00:07:40.180 And we were there, Rebel News, and our former reporter, Kim Bexte, who was forced to stay

00:07:44.900 in one of these hotels.

00:07:46.320 So there was a bunch of lawyers in court.

00:07:48.240 The judge, the courts combined all the trials together, which probably makes sense.

00:07:53.500 And it was weeks of cross-examinations and of checking each other's witnesses and before

00:08:01.980 the trial itself.

00:08:03.340 The trial went very well in that there were so many holes poked in the government's case,

00:08:09.020 they were caught lying on several occasions.

00:08:13.640 I really think our lawyers not only did a great job, but made arguments that no one else

00:08:20.900 in court did.

00:08:21.520 So I feel really good about what we did in court.

00:08:25.420 That said, we lost.

00:08:27.380 And we're appealing.

00:08:28.600 In fact, the very morning we lost, I spoke to our lawyers who said we have good grounds

00:08:32.920 for appeal, including the right to be free of warrantless search and seizure.

00:08:37.540 I forget all the arguments are outlined.

00:08:39.820 Another argument was that the federal government actually doesn't have the authority under the

00:08:43.880 Quarantine Act to set these up.

00:08:45.380 So we will appeal to the federal court of appeal.

00:08:48.720 Let me just say one thing about the politics here.

00:08:51.520 The federal court of Canada is, in my opinion, the most political court in the country.

00:08:55.480 And they put the chief in charge of this.

00:08:58.900 So they wanted it handled.

00:09:00.380 Now, what that means, I don't quite know.

00:09:02.500 But let me put it to you another way.

00:09:05.120 Here we are 14, 15 months into the lockdowns.

00:09:08.920 We have police who have never been, never had their wrists slapped.

00:09:13.280 We have media who, if anything, are cheerleaders for the lockdowns. 0.77

00:09:18.320 We have no opposition party, let alone governing party, that has expressed any reservation about

00:09:25.500 over-the-top policing.

00:09:27.360 We have what the BBC calls the most locked down city in the world, Toronto.

00:09:32.860 We have, in most places in the country, no in-class school.

00:09:40.820 We have a 14-day quarantine that most countries don't have.

00:09:46.160 We have every part of the establishment is part of the lockdownist cult.

00:09:51.840 So what are the odds that the chief of the federal court of Canada is going to be the one person

00:09:59.780 who stands up and says, I'll take a bullet.

00:10:02.940 I'll be the guy who says the emperor has no clothes. 0.98

00:10:06.260 I'll be the guy who says this is insane that we're throwing citizens in jail for three days.

00:10:10.680 I'll be that guy.

00:10:11.820 But, you know, as I get where you're coming from, it's just that if a judge is like the

00:10:19.040 proverbial image of Lady Justice, you know, holding the scales, blindfolded, weighing the 1.00

00:10:25.280 case on its merit.

00:10:26.080 And that's exactly who you would expect to do it.

00:10:28.400 And you would hope for that.

00:10:29.780 And that's what a judge should be.

00:10:31.280 And yet, I think for all the arguments you put out in your video, I thought that's why

00:10:36.720 it was so surprising as well as disappointing for me that it went against us.

00:10:40.080 For one, the hypocrisy, as you mentioned, the CBC head honcho flying every week from

00:10:45.240 New York to Canada, no quarantining there.

00:10:48.060 And the fact that the very idea of these quarantine hotels is perverse from a scientific point of

00:10:53.860 view.

00:10:54.380 You only go there if you're healthy.

00:10:56.560 And I point to the case of 74-year-old Syed Shah, who had returned back to Toronto from

00:11:03.880 Pakistan, was forced into one of those quarantine hotels, got the COVID in the hotel and gave it 1.00

00:11:09.140 to his five family members in North York.

00:11:11.500 Ezra, this is crazy.

00:11:13.340 Yeah, well, when our former reporter, Kian Bextie, went through the hotel, he counted.

00:11:17.280 He said he had contact with 14 people in the quarantine hotel.

00:11:22.000 It's not much of a quarantine.

00:11:23.180 Whereas he planned just to get into his car and go home by himself.

00:11:26.180 So, yeah, listen, I'm obviously disappointed in the ruling.

00:11:30.060 I'm disappointed in the judge.

