Rebel News Podcast - SHEILA GUNN REID ｜ Project Confederation's Josh Andrus gives his predictions for the Alberta election

00:00:00.000 The Alberta general election is right around the corner. The media has their own ideas about what

00:00:04.260 the real election issues are, but I think these people are completely out of touch with reality.

00:00:09.920 I'm Sheila Gunn-Reed and you're watching The Gunn Show.

00:00:12.160 The Gunn Show.

00:00:42.160 One called The Destroyers and one called Stop Notley.

00:00:46.500 One documented the radicals that had just been elected in Alberta back in 2015,

00:00:53.900 and one made the case for making sure that those same radicals were never elected again in 2019.

00:01:00.880 So this is an issue that I know deeply, and that's why I'm concerned.

00:01:08.620 Will Albertans be stricken with collective madness one more time and stick a toe or jump right into the ocean of socialism

00:01:16.440 by sending NDP leader Rachel Notley back to the Premier's office in a repeat of 2015's four long years of darkness?

00:01:24.120 Or will Albertans stay the course and ignore the fear-mongering of the NDP and the screeching of the liberal media

00:01:30.820 and send freedom-minded, pro-business, United Conservative Party leader Danielle Smith back to her chair in the Premier's office? 0.97

00:01:37.800 The NDP and the media are hoping that Albertans are plagued with some sort of province-wide amnesia

00:01:52.980 wherein we don't remember what the reality was when we lived through what felt like nearly every day,

00:02:00.740 opening up the news to read about hundreds of people being laid off at some energy company.

00:02:05.520 All of this thanks to Rachel Notley's ineffectual leadership, her anti-oil policies, 1.00

00:02:11.740 and also her sycophancy with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's anti-energy agenda.

00:02:18.640 Notley called it social license, but it was really just being a doormat.

00:02:23.240 So joining me now is Josh Andrus from Project Confederation to discuss the Alberta election,

00:02:30.000 Alberta's role in Confederation, and his predictions for May 29th.

00:02:37.060 Take a listen.

00:02:45.000 Joining me now from Calgary is Josh Andrus from Project Confederation.

00:02:50.120 Now, Josh is the Executive Director of Project Confederation.

00:02:53.400 We've covered Project Confederation here on Rebel News in the past,

00:02:56.540 but I've never had Josh on my show before,

00:02:59.080 and that's to my great regret.

00:03:00.660 Josh, thanks for taking the time.

00:03:02.260 Why don't you tell us a little bit about who and what Project Confederation is?

00:03:07.280 Yeah, Project Confederation was born out of frustration

00:03:10.020 with the way that Alberta in particular,

00:03:12.780 but Western Canada has been treated within Federation,

00:03:16.340 going back to really before the formation of the provinces,

00:03:21.360 even back to the purchase of Rupert's land by the Dominion of Canada,

00:03:25.020 which is the land that Western Canada now sit.

00:03:27.680 Really, at the end of the day, the West has been treated like a colony

00:03:33.880 where we've been essentially mined for our resource revenue

00:03:38.940 and to pay for large industrial projects and other luxury products in Eastern Canada,

00:03:47.800 lavish social programs in Quebec being a flashpoint right now,

00:03:51.380 given the amount of money we spend on equalization.

00:03:53.300 So what I realized was we needed some kind of an advocacy group to focus just on policy.

00:03:59.500 We're not a political party.

00:04:01.100 We're just a nonprofit think tank that focuses on bringing forward public policy

00:04:06.120 that can help alleviate some of these concerns.

00:04:08.200 We issued a nine-point policy proclamation in 2019,

00:04:14.720 shortly after the federal Liberals were re-elected.

00:04:17.280 They'd outline nine different policy objectives that we felt the provincial government should implement.

00:04:22.100 I'm not going to go through all nine of them just for time purposes,

00:04:24.840 but the big three for me, at least at this point,

00:04:27.400 were abolishing equalization from the Constitution of Canada,

00:04:30.900 unrestricted cross-country free trade for goods, services, and infrastructure such as railways and pipelines,

00:04:37.740 as well as some kind of electoral reform that gives the West a better say on Parliament Hill.

00:04:44.760 Right now, Alberta alone has 34 seats in the House of Commons.

00:04:48.300 Ontario and Quebec have 199,

00:04:50.620 which means that just naturally most policies are going to favor the 199 seats in the House of Commons

00:04:55.520 as opposed to the 34.

00:04:56.480 So that's something that we need to take into account.

00:04:59.240 So those are the policy objectives that we're trying to...

00:05:02.140 The big three right now, we also do have like the firewall initiatives,

00:05:06.020 which essentially was Stephen Harper, as well as five other academics,

00:05:11.940 put together a firewall letter in 2001.

00:05:14.380 We have dusted that off and brought it back.

00:05:17.020 So we're working to make some progress on that.

00:05:19.220 So, you know, as you're talking there, I'm thinking,

00:05:22.560 oh, well, our new premier who is campaigning for re-election,

00:05:25.920 I think she's adopted, at least to a certain extent, some of those policies in theory.

00:05:34.180 In theory, yeah.

00:05:35.320 In theory.

00:05:36.660 And I suppose even in legislation with the Sovereignty Act.

00:05:41.680 But you say you're not a political party, and I think that's great.

00:05:47.040 I think it's important to be working outside of the mechanisms of a political party

00:05:51.040 so you can launch these ideas, float them, see if they're a good idea,

00:05:55.160 and then have political parties adopt them.

00:05:57.100 Is that sort of what you guys are doing?

00:05:58.920 Yeah.

00:05:59.360 The idea is to focus on policy.

00:06:01.720 I find political parties, their objective is to take a snapshot of what they feel is publicly popular

00:06:07.320 at any given point in time and build a platform around that.

00:06:11.160 The objective of a think tank, and the left has been doing this, like, extremely well for the past decades.

00:06:18.200 Broadbent?

00:06:19.860 Broadbent Institute.

00:06:20.880 I mean, if you think of any political issue on the left,

00:06:23.480 you can probably list off five to ten think tanks that have popped up in the last five years to deal with that.

00:06:29.080 Conservative side, we don't really have that level of influence on the ideas side of things.

00:06:34.140 So policy ideas that are generated have a tendency to, we face a tremendous amount of opposition from left-wing think tanks.

00:06:41.540 So the idea with a think tank is to try and change what the public's opinion is on an issue at any given point in time.

00:06:47.680 So a party, like I said, takes a snapshot of what they think they can win on.

00:06:51.880 A think tank's job is to try and change what people think on a particular issue,

00:06:56.260 try and persuade people to support a particular issue.

00:06:59.600 And when it comes to Western alienation, it's a big issue that we don't want to inflame tensions any more than they necessarily need to be.

00:07:09.160 If they get inflamed, we think it should be the federal government that we're pointing the finger at,

00:07:13.020 not at ourselves for being overly aggressive.

00:07:16.480 But it's one of those things where if we take the right approach,

00:07:19.400 I think we can manage to sway enough people on side to our positions that we can get genuine change.

00:07:25.360 I mean, we did, one of our positions was to hold an immediate referendum to abolish equalization from the Constitution of Canada.

00:07:32.720 Alberta did hold that referendum in 2021, and it passed with a 63% success rate.

00:07:39.480 It's one of those things where if we can put the right ideas out there at the right time,

00:07:43.560 we can get public support for them.

00:07:45.360 And it's all about just being intelligent and strategic and academic in your approach.

00:07:50.320 Now, you mentioned, you know, that we are treated as a colony here in the West,

00:07:55.900 and you won't get any argument for me about that.