00:11:31.580 And you would think in a romantic worldview that, you know, the checks and balances in

00:11:39.520 our wonderful democracy, our strong democracy, we can get through anything.

00:11:43.860 And just because all these political madmen are rushing off wildly in all directions, the

00:11:48.420 courts, which are not subject to the same vicissitudes as politicians, they'll be able to...

00:11:54.260 No, it's not like that.

00:11:56.680 I think that the courts are extremely political.

00:11:59.780 In Canada, they're very political.

00:12:02.200 They just lack the political accountability of American courts.

00:12:05.620 Everyone knows.

00:12:07.160 I bet you could probably name more U.S. judges than Canadian judges.

00:12:10.560 I probably could.

00:12:11.100 And I'm not making funny.

00:12:12.220 I'm just saying we could all, because we hear about all the U.S. judges.

00:12:15.620 There's so many battles over them.

00:12:16.800 We get to know them.

00:12:18.020 We get to know their rulings.

00:12:19.080 We get to know their political stripe.

00:12:20.600 They're so partisan.

00:12:21.360 Don't think for a second our Canadian judges aren't as political or as partisan.

00:12:26.860 It's just, oh, don't rock the boat.

00:12:28.880 Don't dare criticize the courts.

00:12:30.580 Whatever the courts say is gold.

00:12:33.040 And if this were a U.S. court ruling, it would be instantly torn apart through a political

00:12:39.220 lens.

00:12:40.120 Why are we pretending that our judges are somehow above politics?

00:12:43.060 I mean, I should remind you of a disgraceful thing.

00:12:46.880 Beverly McLaughlin, who for a very long time was on our Supreme Court.

00:12:50.880 She was the chief justice.

00:12:52.460 What did she do when she retired? 0.81

00:12:54.060 She became a member of Hong Kong's Court of Final Appeal.

00:12:59.340 So Hong Kong had a court made up of lawyers from around the Commonwealth that was like their

00:13:04.880 super duper Supreme Court.

00:13:06.680 And it was a wonderful idea, actually, to take judges from Canada, UK, wherever.

00:13:10.820 Well, of course, Hong Kong hasn't been free for a while.

00:13:13.780 Well, the last vestiges of democracy are being stamped out.

00:13:19.380 Do you think Beverly McLaughlin's given up her seat on that Supreme Court? 0.90

00:13:22.820 No.

00:13:23.740 For the prestige, for the money, for the travel, for the shoulder rubbing.

00:13:29.080 Don't think that judges aren't extremely political creatures.

00:13:32.600 And you know what?

00:13:34.000 Beverly McLaughlin, she could end her note on a very proud, dignified, end her career on

00:13:43.440 a proud, dignified note by saying, I'm resigning from the High Court of Hong Kong in protests

00:13:49.220 of the tyrannization of this city.

00:13:52.680 And people would say, wow, that's courage.

00:13:54.740 That's principle.

00:13:55.340 Instead, she is part of the system and loves it.

00:14:02.200 And so don't think that judges are not political.

00:14:05.720 Ezra, having said that, given that we lost, given that judges, too, are political animals,

00:14:12.360 what makes you hopeful of us winning an appeal?

00:14:16.100 Because we have to keep hope alive.

00:14:17.940 What other choice do we have?

00:14:19.360 And you know what?

00:14:21.360 You never know when you're going to win.

00:14:24.140 I mean, you can't win if you don't take a shot.

00:14:27.280 And I remember two years ago when Trudeau's election debates commission banned Rebel News,

00:14:36.960 including you, from covering the debates.

00:14:39.740 And they banned us on the last day before the debate, really.

00:14:43.840 And so on an emergency basis, we hired a law firm.

00:14:47.400 They said to me on the phone, Ezra, you need to do two things.

00:14:51.380 First of all, you need to send us $10,000 in advance.

00:14:56.460 I can't see a lawyer saying that, Ezra.

00:14:57.920 And then second of all, they said, and just so you know, we're going to lose.

00:15:03.200 We're happy to do it.

00:15:04.180 But just so you know, we're going to lose.

00:15:06.060 Wow.

00:15:06.920 And well, maybe they said that we think we're going to lose or we're probably going to lose.

00:15:10.800 But they wanted they didn't want me to think we're going to win.

00:15:13.440 And I appreciate that.