00:07:58.440 And our resource wealth is being extracted and then sent to places like Quebec, 0.58

00:08:02.340 where they have a balanced budget sometimes.

00:08:04.180 And you're like, how did that happen?

00:08:06.660 I know.

00:08:07.860 But more recently, we're seeing sort of an incompatibility with this,

00:08:13.900 because not only do they want our resource wealth, but then out of the other side of their mouths,

00:08:19.320 they say, but you also cannot develop those resources, as we're seeing with the just transition.

00:08:24.040 And that's really been something that Project Confederation has been banging the drum on,

00:08:28.440 that if Rachel Notley, our NDP leader, is re-elected, I suppose, re-sent back to the Premier's office,

00:08:37.080 there will be absolutely no opposition to the phasing out of our industry, our jobs.

00:08:45.020 And this will all be done at the expense of the rest of Canada, which relies on Alberta's resource wealth.

00:08:54.440 We saw when she was Premier from 2015 to 2019, that in a lot of ways,

00:09:00.400 she did nothing to advance Alberta's cause on the national stage.

00:09:04.320 And in some ways, almost acted as if she was a doormat for federal policy.

00:09:09.600 When the federal government renewed the equalization formula with very little consultation from the provinces,

00:09:15.240 the NDP either didn't notice it or completely ignored it.

00:09:19.460 Not only that, you have policies like the carbon tax,

00:09:24.300 which especially given today's current political and economic environment or affordability concerns,

00:09:30.520 or our front of mind, we could see a provincial government that is actually trying to limit

00:09:37.540 the ability of our energy producers to produce affordable energy at a reasonable cost for consumers

00:09:43.480 and for some of these large scale, the heavier emitters, we could say it,

00:09:49.220 that are producing oil and gas products for the rest of the country.

00:09:53.040 We still have a pipeline bottleneck, which means that we need unrestricted cross-country free trade.

00:09:58.740 So these are the issues that I think need to be on the conversation piece around the water coolers

00:10:07.260 across the province, because we do need to have serious conversations about how energy products

00:10:12.600 and how affordable energy keeps costs low for everybody.

00:10:16.080 And it keeps, it's one of those things that I'm sure you guys have reported on it.

00:10:19.460 Energy poverty is a problem in other parts of the world.

00:10:21.880 I don't think it's so much of a problem in Alberta, but if we continue down this path,

00:10:24.900 I could see people having to choose between heating their homes and feeding their families.

00:10:28.520 And that's not a position I think that we want to be in.

00:10:31.280 Especially when we are so energy wealthy.

00:10:33.900 You know, we have 800 years of coal under our feet, let alone all of our oil and natural gas resources.

00:10:40.120 You know, you just touched on something that was introduced in the House of Commons yesterday.

00:10:44.620 So, you know, we have these pipeline bottlenecks and approval bottlenecks.

00:10:50.600 So I guess bureaucratic prohibitions by inconvenience.

00:10:55.060 But I noticed yesterday it was on the order paper notice in the House of Commons.

00:10:59.720 And, you know, we didn't talk about this before we started recording, but I'll just,

00:11:03.160 I'll take your temperature on it anyway.

00:11:04.540 It's Motion 84 brought forward by the Liberal MP from Whitby, whose name escapes me right now.

00:11:12.560 But it is to bring the Paris Accord targets to the banking system.

00:11:20.420 So what they want to do is say, okay, well, we don't want financial institutions to finance these projects.

00:11:28.280 If these projects will put us over our Paris Agreement targets, which is very chilling.

00:11:37.360 Because I think, you know, what we saw with the Freedom Convoy is you could have wrong thought and then get debanked as a citizen.

00:11:44.480 But now you can have climate crimes, I guess, according to the Liberals,

00:11:48.140 and get debanked and denied financing for these major energy projects.

00:11:53.180 I just, you know, I just want to get your opinion on that.

00:11:55.940 Yeah, that's an easy one to answer.

00:11:58.440 I've seen this, these types of legislative or motions or whatever form of political theater, you want to call it,

00:12:07.140 trying to force banks to dictate or trying to dictate to banks how they can lend their money.

00:12:14.420 We've seen pushback from that in the United States with a lot of these large scale bankers such as Jamie Dimon.

00:12:21.160 He's one, I think he's JP Mergen Chase CEO, one of the biggest on Wall Street, they've been pushing back.

00:12:28.220 So even if the government does move forward with this motion, I don't necessarily think that the banks will get in line.

00:12:34.200 They did in terms of the Emergencies Act.

00:12:36.660 But it's one of those things where from an economic standpoint, if you essentially are dictating to banks what kind of energy products they can invest in,

00:12:47.460 and the energy products they're investing in are more expensive than the existing infrastructure that we have, it's going to drive costs up.

00:12:53.220 And that's not something that's going to be popular amongst the public if they see their heating and their energy costs and their electricity bills skyrocketing.

00:13:01.880 And it's something that I think is already leading to some bleeding from more of the staunch green left individuals.

00:13:09.020 I don't think that their policies are as popular as they think they are.

00:13:12.100 So if they do, if they do bring this legislation, and I anticipate that we'll be pushed back from bank CEOs about, you know, these are just basic micro and macro economic concepts.

00:13:25.260 We're talking about bankers have a tendency to understand these better than politicians, I would say, in most cases.

00:13:31.540 So I do think there will be pushback on it.

00:13:34.540 I don't see it being successful in the long run.

00:13:36.460 Yeah, I hope I hope you're right from your lips to God's ears.

00:13:40.000 I mean, this sounds like it was written directly from by Mark Carney, which is sort of his role at the United Nations right now is implementing these ESG ideas hatched in a inside of the United Nations into the financial sector.

00:13:53.620 And then you see this motion brought forward motion 84.

00:13:57.880 It's, it's going to be debated, hopefully it dies a quick death.

00:14:02.320 Um, just changing, um, changing lanes here to the Alberta election.

00:14:08.640 We're recording this on the 9th.

00:14:10.640 We'll publish this on the 10th, but we head to the polls here in Alberta on May 29th.

00:14:17.620 And, um, I'm sure you've noticed there's just an absolute full frontal attack on, um, our premier Daniel Smith.

00:14:28.000 Now, I don't have a horse really in the race.

00:14:31.180 I don't belong to any political party.

00:14:32.960 I don't work for a politician.

00:14:34.240 I don't want to be a mouthpiece for a politician, but I care about jobs and I care about the impact of, uh, you know, the government on normal people, farmers, rakehands, all those things.

00:14:44.180 And I just think Rachel Notley would absolutely destroy any sort of economic recovery that we're undergoing here in Alberta.

00:14:52.280 Uh, what, what do you think really are the main issues in this election?

00:14:57.700 Because if you paid attention to the mainstream media or to the NDP, uh, it would be things Daniel Smith said in a podcast.

00:15:05.840 But I don't think the, uh, general public actually cares about those things.

00:15:10.480 I actually, and I'm going to put my prognosticator hat on.

00:15:14.680 So I hope I'm right.

00:15:15.880 Um, I think what you're seeing is the NDP.

00:15:21.040 They, because of like, and this is, this is an interesting, uh, observation that I've made over the last couple of weeks here.

00:15:27.400 The poll numbers haven't really changed too much from the day that the rip dropped to today.

00:15:31.300 Now it is only eight days into the campaign, but the NDP has been bringing in a, it's a full frontal, you're right.

00:15:37.240 It's a full frontal assault on the credibility of Daniel Smith's decision-making.

00:15:41.700 I don't think it's sticking.

00:15:42.840 I don't think it's working because I think most people in this province, at least the ones that were here four to eight years ago, they remember Notley's record.