00:15:14.960 Appreciate that.

00:15:16.460 And what do you know, we won.

00:15:18.100 Yeah, I remember that day.

00:15:19.400 Well, you were very down in the dumps.

00:15:21.500 You were saying not hopeful, not hopeful.

00:15:23.540 And when the decision came, I've never seen you happy.

00:15:25.980 Well, I was excited.

00:15:26.920 And that was a remarkable domino that led to so many other dominoes of success, success following success.

00:15:35.140 And it came from audacity, from daring to fight the man, came from the support of our viewers who paid for that $10,000 challenge, actually wound up being a little more than that.

00:15:47.360 And that taught me, you may as well try.

00:15:51.160 I am not ready to say it now because we're literally signing the agreement might even be happening as we're speaking.

00:15:59.840 But we recently filed a lawsuit that our lawyers said, that's a long shot, Ezra.

00:16:07.100 I said, we have to do it just out of self-respect.

00:16:10.820 And what do you know, and I'm not trying to tease you.

00:16:14.000 I'll let you know when I can say it publicly.

00:16:15.880 I just want to wait until it's all signed on the dotted line.

00:16:18.580 Long shot lawsuit against a political bully.

00:16:22.240 We just had to do it.

00:16:24.040 And the bully said, oh, huh.

00:16:27.260 All right.

00:16:28.360 Let me settle with you.

00:16:29.360 Let me get out of this.

00:16:30.040 Let me do.

00:16:31.220 And I'm not trying to tease people.

00:16:32.740 I'm not trying.

00:16:33.480 I just am waiting.

00:16:34.760 But this goes to the long shot.

00:16:36.480 You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.

00:16:39.960 And so, and who else is taking them?

00:16:43.980 So, for example, in court for this COVID jail hotel, was the Canadian Civil Liberties Association there?

00:16:51.000 No.

00:16:51.640 How about the Hotel and Conference Association?

00:16:55.760 Nope.

00:16:56.080 How about the Airline Association?

00:16:58.880 How about anyone whose industry has been devastated by these no travel rules?

00:17:03.460 How about, like, all, where's the Chamber of Commerce?

00:17:07.720 Where is any opposition party?

00:17:09.800 Where is any working class party?

00:17:11.340 And why is that, Ezra?

00:17:12.640 They have skin in the game.

00:17:14.080 They have the most skin in the game.

00:17:15.420 And that's the weird thing.

00:17:16.260 We were there and our friends at the Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms were there.

00:17:20.480 And that's it.

00:17:21.600 And I think that there's a total system-wide failure in our democracy these days.

00:17:28.380 The media, the law professors, the legal profession, the courts, popular culture, government parties, opposition parties, NGOs, total system breakdown.

00:17:40.860 Police oversight commissions, the public health deep state, the law societies, the colleges of physicians and surgeons, every, the business lobbies, the labor lobbies.

00:17:56.520 Total system-wide failure.

00:18:00.700 And it's terrifying.

00:18:03.620 And we here at Rebel News have expanded to fill some of these gaps, but, you know, we can't be everything.

00:18:10.360 We've actually turned into quite a big national civil liberties law firm.

00:18:13.400 I did a show the other day with Victoria.

00:18:15.320 We now have 1,834 clients.

00:18:17.820 1,834 people we're helping.

00:18:20.540 I call them clients.

00:18:21.480 These are people who received lockdown fines.

00:18:24.720 That's really weird.

00:18:26.480 What do we do?

00:18:27.300 We're in the media business, but we're running a national civil liberties law firm.

00:18:31.540 Well, Ezra, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, they're going to do it.

00:18:34.480 One last question.

00:18:35.960 Well, how would you respond to a cynic or a skeptic that would say, look, Ezra, you have time on your side.

00:18:41.800 Already next month it's been rumored that fully vaccinated travelers coming back to Canada won't have to go to these hotels.

00:18:48.580 After that, we know when there's a certain level of vaccination or COVID is wiped out, these hotels will not exist.

00:18:55.000 Why don't you save your money and just let time take care of things?

00:18:58.520 Well, first of all, I just know they're going to extend it because they've extended it 20 times already.

00:19:04.280 Trudeau is entering into contracts we see on government disclosure sites into 2024 for various things.