00:15:50.620 And the media may try and change the channel and, uh, Twitter will just exsoriate, um, Danielle for what she said. 1.00

00:15:59.660 But I don't think Twitter is an accurate representation of what is going on in the mainstream of public thought.

00:16:06.700 I actually think in a lot of ways that the media itself, the mainstream media has lost, um, public trust.

00:16:12.760 Um, and I think that it's going to be one of those things where they are going to try and change the channel.

00:16:17.260 Whether voters go for it or not is another question.

00:16:19.680 I don't think they are right now.

00:16:20.940 The polls seem to be holding steady with the UCP projected to win in between 50 and 53 seats.

00:16:27.080 That's where they've been at since October.

00:16:29.660 Nothing's really changed.

00:16:30.880 So whether these attacks are working or not, I don't think they are.

00:16:34.460 I think that the issues that people want to hear about are affordability.

00:16:37.720 I think they want to hear about, um, crime is another one.

00:16:41.780 I know the, the federal, uh, catch and release policies are very much, I mean, downtown Calgary.

00:16:46.880 Uh, I was, uh, downtown working at the office the other day and I pulled in and there was someone overdosed in the alley.

00:16:52.580 And then three hours later, there was a, you know, some, some, uh, homeless people fighting in the same alley.

00:16:59.440 Um, so it's, it's becoming an issue that I think most people want to see changes for.

00:17:05.520 People don't say, feel safe riding public transit.

00:17:08.160 They don't feel safe walking by themselves in, in, in the downtown core, even some more commercial areas of, of the rest of the city.

00:17:16.800 And it's a public safety thing.

00:17:18.260 And the third, and I, I think that this ties in is in this province, especially energy policy is central to our economy.

00:17:26.340 I mean, everything runs on energy and, and in Alberta, that's especially so.

00:17:30.400 So it's one of those things where I think the NDP, because of their alliance with the federal government in 2015 to 2019, I think most people are remembering that.

00:17:40.600 I think the people are, don't want to see further attacks to the energy industry, whether they be from, uh, we'll call it foreign, uh, attacks from the federal government or domestic attacks from our own provincial government, carbon taxes, stronger environmental regulations that are necessary, things like that.

00:17:58.660 I think, um, those are, those are the issues people care about.

00:18:01.880 And I think because the NDP is not really speaking on them or, and the UCP is, I think that's why we're seeing the polls relatively stable, um, given the attacks, like some of them are, like, I don't, I don't know if they're even accurate attacks, but the attacks that the NDP have been leveling on Danielle.

00:18:20.420 Yeah, I, uh, I just saw some reporting from the Western standard who've done some great work on this, um, that it's on a main street research poll that shows that the undecideds in Alberta are very recently breaking in favor of Danielle Smith.

00:18:39.140 So these, um, um, attacks on social media and Twitter is definitely not real life.

00:18:44.940 Like the, the farmers down at the A and W in the morning, they're not on Twitter.

00:18:50.340 They don't care.

00:18:51.200 They care about the price of fertilizer and carbon tax is not helping with that.

00:18:56.040 Um, it shows that the undecideds who, um, I think we're probably conservative, but also Jason Kenney skeptics, um, who were waiting to sort of plant their vote with Danielle Smith.

00:19:09.060 Or maybe just sit on it.

00:19:10.180 Um, uh, they're breaking towards the UCP in, in like very recently.

00:19:15.320 So, um, I think the NDP's campaign of desperation and nothing else, um, is falling flat on its face.

00:19:24.040 Yeah.

00:19:24.540 I think it's, you're going to see, you're going to see more of their desperation.

00:19:28.160 You're going to see more of the attacks.

00:19:29.300 I'm sure they've got more controversial things that Danielle has clipped, uh, at certain points in her career. 1.00

00:19:35.860 I don't know if those are really going to impact the bottom line anymore.

00:19:39.440 They should, if they were, they should have been, and the polls haven't really moved.