00:19:12.000 These quarantine hotels are set up well into 2022, their contracts.

00:19:16.220 So first of all, just the basic contracts themselves suggest the government expects and perhaps wants this to continue for one, two, three more years.

00:19:24.320 Second of all, I would like to win and set some precedent of scrutiny.

00:19:31.340 Third of all, that happy outcome that they're describing is not actually a happy outcome.

00:19:38.720 Happy outcome to force people to take vaccines that are still untested and experimental.

00:19:43.720 What if you have natural immunity as in you caught the disease?

00:19:47.040 Thank God it didn't finish you off and now you have a natural.

00:19:49.300 Do you still have to take the shot?

00:19:50.940 What if you have a medical reason for not?

00:19:53.380 What if just a statistical reason, you say, well, I'm 25 years old and healthy.

00:19:58.540 I'm not talking about myself.

00:20:00.000 You're a healthy 25-year-old who exercises.

00:20:02.380 You have a low chance of getting the disease and you have an extremely low chance of being mortally injured by it.

00:20:09.200 Why would you take a vaccine that has increasing risk for different groups?

00:20:13.240 You know, I see all sorts of report of heart inflammations for young people.

00:20:18.500 In fact, the younger the patient, the more the heart inflammation, like terrifying things.

00:20:23.640 And I'm not saying that I know definitively what is up with these vaccines.

00:20:28.080 I'm saying the opposite.

00:20:28.800 I'm saying no one knows definitively because never before has a vaccine like this been rushed to market.

00:20:33.960 Let me tell you, I watched a terrifying National Film Board movie called Outbreak.

00:20:40.340 It was filmed about a decade ago and there's a cameo appearance in it by Teresa Tam.

00:20:45.140 That's where she fantasizes about having internment camps for people who won't take vaccines.

00:20:49.520 You've probably seen that clip.

00:20:50.920 Yes.

00:20:51.080 But the rest of that movie is actually about the outbreak of smallpox in Montreal 140 years ago.

00:20:58.040 Fascinating.

00:20:58.840 And it was devastating.

00:21:00.200 The number of people who died proportionate to the size of that city was just incredible.

00:21:04.660 It really was a deadly epidemic.

00:21:07.520 But, and vaccines were very new back then.

00:21:10.480 The concept of purposefully injecting yourself with a small disease to make you immune to the real disease,

00:21:18.800 that was new and dubious.

00:21:21.860 And there was lots of debates back and forth.

00:21:24.460 Should we, is this natural?

00:21:25.980 Is this unholy?

00:21:27.620 Well, in that movie, they document how there was a bad batch and a bunch of people got sick or died from it.

00:21:36.480 And that spooked the people against it.

00:21:39.280 Yeah, no doubt.

00:21:40.840 No doubt.

00:21:41.500 And here we are 140 years later and we have batches of various vaccines being recalled.

00:21:46.340 And this is not a perfect science willfully infecting people with a little bit of the disease so they stay strong against the whole thing.

00:21:58.260 I mean, great idea.

00:21:59.140 But let's test it first.

00:22:00.820 And the gene therapy of this mRNA vaccines, that has never been tested before.

00:22:06.100 Forgive me if I don't want to be a guinea pig.

00:22:08.240 And more importantly, if I don't want my family to be a guinea pig.

00:22:10.680 I share your fear.

00:22:12.360 And great video, Ezra.

00:22:14.020 And let's all collectively hope that on appeal we are successful.

00:22:17.780 And, you know, folks, I mean, it comes down to this, I think.

00:22:19.880 I mean, these so-called quarantine hotels, they simply do not work.

00:22:25.140 We have chronicled the stories of a woman who was allegedly sexually assaulted in one.

00:22:29.660 A man who if he had eaten the meal he was given, he would have potentially have died of anaphylactic shock.

00:22:37.580 Other individuals who got COVID by checking into these hotels when they were healthy.

00:22:43.160 As they say in Alabama, this dog don't hunt.

00:22:45.680 And for that reason alone, they should be closed down as soon as possible.

00:22:48.980 Keep it here.

00:22:50.180 More of a Rubble Roundup to come right after this.

00:22:57.840 As we know, there's no end to the things the federal government will waste our hard-earned money on.

00:23:03.820 I think the big brains in the federal government don't know the difference between e-sports and actual, like, sports sports.