00:19:45.140 So at this point in time, I think that it, we are, I don't want to say hopefully, cause that's not fair to any of the other parties.

00:19:53.400 But I think that just in terms of the direction that the election is going, that it should be UCP majority territory, um, which given that this is really the NDP's last cry.

00:20:07.060 Um, it'll be interesting to see what happens post-election.

00:20:10.560 Then again, I am thinking way too far in advance.

00:20:12.960 There's a lot that could happen between now and then, um, maybe some with the wildfires go sideways.

00:20:19.800 I don't know.

00:20:20.800 I mean, it's impossible to predict those types of events, but if everything remains equal, um, and the wildfires are put out with no, no real loss of life or, or, or property damage.

00:20:31.620 I, I do think that the UCP is in good shape to hold onto power.

00:20:35.500 I do too.

00:20:36.340 I think Calgary is going to save us all from ourselves here in Alberta.

00:20:40.360 South Calgary at least, yeah.

00:20:42.520 Calgary's going to save us.

00:20:43.620 I mean, rural Alberta, it's always going to go UCP.

00:20:46.060 Edmonton is a write-off.

00:20:47.320 We should just build a wall around Edmonton and just leave it.

00:20:50.180 The UCP, Daniel Smith, has rightfully suspended her campaign so that she can focus her attention on the state of emergency here in Alberta.

00:21:00.360 But, uh, but the NDP, they're going hard.

00:21:04.520 They are taking every opportunity, um, to attack the premier, hold campaign events.

00:21:09.940 As we're recording this, I think this is day two in Lethbridge.

00:21:13.240 I think they were in Medicine Hat, Lethbridge yesterday.

00:21:15.260 Again, Lethbridge today.

00:21:17.380 Um, they don't even have the decency to say, okay, you've suspended your campaign.

00:21:23.400 We're going to do the same because the province is in a state of emergency.

00:21:26.840 Lethbridge, let's rethink this in three days, 48 hours, whatever.

00:21:30.780 They're not even doing that.

00:21:32.060 Do you think that's going to impact people's perception of them?

00:21:35.500 It, I mean, I couldn't think any less of them, but there are people out there who probably have, like, a middle-of-the-road opinion of the NDP.

00:21:42.020 Is this going to affect how they feel?

00:21:43.520 It really depends on what's said and the tone of the campaign.

00:21:48.800 And I know that they've been negative, but it's one of those, it's, it's going to be very interesting because I do think that they've got, I mean, the UCP has some challenging candidates that have said some controversial things.

00:21:59.800 But I think the NDP is in a position where the more they talk during a wildfire, the more likely it is that someone says something akin to an Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez quote.

00:22:11.580 So, I think it's a risky move on the NDP part.

00:22:15.600 I think that if the NDP continues to campaign like this, eventually someone is going to say something that, at least from their vantage point, is damaging into the electoral chances of the NDP.

00:22:31.460 I mean, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a lot of things, but she's unelectable in the province of Alberta. 1.00

00:22:36.520 And I think there's a lot of NDP candidates that are adherents to her philosophical inclinations.

00:22:41.600 I'll leave it at that.

00:22:42.860 Yeah, I can't wait for them to try to, the climate change did this, while Parkland County is like, actually, it's arson, it's arson.

00:22:51.000 Yeah, you know what I mean?

00:22:53.180 So, yeah, I think it's, I think it's a, it's a tough, it is a very tough position for the NDP to be in.

00:22:58.400 And I understand why they're, they're campaigning.

00:23:00.980 They are behind.

00:23:01.980 I mean, you have to, but I think it's a risky move.

00:23:05.800 It's one of those things where, yeah, if you're out there campaigning and someone says something controversial about the wildfires, especially if someone's farm is burning at the same time, it's going to impact their electability, their chance of electability.

00:23:19.100 In a place like Lethbridge, where Lethbridge East, like the south side of Lethbridge, at least, is pretty conservative leaning.