00:23:12.880 E-sports don't normally involve putting on your running shoes or even getting out of your gaming chair or off the couch.

00:23:19.940 And e-sports certainly don't involve you being in direct physical contact with other people.

00:23:25.740 The federal government thought it was worth spending over $92,000 twice to remind video gamers to stay on the couch, remain away from other people, and not play real sports.

00:23:35.560 Oh, and also wear a mask, I guess, while they're alone on the couch playing video games in their own homes.

00:23:42.060 Now, today's information comes to us by way of an order paper response to a question posed by conservative MP for Saskatoon West, Brad Redekop.

00:23:50.560 Now, way back in October, Redekop asked the federal government to provide him the details of the kinds of videos being produced by the federal government for public consumption with public money.

00:24:04.860 It is a huge document.

00:24:07.880 498 pages in total, because naturally the government is wasting a lot of our money making self-serving propaganda to scare us about COVID,

00:24:15.860 but to also remind us that the government knows best about how we should deal with COVID in any and all situations.

00:24:22.920 I'm still winding through the 500 pages of it all, but so far I thought I would update you on the silliest thing I found.

00:24:32.140 On pages 215 and 216, Health Canada spent over $92,000 on ads to encourage video gamers to wear masks, stay home, and be physically distant.

00:24:42.320 Look at this. Four 15-second long videos, so just 60 seconds of video production in total, targeted at Canadians who play video games.

00:24:51.020 Titled, wear a mask, keep your distance, wash your hands, and stay home if you're sick.

00:24:55.780 And I'm pretty sure that's not going to be a problem since they're gamers, and I'm only teasing here, so just lighten up.

00:25:01.740 Anyway, the cost of the taxpayer, $92,600, and this thing was distributed to the Entertainment Software Association of Canada website, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook channels.

00:25:13.080 I mean, they're at home, playing video games.

00:25:17.140 But that wasn't crazy enough because on the very next page, page 217, the Public Health Agency of Canada, so a separate agency from Health Canada, spent yet another $92,600 to encourage video gamers to stay home, be physically distant, and wear masks.

00:25:34.560 The exact same videos, exact same expenditures, exact same title.

00:25:38.740 So why are we paying for all of this twice? Somebody tell me that.

00:25:41.460 Wow, your tax dollars hard at work yet again, folks.

00:25:45.780 And what new six-figure government studies await?

00:25:49.800 Perhaps a video instructing Canadians not to bring a plugged-in toaster into the bathtub,

00:25:55.740 or maybe a whiz-bang report on reminding Canadians to look both ways before crossing the street.

00:26:03.640 Unbelievable.

00:26:04.360 And joining me now regarding the latest egregious expenditure by the feds on videos that are beyond useless is Sheila Gunn-Reed.

00:26:16.280 How are you doing there, Sheila?

00:26:17.860 David, I'm great.

00:26:19.040 You know, this story, it's so, it's not a ton of money, like it's a lot of money, but for you and I, but for the federal government,

00:26:26.760 it's not a huge amount of money that they're wasting, but it is absolutely wasted.

00:26:32.600 They've spent nearly $200,000 to remind people who, by nature, stay home alone, to continue to stay home alone,

00:26:40.660 and also to wear masks while they're, I guess, sitting on their own couch at home alone while they're playing e-sports, like video games.

00:26:49.740 People are far away from you when you're playing video games, if you're playing with people at all.

00:26:54.060 But that's what the government saw fit to waste nearly $200,000 on.

00:26:57.520 And, you know, sadly, Sheila, you are right.

00:27:00.500 A couple hundred thousand, that's chump change.

00:27:03.740 That's the kind of nickels and dimes you find in the sofas of the federal treasury in this day and age of deficits and debts in the billions of dollars.

00:27:13.880 But I just, how does such a thing, Sheila, get started in the first place?

00:27:20.220 What is the genesis for an idea like this that's so lame-brained that resembles something out of Monty Python, for goodness sake?

00:27:30.080 How does it even get started?

00:27:32.440 The whole government is currently like this.

00:27:35.240 I noticed today on Twitter that Public Safety Canada, so as Ezra pointed out,

00:27:41.280 the Canadian version of Homeland Security is sending out tweets reminding people to wear masks outside.

00:27:49.540 And so this is something that is just pervasive across all levels of government.

00:27:54.900 They just are wasting money sending out COVID warnings that I don't think people necessarily need.

00:28:02.560 For example, why does Public Safety Canada need to be telling people to wear masks outside?

00:28:09.680 That's not a public safety issue, and transmission of coronavirus is basically nil outside anyway.

00:28:17.380 And again, with the gamer videos, they spent nearly $200,000 to create identical videos, by the way.

00:28:25.540 Why couldn't they just take the same video and give it to the other people, reminding people?

00:28:30.040 And these are like four 15-second slots of videos.

00:28:35.900 So like $200,000 for 60 seconds worth of video to tell people the most useless of all information.

00:28:45.580 And this is something that happens in every single department. 0.98

00:28:49.240 This is just one thing that I saw that was so stupid I just had to do a video about it. 0.97

00:28:53.080 Oh, no, and I'm glad you did. 0.99

00:28:54.980 And it's just the appalling amount of pork that goes into what you get as a final product.

00:29:01.660 I mean, compared to our skeleton staff and what we produce, it is really obscene how these federal bureaucrats spend our money.

00:29:09.620 But Sheila, here's the thing, though.

00:29:11.480 We talked about, I mean, it was just last month, I think, or earlier this month, that in Ontario,

00:29:17.840 finally, the golf courses were opened.

00:29:21.680 And if you had to think of a sport that was designed for COVID-19, it would have to be golf.

00:29:29.980 You're outdoors, right?

00:29:31.600 There's plenty of social distancing.

00:29:34.220 It's non-contact.

00:29:35.560 It was a joke.

00:29:36.360 They were shut down in the first place.

00:29:38.260 But when it comes to indoor sports, if you will, if there's something designed for that, surely it's gaming.

00:29:45.460 You can isolate yourself in your basement, in your living room, and play with people online, I understand,

00:29:53.000 because my last gaming was done after they took Ms. Pac-Man out of the arcade.

00:29:57.700 But you can play with people around the world. 0.99

00:30:02.920 So I don't understand what the need for this stupid, useless information was in the first place. 0.99

00:30:11.240 Well, there's no need for it. 0.99

00:30:13.400 But this poses a bigger question for me.

00:30:16.580 And I want to know how these bureaucrats live in their real life. 0.92

00:30:21.760 Like, are they doing that which they want the rest of us to do,

00:30:25.360 and that which they are wasting our own money to tell us to do?

00:30:29.960 For example, are they sitting at home wearing face masks, completely alone, watching Netflix?

00:30:36.900 Because basically that's just, it's a very similar activity to playing video games, right?

00:30:42.980 You're just sitting on the couch looking at a TV.

00:30:45.400 Are they sitting at home alone, wearing masks, watching Netflix?

00:30:49.980 Are they out in the park wearing masks the way Public Safety Canada is telling us to do?

00:30:56.060 Or are they just living their lives?

00:30:57.780 And are they just wasting our money?

00:30:59.880 That's what I really want to know.

00:31:01.500 I'd love to know if they are replicating their, you know, their scolding in their own lives.

00:31:08.700 And Sheila, as always, whenever we talk about COVID, it all comes down to the science,

00:31:14.700 because that's what we're endlessly preached.

00:31:17.620 And yet, is there any evidence of gamers coming down with the Wuhan virus?

00:31:24.080 No, I don't think there is.

00:31:26.260 But we do know there is tons of evidence that elderly people, typically with a medical condition,

00:31:33.040 living in a long-term care facility, those are the hot spots in terms of dying from this virus.

00:31:39.880 Why can't they direct this money?

00:31:43.040 Rather than spending it on useless studies, the information that people already know,

00:31:49.580 just put more money towards keeping those truly at risk from the virus safe and alive.

00:31:58.040 Yeah, you know, this $200,000 could have went to pay for, let's say, four healthcare aides

00:32:04.180 in one of those nursing homes where the elderly were abandoned to die,

00:32:10.040 where they faced dehydration and dying alone,

00:32:13.440 because the facility was either chronically understaffed or the staff were so scared

00:32:20.020 because of the media, because of the government,

00:32:23.600 that they just stopped showing up to work to care for the elderly.