00:23:25.400 That is, it's a potential swing riding.

00:23:27.480 I know that there is a reason they're down there.

00:23:29.780 But if it, if, if Shannon Phillips says something controversial, it could turn people off in south Lethbridge or even north Lethbridge that maybe don't think we're going to die in seven years from climate change like AOC.

00:23:40.320 Although she didn't clarify her remarks, but she did say that one.

00:23:43.980 Yeah.

00:23:44.140 Is it seven years?

00:23:44.940 Because the clock's been ticking for a while.

00:23:46.940 It might be closer to three.

00:23:48.840 We might be, we might already be dead.

00:23:50.740 I don't know.

00:23:51.760 You're dead?

00:23:51.820 I died already. 1.00

00:23:53.320 Maybe.

00:23:54.100 Yeah.

00:23:54.200 Dang, I missed it.

00:23:55.940 Yeah.

00:23:57.120 Josh, I want to thank you so much for being generous with your time now.

00:24:00.380 Is there a way that people can support Project Confederation, see your work?

00:24:04.400 What's the best way for people to know what you're up to and get involved?

00:24:08.820 Yeah.

00:24:09.100 So just check us out.

00:24:10.240 It's www.projectconfederation.ca.

00:24:13.500 There's some big buttons at the top right-hand corner of our website to join.

00:24:18.000 You can join our mailing list.

00:24:19.220 We send out regular updates, sometimes twice a week, especially during an election campaign.

00:24:24.220 Just kind of getting our message out there.

00:24:26.060 We're focusing on affordability right now.

00:24:28.020 We're focusing on energy policy.

00:24:31.320 And these are the two things that we think that are going to drive, you know, drive people

00:24:37.820 to the polls.

00:24:39.040 And so we are, we're coming at it from a Western Canadian perspective and talking about

00:24:45.000 the benefits of energy.

00:24:46.020 And honestly, it's just, it's a good, it's a good read.

00:24:49.360 Check it out.

00:24:49.880 You can donate as well if you, if you like what we're doing.

00:24:53.260 But really at this point in time, I just want to, I want as many people getting our

00:24:56.960 talking points as we can get them.

00:24:58.620 We think it's good information that helps you communicate to people around you what some

00:25:05.000 of the issues are and what our take is on it.

00:25:07.560 Yeah.

00:25:07.740 I think your website is full of great arguments that normal people can take out into the world

00:25:12.420 to help articulate their viewpoint to their CBC consuming friends and neighbors.

00:25:18.800 Yeah.

00:25:20.160 Yeah.

00:25:21.740 Put that on the website, Josh.

00:25:23.940 Absolutely.

00:25:24.700 Actually, there is a room for quotes, so I might.

00:25:28.900 Well, Josh, thanks so much for coming on the show.

00:25:30.980 And we'll have you back on again very, very soon.

00:25:32.620 I promise.

00:25:33.140 Yeah, this was good.

00:25:34.200 I think I want to come back for sure.

00:25:36.280 I enjoyed this.

00:25:37.360 Thank you.

00:25:37.680 Yeah, cool.

00:25:46.080 Well, we've come to the letters portion of the show where I happily take your viewer

00:25:51.740 feedback or your constructive criticism.

00:25:53.860 It's the reason I give out my email address right now.

00:25:55.980 It's Sheila at rebelnews.com.

00:25:57.620 If you want to drop me a line about the show, put gun show letters in the subject line, or

00:26:03.040 don't hesitate to leave a comment on one of the platforms upon which you're watching us,

00:26:08.260 like Rumble or even the censorship platform of YouTube.

00:26:12.240 I think accepting viewer feedback and constructive criticism is so important because without you,

00:26:20.400 there really is no rebel news, is there?

00:26:22.920 We rely on your support and what you think about what we're doing and what you think about

00:26:28.620 the topics we're covering because we'll never take a penny from Justin Trudeau.

00:26:34.500 So we have to talk about the things that you care about.

00:26:37.240 Now, today's letter comes on last week's show where I interviewed Rick Igersich of the National

00:26:45.920 Firearms Association about Justin Trudeau's attempts to buy back property that was never

00:26:52.640 his in the first place to compensate firearms owners for the confiscation of their lawfully

00:26:59.280 acquired property that was never used in the commission of a crime.

00:27:03.800 And it's all based on Justin Trudeau's initial order in council, which is completely undemocratic

00:27:09.760 to ban 1,500 models of firearms, which has now ballooned to 2,000 and includes many

00:27:17.320 Canadian hunting rifles.

00:27:20.040 So the Spen writes to me, and this comes to me via Rumble, actually.

00:27:27.080 And he says, or she says, I'm not sure.

00:27:29.520 It doesn't matter.

00:27:30.660 Even with all this NFA coverage Rebel has been doing recently.

00:27:34.160 Now, I don't say it's disproportionately NFA.

00:27:37.180 We talk to the CSSA all the time.

00:27:41.860 And we also talk to the Canadian Coalition for Firearms Rights, too.

00:27:47.180 So we talk to everybody in the firearms rights universe because it's an issue we all need

00:27:54.220 to be working together on.

00:27:57.440 Anyway, the Spen writes, even with all this NFA coverage Rebel has been doing recently,

00:28:01.620 I still don't understand what exactly it is they do to help the firearms community.

00:28:06.800 We hear lots of talk about their advocacy.

00:28:08.720 Yet there's nothing visible outside of the gun communities themselves.

00:28:14.060 All of their work, in quotation, seems to amount to just screaming into an echo chamber

00:28:18.340 to gather memberships and donations while doing nothing forward-facing of value.

00:28:22.100 Well, I'm not sure then, the Spen, that you watched the interview at all.

00:28:26.660 Because Rick was updating us on a court challenge that the NFA is a part of in federal court.

00:28:35.760 They're challenging the Order in Council, which the Liberals used to ban 1,500 and now 2,000

00:28:43.160 models of Canadian firearms.

00:28:45.340 They're doing the tough work to fight this stuff in court.

00:28:49.720 So you have to do the advocacy because you have to raise the fundraising dollars so that

00:28:55.360 you can then go into court with five other allies because the NFA is one of six involved

00:29:01.360 in this case.

00:29:02.160 But you have to raise the money through awareness of the issue to be able to pay some lawyers

00:29:08.380 to take on the government who has more money than you can ever imagine, all of our money

00:29:15.200 to fight us with.

00:29:17.180 And just deep pockets to hire the best lawyers in the country to fight the National Firearms

00:29:22.420 Association, the Canadian Coalition for Firearms Rights, and four other groups.

00:29:27.420 So that's why they do advocacy, because they need to tell you about the issue so you can

00:29:33.300 care enough to get involved, and then they take it to court, which is exactly what's happening

00:29:37.240 here.

00:29:37.500 So I hope that answers your question.

00:29:38.900 They are doing more than just raising awareness, as the left would say.

00:29:42.900 They're taking the government to court, which is something we do at Rebel News here a fair

00:29:47.700 bit.

00:29:48.940 So hopefully that answers your question.

00:29:51.340 Well, everybody, that's the show for tonight.

00:29:53.100 Thank you so much for tuning in.

00:29:54.740 I'll see everybody back here in the same time, in the same place next week.

00:29:57.620 And of course, remember, don't let the government tell you that you've had too much to think.

00:30:24.740 Thank you.

00:30:27.620 Thank you.

00:30:28.680 Thank you.

00:30:30.340 Thank you.

00:30:31.180 Thank you.

Rebel News Podcast - May 10, 2023

SHEILA GUNN REID ｜ Project Confederation's Josh Andrus gives his predictions for the Alberta election

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