00:32:27.620 Imagine what $200,000 wasted telling gamers to stay home alone,

00:32:32.400 which I'm pretty sure they're not going to have a problem doing.

00:32:35.340 Imagine what that could have done if it were effectively targeted

00:32:38.260 at the people who needed the help the most.

00:32:40.380 Absolutely.

00:32:40.780 Well, Sheila, you know, I'd love to renew my acquaintances with Ms. Pac-Man,

00:32:45.400 but alas, I don't have a mask, so no video game for me.

00:32:49.340 Thank you so much.

00:32:50.420 That was an excellent report, my friend.

00:32:52.780 Thanks, David.

00:32:53.460 Have a great weekend.

00:32:54.300 You too.

00:32:55.140 And that was Sheila Gunn-Reed somewhere in the hinterland of northern Alberta.

00:33:00.460 Keep it here, folks.

00:33:01.220 More of Rebel Roundup to come right after this.

00:33:03.360 Now, funny thing is, when I visited Hamilton to cover a protest at City Hall recently,

00:33:15.040 it was a sad protest indeed.

00:33:17.640 There were fewer than a dozen demonstrators.

00:33:20.220 But unlike Efron, I never encountered any cops or by-law officers.

00:33:26.640 They were AWOL that day, or so I thought. 0.87

00:33:30.400 You see, they were just too cowardly to engage with me.

00:33:35.140 After all, Efron's videos exposed them to be, what's the word? 1.00

00:33:40.100 Ah, pathetic Karens without a cause. 1.00

00:33:42.820 In any event, just the other day, I received an email. 0.96

00:33:47.960 It indicated I was being served with a ticket for a whopping $560.

00:33:54.380 Now, at first, I thought it was a joke.

00:33:56.780 Whoever heard of being served by email?

00:33:59.900 Usually, service is conducted by a peace officer,

00:34:03.200 or at the very least, by a courier.

00:34:05.500 And yet, here was this electronic notice of a violation sitting in my inbox

00:34:12.980 sent by Ranjeni R.J. Reddy, she, her.

00:34:18.480 And it turns out that Ranjeni R.J. Reddy, she, her

00:34:22.640 is indeed a City of Hamilton Municipal Law Enforcement Officer

00:34:27.780 slash Licensing Compliance Officer.

00:34:31.660 Wow, that's a mouthful.

00:34:33.100 I gave Ranjeni R.J. Reddy, she, her

00:34:36.480 a call to find out how to fight this nonsensical ticket.

00:34:41.560 Get this, you can't fight it.

00:34:45.180 Well, at least not in a court of law.

00:34:47.280 Check it out.

00:34:48.080 Yeah, actually, if you could give me clarity there,

00:34:52.060 Ms. Reddy, she, her.

00:34:54.080 Is there a way I can go to court to fight this ticket?

00:34:59.080 Nope, it would go through a screening officer.

00:35:00.620 Like I said, if you read the back of the ticket, your options are going to be there.

00:35:03.300 Okay, sir?

00:35:04.920 So, I can't fight this in a court of law.

00:35:08.220 I mean, like, to me, this is very unusual in that I've even gone to court.

00:35:13.160 There's no court of law.

00:35:14.020 It goes through a screening officer with the City of Hamilton.

00:35:16.500 It's a City of Hamilton ticket.

00:35:17.500 But that's what I'm getting at.

00:35:21.220 Is there not an inherent conflict of interest there?

00:35:23.780 It is a City of Hamilton employee that's given me this ticket,

00:35:28.920 and I've got to go to a City of Hamilton employee to, I don't know,

00:35:33.240 make my case that I'm guilty or to reduce the fine, whatever it is.

00:35:38.660 I mean, for speeding tickets, even parking tickets, I can go to court for that.

00:35:43.180 Why couldn't I go to court for something like this?

00:35:47.160 So, that's the City policy.

00:35:49.060 If you want to discuss that further, you can speak to somebody else,

00:35:53.140 maybe a mayor, maybe a councillor, but that's not something I can help you with, okay?

00:35:56.520 You see, here's the problem, folks.

00:35:58.480 The ticket I received is known as an Administrative Monetary Penalty System ticket.

00:36:05.380 An Administrative Monetary Penalty System is a very fancy phrase to say in layman's terms

00:36:11.880 that you, the citizen, are getting royally screwed by the system.

00:36:17.780 Indeed, you know the old saying, tell it to the judge? 0.97

00:36:20.840 Well, you're shite out of luck doing so when it comes to the Administrative Monetary Penalty System ticket. 0.90

00:36:27.780 There is no judge. 0.97

00:36:29.140 There is no court.

00:36:30.880 Instead, to seek a modicum of justice,

00:36:33.840 I have to go to a Hamilton bylaw officer to get my ticket withdrawn.

00:36:39.280 That's right.

00:36:40.100 I have to go to the same bylaw enforcement department

00:36:43.660 that issued me the ticket in the first place.

00:36:47.220 Well, there you have it, folks.

00:36:48.600 When it comes to an AMPS ticket, as they say in Vegas, the fix is in.

00:36:54.680 What a disgrace that we have a set-up in Canada in which one is presumed guilty

00:37:00.340 and then denied a day in court.

00:37:03.660 Unbelievable.

00:37:05.380 In any event, you had plenty to say about the various she-hers and he-hims and z-zers 1.00

00:37:10.020 who comprise the rank-and-file of the Hamilton bylaw department handing out these tickets.

00:37:15.920 Mucho Taco writes,

00:37:18.000 So now city policy trumps your right to fight it in court,

00:37:22.580 just like store policy trumps mask exemptions.

00:37:26.280 You know, good point, Mucho Taco.

00:37:28.380 How did anyone in the justice system think that this sort of a ticket is indeed justifiable?

00:37:35.760 It's mind-boggling.

00:37:37.200 That's right, Jason.

00:37:48.660 And here is something that's much worse.

00:37:51.760 When we learned of these AMPS tickets, we said this is an outrage

00:37:55.900 and we must file a constitutional challenge.

00:37:59.320 Well, guess what, folks?

00:38:00.360 A constitutional challenge was filed some six years ago

00:38:03.920 and the Supreme Court of Canada upheld the right for municipalities to issue such tickets.

00:38:11.000 But how can any court think it's a good idea to deny citizens their day in court?

00:38:17.040 I just can't believe the Supremes voted in favor of this miscarriage of justice.

00:38:23.080 Lao Tor writes,

00:38:24.320 How were God-like judge, jury, executioner powers given to glorified mall cops?

00:38:31.020 Indeed, oh sure, this system is more efficient

00:38:34.620 in that a city doesn't have to go through all that, you know, justice-y stuff.

00:38:40.160 But is this ethical?

00:38:41.760 Is this moral?

00:38:43.260 Is it even lawful given how our justice system is supposed to operate?

00:38:48.360 Well, the answers are no, no, and no.

00:38:52.200 Jerome D. writes,

00:38:54.820 The circus continues.

00:38:56.240 She, her, the wokeness has spread in the police. 0.97

00:38:59.560 It's like the corona these days.

00:39:02.000 Yeah, Jerome, how did this pronoun nonsense ever become so trendy? 0.98

00:39:06.360 You know, I'm kind of jealous in a way.

00:39:09.320 I want special pronouns too.

00:39:11.760 How about, hmm, he, man, she, her.

00:39:15.400 Those are my new pronouns as of right now, folks.

00:39:18.420 But give me a holler in half an hour because I might be adopting a new pronoun.

00:39:24.460 It's all so fluid, you see.

00:39:27.540 And Rezar writes,

00:39:29.480 If it was sent via email, it's about as good as a Nigerian print scam, IMO. 0.76

00:39:35.820 They don't even have the kajonis to issue you the fine in person. 1.00

00:39:41.180 Well, wait a minute, Rezar, are you telling me that the $1,200 lottery ticket processing fee

00:39:47.960 I just sent to Prince Kunta Kinte in Laos is a scam?

00:39:53.500 Mercy me, what a terrible month this has been.

00:39:57.500 Well, that wraps up another edition of Rebel Roundup.

00:40:00.440 Thanks so much for joining us.

00:40:01.760 See you next week.

00:40:02.500 And hey, folks, never forget, without risk, there can be no glory.

00:40:06.760 Good night.

00:40:07.100 Good night.

Rebel News Podcast - June 26, 2021

DAVID MENZIES ｜ COVID Jail Lawsuit Appeal, Masking Up For Video Gamers

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